here is a quote from moiraine's letter to rand:

"we have made the world dance as we sang for three thousand years,

that is a difficult habit to break,as i learned while dancing to your song.

you must dance free."

probably the best piece of advice rand received from an aes sedai.

@azrayne,

"call it even at nynaeve?"

leave nynaeve out of this,lol,don't worry about rand,he can take care of himself,

just ask the forsaken...

ah,the what if question,

of all the mistakes(storywise) robert jordan made in books 1-11,the three that were the

most significant(in my opinion) are surprisingly in books 3,5 and 6.

so if i had the opportunity to rectify only one of robert jordan's mistakes,i would have 

changed the outcome of the cairhienin docks incident,i.e. rand-lanfear-moiraine showdown,

removing lanfear and moiraine from the story at the same time was a monumental mistake.

@mr ares,

the two tams confusion was caused by tam being with rand in tom not in tgs and then reappearing

with perrin in tom(perrin part in the gathering stom is negligible,3 chapters only and tam is

mentioned only in 1 of them).

the perrin scenes in tom are set before the rand scenes in tom,and yet,tom chapter 1(apples first)

is about rand post his dragonmount epiphany and only in chapter 30 perrin witness rand struggles

on top of dragonmount.

@ewin,

i thought it was the other way around,in my opinion,brandon sanderson portrayed

perrin even better than robert jordan.

one of the main differences between robert jordan's mat and brandon sanderson's mat

is their different sense of humor.

robert jordan sense of humor(regarding mat) is mature and subtle,while brandon sanderson

sense of humor is infantile and crass,one transformed mat into a daredevil,the other into a clown.

just re-read the confrontation between rand and tuon,on one side we have the leader of forces of

light,on the other side the seanchan empress,both of them ready for a showdown,it could and shound

have been an epic clash,but no,we of course have mat,(literally)standing between these two and behaving like

a bad stand-up comedian,i am sorry to say this but his words and demeanor utterly ruined the scene.

@wotfan4472,

i completely agree.

the pattern first priority was to protect rand at all costs,

it never intended to give a group of  hostiles  even a few hours advantage and the opportunity

to  wait on the slopes of dragonmount for a pregnant woman to appear.

the moment gitara moroso finished  her foretelling it was  already  too late,tam was in the vicinity.

@mb,

gitara moroso had her foretelling about the dragon being reborn on danu 2,

that's 25 of november in our calendar,so we have more than a time frame

for rand's birth,we have his exact date of birth.

@sabio,

in the beginning of our story rand is neither 18 nor 20,

according to steve cooper timeline:

rand was born on 25 of november 978 ne(new spring),

first scene with rand and his father walking towards emond's field

did occur on 23 march 998ne(eye of the world),so rand is 19 and 4 months old.

@phoenix,

your way of pronouncing seanchan as sane-chan is...interesting,

in my opinion,the seanchan are anything but sane.lol.

by the way,its siuan not suian.

@mkelly157,

nynaeve-nin a veeve,well,that's a new one on me!

poor nighneev,got more name variations than rand got titles.lol.

2 years and 6-7 months

@sabio,

+1,on a scale from 1-10, i gave lanfear 11.

when lanfear changed her appearance from selene to her true self in front of rand,

he thought,"she was--older than he,certainly,but older was not the right word.

more mature.riper.even more beautiful,if that was even possible.a lush blossom in

full flower compared to a bud.even knowing what she was,she made his mouth go

dry,his throat tighten".

and this guy was surrounded by three of the hottest girls in randland.

lanfear for the win.

how do you pronounce morgase?,moor-gaze?

@dawnflower,

i used to pronouce nynaeve's name nina-eve lol,

it's nigh-neev by the way.

i like the way you pronounce semirhage's name.

there's something about the nakomi-tigraine connection that bother me,

can anyone tell me how old was tigraine when she died?

to the best of my understanding,the meeting between aviendha and nakomi did occur

in tel'aran'rhiod so nakomi's appearance means absolutely nothing(she could have easily

changed her appearance),but when rand returned from the pit of doom he saw an old woman:

"an old woman with grey hair?"

rand did see her in the real world,in the "flesh",so why mask her identity from her son?was it

even possible for her to change her appearance in the real world?

after all,tigraine couldn't have been more than 30 years old when she died.

@suttree,

nakomi is tigraine?and she is a hero of the horn?

so when rand came back from the pit of doom his mother was there

to say goodbye?(as i recall,the heroes of the horn were in shayol ghul).

@nevertame,

" i don't think aviendha would have told nynaeve at that point."

i agree.nor at any point for that matter,rand meant everything to aviendha,

she and min and to a lesser extent elayne undertood rand's desire to get away

from the whole dragon reborn thing.

during "rand"'s funeral the three girls reached some sort of an agreement:

"elayne.so now what?"

"now...aviendha said.now we make sure that everyone well and truly believes he is gone."

"min nodded..."

@durinax,

why would aiel forces stop and detain an unknown soldier returning home from

the fighting in shayol ghul?

@damandred,

yes she did.but aviendha's response was very odd:"let us prepare his pyre",at that point,

aviendha could barely walk,she needed the help of two maidens just to stand near min

and elayne during the funeral.

curiously enough,just after aviendha's odd response,we do have birgitte's point of view

from outside the tent:"nearby,soldiers prepared rand al'thor pyre" without mentioning

nynaeve or aviendha.

so did aviendha tell nynaeve that rand is alive? your guess is as good as mine.

in my opinion,it was a combination of factors.

rand's tremendous effort to drag moridin out of the pit probably wasn't enough

to give him(moridin) carte blanche in their camp,but it was enough to give him

some sort of approval,especially to nynaeve who clearly was in charge of the

healing and really really trusted rand.

the rest of it was probably an oversight,the forces of light just won a huge victory,

they were exhausted,happy and drunk( some of them),so when the the time came

to start the dragon reborn funeral rites,everyone went to pay their last respects,

including the guards(according to perrin,rand's healing tent was cordoned off by

soldiers),fortunately or maybe being a ta'veren,rand did wake up during "his"

funeral,and was able to slip away almost undetected. 

@mik,

you do have sixteen books on your list,

what does bwb stand for?

@jedman67,

i'm so happy that you called aviendha,min and elayne his wives,

because they are in all but name.