i am far from an Egwene defender.  while i enjoyed reading her POV's for most of the series, Id be lying if I didnt say that she had me wanting to smack her on more than on occasion.

Does she treat the 3 taveren like childrn?  absolutely. But the thing that most of us are conviently forgetting here is that Egwene doesnt have the same information that the rest of us do regarding Rand, Matt and Perrin.  She doesnt know what theyve all gone through internally over the last 2 years.  shes seen matt, what, twice?  She has no idea that he even HAD holes in his memory, much less that they were filled with the thoughts of all of the greatest generals that the world has ever known.

Im not saying you cant criticize, just to keep in mind that Egwene doesnt know what we know.

Egwenes death was for sure the saddest part of the book. I really liked her character, and didn´t feel that the story with anti balefire was forced. Apart from the arguments above, with people having discovered new weaves at the right time before, anti balefire fits pretty well into the rules of this universe. Quendillar was supposed to be indestructable, for ever burned into the weave, and stil there was a way to destroy it. In the same way balefire was supposed to be permanent, but really it wasn´t.

I dont know.  Belas death was pretty sad.  I mean, shes been around since the beginning and ended up being trolloc stew.  very sad