My biggest dislike of the series is that I'm never really scared for any of the characters.

I love how detailed the world is, and how Jordan thought so much through decades ago, but the story is WAY too Black and White.

It's like a 1950s Western movie, the guys in the White hats vs the guys in the Black hats, and you know the good guys will be just fine when it's over.

We all knew Moraine wasn't dead.

We never fear for any of the main characters.

I read the books because I have for a long time, it was my first Fantasy series that I stuck with (Dragonlance before that, but I didn't finish the 2nd or 3rd book).

If I picked the first one up today, and hadn't read them, I doubt I'd finish them.

The biggest problem I have with Sanderson's writing is the fact that he always has the characters explain everything in their heads.

Jordan was much better at giving the readers some credit for figuring out why a character did something they did.

All the Sanderson books I've read so far are the same. The characters always spell everything out clearly; he never leaves the reader in the dark on anything.

It really bothers me during his combat scenes where a character has a long inner dialog going on while fighting, it seems very unnatural.

THIS TIMES 100000000000000000000000! This is truly the only thing that I just do not like at all about the past 2 books, way too many instances where this happens. It's really annoying because a lot of the time what they are explaining is pretty obvious so it's just a wasted few lines.

I first noticed it when I was reading the Mistborn series, and had just finished reading all the Song of Ice and Fire books – It was a huge departure from Martin, so it bugged me right off the bat.

When I read Gathering Storm I was really annoyed that Brandon did the same thing throughout the book, because Jordan never did that either.

However, when I read the prologue to Gathering Storm I was immediately reminded that Jordan's series was just better then Sanderson's Mistborn, even though Sanderson was writing it, so I do think he's done a good job.

I remember clearly when i read the prologue that I felt like I was putting on a pair of well worn in shoes that had been lost in a closet somewhere.

They still felt like I remembered; but every now and then a pebble would dig in, to remind me they weren't exactly the same as I remembered.

The over explanation he does, and the lack of humor, are really my only criticisms with any of his work.

If I ever reread these latest two books I'll probably highlight one of the unnecessary lines and post it, so people understand what I'm talking about.

I agree with most, Mat isn't the same in Gathering Storm or ToM; however, by the time I read ToM, it didn't bother me nearly as much as it had before.

However, I remember reading the Gathering Storm and I actually preferred Sanderson's Aviendha.

She seems more like the old Aviendha, a little more "savage." I actually didn't like her character much because she seems the same as any other wetlander.

Which make the Aeil nothing special.

I think Sanderson did a pretty good job of making her a little more Aeil and a little less Randlander; Jordan started writing her the same way as all the other women in the series.

The biggest problem I have with Sanderson's writing is the fact that he always has the characters explain everything in their heads.

Jordan was much better at giving the readers some credit for figuring out why a character did something they did.

All the Sanderson books I've read so far are the same. The characters always spell everything out clearly; he never leaves the reader in the dark on anything.

It really bothers me during his combat scenes where a character has a long inner dialog going on while fighting, it seems very unnatural.

Sanderson isn't as good at writing funny characters, and being forced to write a character you didn't create is probably pretty hard to do.

I'm currently reading "Way of Kings" and Sanderson goes out of his way to make some characters funny - Wit for example, but it just comes off as really forced, and not funny at all.

I'm guessing Sanderson wasn't a class-clown type and just isn't really that funny; and there's nothing wrong with that.

The Mistborn series was the same way, none of the characters were funny.

I think Sanderson is more clever then he is funny, when it comes to his writing style. I think he's got a creative imagination, and is a good writer, but he's not witty.

With Sanderson Everything is a Tempest.

The sky was a tempest.

His emotions were a tempest.

She could feel a tempest of power surging within her.

When lanfear reveals herself to Rand in the stone she say there were only two terangreal stronger then callandor a man could use. One of them is the male Choedan Kal. Any idea about the other?

I believe she also said that she only knew of 1 that was still around. - The Chodan Kal.

So we don't know if the other one is still around, or if it's been lost to this Age.

We do not yet know if the other one will show up. A lot of people believe it's the Ring of Tamyrlin that the leader of Aes Sedai wore in the Age of Legends.

We don't know if that ring is any type of angreal for sure, and don't know if it's restricted to men or women or can be used by both.

My guess is it can be used by both and that it is the other Sa'angreal that Lanfear is talking about. We know that Men or Women could have been the leader during the Age of Legends, why else wear some ring if it's not a source of power?

It's possible that Moridin, or Demandred will show up with it. Which will be interesting, because it would definitely put them over the top of Rand in power even with Callandor.

I believe Lews wore it when he sat the High Seat, so Rand should know more about it now, and might even know what happened to it.

What ever happened to Mat's Bow Stave?

I think it was Mat that came across a nice Two Rivers hunk of wood that he was going to turn into a Stave.

I assumed it would find it's way into Birgette's hands.

What ever happened to that, I dont' remember at all, and thought about it on my drive into work for some reason.

How can the gholam be destroyed?

The SteelyPips website had a lot of options:

http://www.steelypips.org/wotfaq/1_dark/1.6_beasties/1.6.2_gholam.html

unfortunately that site hasn't been updated in a long time.

I assume it merged into one of these other Wheel of Time sites.

edit: looks like it was taken over by dragonmount.

I wish they would have kept all the great theories from SteelyPips.

@ DocBean - are you looking for Demandred, you sly little divil?! ;-)

why yes I am.

Found him!

Is there anyway to find a list of characters in each book?

I'm trying to find a list of new characters in The Gathering Storm, characters we didn't see in earlier books.

is there an easy way to do that?

I always pictured that scene hinting that Rand could sense Women Channelers.

He said she was the most dangerous of them all, so in my mind that meant she was a channeler, and he knew it.

I assumed they were all darkfriends, but never made the gray man connection.

In past lives has the Dragon ever gone over to the Shadow? We have a few quotes supporting this but in a recent thread it was mentioned RJ went back on the earlier interviews and the Dragon never went over. If true would love to see that quote and some clarification. Thanks.

This comes up a lot.

RJ said yes, that soul has gone over before and the result was a draw.

However, the "Dragon" was a political name for Lews Therin.

Which is why Rand is "The Dragon Reborn"

Since neither Lews, nor Rand has ever gone over to the Shadow, technically the "Dragon" never has.

nah i totally swear he mentioned a name to Lan and Lan said it was some king from during the Trolloc wars or something

Mat's memories are not from his past lives.

I hope I'm not spoiling anything here, but it's clearly explained in later books.

So if he ever mentioned a name from one of his memories, he wasn't asking about his soul.

I don't remember the scene you're talking about though.

someone that is bale-fired will not be reborn

I found the quote, and it answered my question:

BWS: (Sorry I cannot put out his precise words, but here is the gist) – Jordan started by having balefire do this, but he later debunked this theory by saying someone killed by balefire can be reborn at some point. We currently know of nothing/no method that will completely remove someone from the Pattern.

I'm glad to see others were confused by this too.

I'm confused on Balefire and the dream world.

I seem to recall that balefire burns out your thread and you're done. Truly finished forever.

However, I think I remember Brandon said that balefire keeps the Dark One from being able to resurrect you, but your soul will be reborn eventually.

So is balefire really not the end of all things for a person?

If Rand were Balefired, would he be spun back out when the world needed him?

Would he be able to channel like he does in every life, or would he be done forever, and a new Dragon would replace him?

The wolves say if they are killed in the wolf Dream, then they are killed forever.

Is that how it works with humans too? Is dying in T'A'R more finite then balefire?

Could the wolves be wrong?

If a Forsaken has an evil soul, will that soul still be evil and likely to join the darkside if they are balefired and reborn?

Do souls ever change forms? Like can a wolf that died naturally be reborn as a human in its next life, or a darkfriend come back as a toad?

If you did it to yourself, then you would be the only person in the history of the world that could channel.

it's a story, don't go around thinking you're going to learn how to channel. Even RJ said he hated when fans asked him if it's real.

 

Seriously? I obviously didn't mean me personally. I don't think I can use the OP or the Force or fairy dust. Thanks troll.

Then again, I wouldn't be shocked if Rand does it to himself for the greater good when this thing is all over.

Which would be pretty similar to what Lews did.

If Rand BFed himself it'd most likely be as if he didn't even do it. BF erases what the person has done, so he'd be undoing his own history by a few seconds and un-BFing himself.

Don't ask a question and then ignore the answer completely.

You asked what would happen if YOU did it to YOURSELF.

I jokingly implied that you might be one of the crazy fans that thinks they can channel.

Of course after rereading what I wrote I understand why you took offense. my apologies.

Here is another example of a need for a widely accepted internet sarcasm font.

You later said that you did not mean doing it to yourself, while at the same time said it would be impossible for a character to do it.

So now I'm a little confused by your first post. I'm guessing if anyone is the Troll it's you.

In trying to answer I said it's probably impossible for any character to do it.

However, I'm sure there could be a clever way around it, and nothing happening in this series would shock me.

Including Rand doing it to himself. I would be surprised if it happened, and would expect some sort of explanation, but I wouldn't be shocked.

I think I know the answer, but I don't remember seeing it asked so... What would happen if I balefired myself?

If you did it to yourself, then you would be the only person in the history of the world that could channel.

it's a story, don't go around thinking you're going to learn how to channel. Even RJ said he hated when fans asked him if it's real.

However, I'm guessing it's impossible for a character in the books to kill themselves with balefire.

It might destroy the pattern completely, or at least put a nice burn mark in it.

The wheel might freeze up like a computer; it might try to keep rewinding and replaying over and over again.

Then again, I wouldn't be shocked if Rand does it to himself for the greater good when this thing is all over.

Which would be pretty similar to what Lews did.

There are several cultures (in terms of population far larger than North America-Europe) where it's unusual for members of the same clan / family to have the same name. India, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Central Asia, Indonesia, some of the Chinese. We find the whole concept of "Bill Jnr", "John III" weird as well.

 

So you're saying in those cultures every single person in each of those countries has names no one else has?

I'm not saying relatives should have the same name, I'm saying that if Rand is such a common name, why haven't we met any other characters with the same name?

Why with over 2000 characters is there only 1 instance of two people having the same name?

so were the two Herid's the first people in the story that share a name?

I can't stand how no one in Randland share a name. This especially drives me crazy when Rand thinks about how his name is too plain for him to be a king.

That and a giant Tower (seen as an engineering marvel), which was created by Ogier who were too short-sighted to realize the need for an elevator system.

Those two things drive me crazy.

Does the White Tower have an Elevator system?

Let's face it, how many of those old women could walk up and down that many flights of stairs?

How many levels is the thing supposed to be? Counting the Lower Levels, and Dungeons, and everything.

Now that they've rediscovered Traveling, wouldn't you think the first thing they'd do is set up a safe area for using it to move throughout the tower?

Lenn, who flew to the moon in an eagle made of fire - Neil Armstrong

 

I would hypothesize that Lenn is John Glenn.  Just sayin'.   ;D

haha, you're right.

I knew it wasn't Neil Armstrong when I wrote that; and that the name Lenn was more in line with someone from real life.

I just couldn't figure out who the Lenn was supposed to sound like. I thought maybe it was Neil backwards, but you're right John Glenn.

We are from the 1st Age, the Age before the Age of Legends.

We've seen lots of samples of stuff from our world.

Lenn, who flew to the moon in an eagle made of fire - Neil Armstrong,

and the discovery of an object which appears to be remarkably like a Mercedes Benz logo, made of silvered plastic and radiating an aura of greed.

there have been some other things too, I can't remember them all.

At some point for the Wheel to circle all the way around again, the ability to channel will need to be removed from mankind.

On a scale from 1 - 10.

Berelain - 10 - how many times have we heard she's the most beautiful woman in Randland? If I were Perin I would have caved long ago.

Grendal - 10 - hotter for the things she would do to you

Lanfear - 9.5 - I picture her as a young hot Catherine Zeta Jones, nice and curvy

Avienda - 9.5 - Kissed by fire baby! Got to love the redheads

Min- 9 - I just picture a great body, and she seems horny. By far the best personality

Tuon - 9 - I dig short girls, and she's the only black girl, just plain hot. Can't think of a single actress that would do her justice

Elayne - 8.5 - Must love blondes, 1/2 bonus point for being pregs, but minus 1/2 point for being hormonal.

Birgitte - 8 - Another hot blonde

Moiraine - 7 - something about her is freaking hot, but lacks the sex appeal

Bain - 7 - tall model type (too muscular and aggressive for a higher score)

Chiad - 7 - tall model type (too muscular and mean for a higher score)

Faile - 6 - her name says it all

Nyanave - 6 - bad attitude, but nice everything else.

Egwene - 5 - She's Bella if they were all horses.

Cadsuane - 4 - seriously people?