To be fair, the Children of the Light are actually (ironically) infested with darkfriends, so we shouldn't really expect them to make much progress towards the good cause. 😉 But yeah, many characters in the Children of the Light are extremely frustrating to read about.

It repairs an otherwise terrible ending for Lanfear. I feel like that has to count for "adding something".

Brandon Sanderson was live with the Dusty Wheel on the AMOL 10 year anniversary and revealed a certain thing about the ending that made a lot of people go kinda floompy. You can find it on YouTube as well. But I don't think you missed it. It's got to do with Lanfear's part in the ending.

Huh, I feel like an idiot for not thinking about this. 🤣

The best Rand book would be book 12. Which is also the best Egwene book, by the way. But yeah, like the others said, reading these books in random order will ruin things. The only book I'd say you're allowed to skim or only read the summary of, would be book 10. Book 10 is the bad one. The rest I'd rank ranging from decent all the way up to brilliant. You've read book 1, which is flawed indeed, but if you consider it decent, I'd recommend you keep reading in order. Skip the prologue book New Spring for now. I currently recommend you read that after book 11, or after you finish the series. You don't need that one. Anyway, continuing onwards, book 2 improves upon a few flaws from book 1 (mainly pacing and a much better ending), and book 3 I loved so much that's where I decided to read the entire series. Fair warning though: book 3 is about Rand a lot, but we don't get a lot from his perspective. I do think this was a great idea though, as worrying about Rand works better if you're not sure what he's up to. Hard disagree with Elendir here. Don't skip this one! You don't want to miss out on the ending to book 3. Continuing onwards, now you're in for a treat: book 4 is the best in the series, and books 5 and 6 are close behind. Those three I reckon probably make up the strongest bit of fantasy of all time. But.. book 6 has such an explosive and amazing ending that book 7 will probably feel a tad disappointing. It's not bad though. Perhaps take a little break before starting book 7. Book 8 feels rather episodic but is quite strong in its own right. Book 9 has a lot of Rand, but it's very slow. Great ending though. Book 10 I mentioned is the bad one. Almost no Rand, all setup and no payoff, and to make matters worse, it ends in a cliffhanger. Book 11 is really good again though. And here we switch authors, which you'll notice by the pace going up twofold. And from a few other things. Book 12 is one of my favourites, but many disagree. But like I said, lots of Rand so you'll enjoy that one. Book 13 has amazing Rand moments, but focuses more on other characters. Still very good by the way. Book 14 everything blows up and you get the ending to the biggest fantasy series of all time. If you make it that far, you'll be interested to know how it ends. 😛 So here's a sneak peek into the series. It's absolutely worth it. Don't quit after book 3, or you'll miss out on the best books.

Hahaha don't sweat it! We all have our opinions and that's cool. 😅 With Lan & Nynaeve I'd agree except if you only read book one, you'd have to put that romance in bad. The setup just isn't there. Them liking eachother came out of nowhere and when I read it, I was like: huh where'd that come from? Contrast that to Rand & Aviendha and the difference is night and day. Rand & Avi get an entire 1000 page book to get to know each other, dislike each other at first, growing to respect each other and so on. When they finally get together it feels inevitable. And weird, but that's because Rand's supposed to be with Elayne. The way Aviendha deals with that did add to the dynamic though. She feels proper shame and has immense toh towards Elayne. But I disgress. If the Lan & Nynaeve romance had had a proper setup, for me it would probably have been fighting for the top spot. But setup is so important! For the Siuan & Bryne romance I could get on the same page as you, but there's something off. I loved Siuan in books 2-3-4, but somehow the powerhouse personality of Siuan Sanche seemed to slowly diminish after that. I liked her character more in earlier books, and found myself not caring as much anymore when that romance started to come along. Egwene's arc in books 11 and 12 RULES, but for the romance I shall agree to disagree. 😉 Lastly, you mention disagreeing about Faile & Perrin, but you don't elaborate. Care to? 🙂

Have fun! You're in for a treat. Do give it some time though. It's long, and in style it takes a while to get going proper. It's absolutely worth it though. 🙂

Should you wish to change this, I recommend Warbreaker. It's a standalone, but it does happen in his connected universe, the "Cosmere". You don;t need to know any other stroies though. It's a really fun read, and you can get the e-book for free on his website if you sign up for his newsletter. Don't worry about that last bit. He sends like two a year, and they always contain a button to unsubscribe, should you wish to never get any again. Sanderson's main contribution to epic fantasy is that connected universe, but if you don't care for that bit, just see him as the writer who writes epic fantasy that reads like a thriller. Simple, functional prose, a faster pace, and very little literary stuff like symbolism, thematic layers or poetic commentary. He deliberately focuses mainly on the story itself, and everything he does has to support that story. If you read mainly to relax after a busy day, he's definitely an author you want to check out. But if you read for a literary challenge, Sanderson isn't the author for you.

New Spring I've seen recommended after book 5, after book 10, after book 11 and after the final book. My personal recommendation right now is after book 11, as the author switch is already a bit of a breaking point in the series, so might as well slot New Spring in there. But there's arguments to be made for any of the mentioned moments. Just don't read it before The Eye of the World, at least not upon the first read through.

The Wheel of Time and its Pattern exist in order to keep the Dark One busy trying, but eternally failing, to escape. At least, that's my reading. Following from this, as you said, ta'veren are created by (or exist within, depending on your view on creation) the Pattern, in order to make sure certain things happen so that the cycle definitely continues. But in order to keep the evil side hoping for a win, I see no reason why there wouldn't be evil ta'veren making sure their side keeps doing what it's supposed to. But to be fair, this idea leans heavily on my view on how the Wheel and the Pattern work.

Okay let's give this a shot: Good - Rand & Aviendha. This is probably mainly because Aviendha is such an interesting character. She's our window into the Aiel culture, and her interactions with Rand were a blast to read. I felt like these two complemented each other the best, and Avi is my favourite of Rand's three wives. (Yes, this hurts a bit, but the others are all in between or worse, in my opinion. Hey, romance wasn't Jordan's thing. That's okay. There's enough cool stuff in the series.) In between - Lan & Nynaeve. This one I can't put into good simply because of the extremely rocky start. This romance came absolutely out of nowhere, which forces me to withdraw many points. But I have to say: once the romance gets going properly, it's one of the best for sure, and the foreshadowing for that has really nice moments here and there. But we have to wait so long for it to actually go anywhere that I was like: oh yeah, that was a thing a few books ago. - Rand & Min. They are cute together, but at first I wasn't feeling this one, and while Min helps Rand stay somewhat human, beyond that she's just kind of there for large parts of the story. Perhaps me ranking this here is mainly because I'm team Aviendha, so feel free to chalk this one up to bias. - Gareth & Siuan. Solid buildup in typical Jordan style: they don't get along at first, then get to know each other better, then start to respect each other, and from there fondness and onwards to love. This one is okay. Could have been good, but some parts are silly, and others are a tad clunky, so I can't really put it in good. - Rand & Egwene. This felt like a natural small village romance. But I can't put it in good, as it never goes anywhere. It just lingers for a bit and then both get over it quickly enough for it not to affect what happens in the main story. - Galad & Berelain. This one was inevitable. I can see how people see it as just another shipping to add some flavor, and the setup for this one is weak at best, but when it happened, my first thought was: yeah this was really the only sensible combo for these troublemakers. It deserved a different ending, though, in my opinion. Or more of one. Anyway, maybe this one objectively belongs in bad, but I'll leave it here. Bad - Rand & Elayne. The weakest of Rand's romances. It feels like a high school fling, and to me it never exceeds this. Elayne does grow a lot in the story, but especially in the second half of the series to me it feels like she grows away from Rand. But I'd say this is the best of the not good romances. - Mat & Tuon. Their early interactions are fun, but the more they start to like each other, the less I like the romance somehow. I can't put my finger on exactly why. Perhaps I'll need a reread for this one. - Perrin & Faile. This one I'll chalk up to pacing. They just don't learn. This is the main issue with Perrin in the story anyway: he learns too slowly, which resulted in Sanderson having to rush his arc towards expert Dreamworld user. In the romance we run into the same issue: they have the same problems for too long of a period. Perhaps this would be realistic in real life, but in a story it starts to drag and ultimately becomes frustrating AF. - Gawyn & Egwene. This one started okay, but Gawyn as a character got worse and worse, to a point where I felt like Egwene should just ditch him and be done with it. There was potential here, though, if Gawyn had developed into a better person, but he ended up regressing somehow. - Thom & Moiraine. This one was just a bad idea. Moiraine's return happens too late in the story, and while their getting together makes sense, there just isn't enough time. I would have left their relationship in a will they/won't they during the ending. But I guess that would have required Sanderson to throw away some of Jordan's work on the ending, which he really did not want to do. There are others, but none stand out to me as noteworthy, and none would be able to get anywhere close to "good". Or did I forget an important one? 😛 Anyway, these are my thoughs. I didn't hate the romances, but ultimately it is one of the weakest aspects of the series.

Sanderson is a very different writer from Jordan, with different strengths and weaknesses. I think the people who dislike Sandersons work are those who enjoyed the things Jordan was strong at and Sanderson wasn't. And there's nothing wrong with that. I do think it'd help the discussion, though, if we'd all recognize this and keep the discussion away from "Sanderson is terrible, childish, ..." when that's clearly not the case. I think Sanderson did a better job than we had any right of expecting, especially because he's such a different writer, but also because the original plan and outline were for one large book of 2000+ pages, but halfway through writing the publisher started to push for turning it into three volumes. This forced Sanderson to move things around, in order to not have book 12 become another Crossroads of Twilight. Yes, the author change shows. Clearly. Sanderson's work is paced about twice as fast as Jordan's, he doesn't always get the characters right (especially Mat) and some of the plot threads ended up sidelined or underplayed. But the main story lines get satisfying endings, and I'm extremely happy we got these books. Just look at how cynical the Martin fanbase is getting. I infinitely prefer this over an unfinished series that because of the fact it's unfinished becomes unappealing to reread.

Please note that you're about to speculate in a topic started by someone who at that time was only at book 3. 😉

Meh, fourth wife. Whatever. 🤣 Anyway, I don't think Cadsuane would ever snitch. Neither would any of his wives. He's got smart women attached to him, who tend to think before they act. And for Cadsuane: the fact that she's more powerful as long as the Dragon "stays dead" was already mentioned, but more importantly I think she'd never snitch because it doesn't serve a purpose. Rand has done his duty, she knows he'll just want to live his life in anonimity now. There's no point. And Cadsuane can be a huge pain in the behind, but she never does things without express purpose. The knowledge that the Dragon still lives is a powerful one in theory, but in practice it'll never come in handy. Besides, saying the Dragon lives only to point at a dude who looks completely different, and who can't channel at all, could undermine her power quite a bit.

I came in from the complete opposite direction, having read a pile of Sanderson books before I started WoT, but I feel the same way regarding plot details that got sidelined or ended up inconsistent. To me, things like Nakomi are cute little details to speculate about, but ultimately somewhat inconsequential to the story. Rand lighting his pipe is definitely a Jordan thing, as Sanderson revealed that the ending is all Jordan. But that too is just a fun little detail. Bigger plot issues arise with the male Aiel channelers, but that was as far as I can tell also a Jordan idea, and whether the Demandred + Sharans thing was Sanderson or Jordan, I do feel like that was foreshadowed well enough. We've had a number of moments through the series where Shara was discussed briefly, and we've had news about the whereabouts and plans of all Forsaken except Demandred, so this is something I feel like I could have seem coming if I had taken the time to review my ideas between books. I didn't though. I flew through the series without theorycrafting in between volumes. But back to the author switch: I knew Sanderson's work and methods quite well before I started WoT, and what I can tell is this: Sanderson is a big planner. He will have thoroughly gone through all the written work and all the useful notes from Jordan, and he'll have drawn up a rough plan for the ending. He will then have looked at gaps and missing arcs, and have asked Jordan's team to find references for what Jordan wanted to do there. He had almost nothing for a few characters and plotlines, but being a massive fan himself, he probably came in with a few ideas of his own already. With all that, he made a massive outline before he started writing, and when he was a way into writing the actual book, the publisher decided that it would become three volumes rather than just one, which forced Sanderson to change a number of things so each of the books would work individually as well. He distinctly warned the publisher that specifically the first one would need payoffs, as he didn't want it to become another book 10 (all setup and no payoff). So the outline got revised, things got shuffled around, and he had to rewrite some stuff, but this is how we ultimately got the three Sanderson entries. I think that the books would have been a bit stronger if the publisher had forced the ending into three volumes from the start. Sanders, being the planner that he is, would have been able to plan out all three from the start, and I think that would have helped him. But to me, other than Padan Fain's ending and the level 1, 2, 3 defeat of Demandred, which I both felt were not good at all, I think over all Sanderson did a great job. In Jordan's hands the ending would have been at least 5 books, perhaps more, and probably better, but I have to say I infinitely prefer this over what's happening with A Song of Ice and Fire. 🙂

Sure, you could go into detail about which aspects saw decline and which saw progress, but the fact that ancient Greek scientists knew that the Earth was round, and that they knew approximately how large it was, but that in 1200AC people thought the Earth was flat and so on should tell us more than enough. Ever since the collapse of the Roman Empire in the west, we saw decline in most fields. Mainly in education, healthcare, state law, and most sciences. Turns out having the church as your main source of leadership is suboptimal. Let's face it: advancements were few and far between during the dark ages in the western world. Of course it's a completely different story in Asia. But let's not go into full history mode. I was only making the point that advancements aren't nearly as inevitable as the mordern Westerner might expect.

To be fair, the lore does suggest that Randland had technology before it had channeling. The idea is that our time (or something similar) would be the first Age, and the second Age was kickstarted by the discovery of the One Power by people who were able to channel it. If we stick to this order, one would expect the advancements in the second Age would be mostly in channeling, and combining weaves with existing technology. Purely technological advancements had been more or less obsolete for a few millennia, assuming the Age of Legends was about as long as the third Age. A big issue is that during the Breaking, almost all channelers will have perished. The men went crazy and caused destruction akin to the movie 2012 (think Earth Crust Displacement), and many of the female channelers will have died trying to stop the rampaging men. What was left, was an unrecognizable planet, with almost no channelers left, most of humanity dead, and everything that was even somewhat vulnerable burnt, buried or otherwise blown up. So what we were left with, was an Earth that was changed completely, most knowledge gone, most channelers gone and the ones remaining would be heavily preoccupied with finding and gentling male channelers. The few remaining normal people (I would estimate not more than a few hundred thousand to have survived the Breaking) would have been forced to reinvent regular farming methods and the like. But the main reason why I don't think it's all that strange to see such little advancement in the 3000 years since the Breaking, is that every few hundred years, a wave of trollocks would get sent across the land, and of course there's a lot of civil war in the history of the third Age as well. The times weren't ideal for advancements. But more importantly, our current advancements went really fast, with the invention of the steam engine being like 300 years ago. Before that, we had like 1200 years of steady decline. It seems weird now, but in the times since the advancements of the Greek and subsequent Roman societies, we've gone backwards for well over a millennium. And that was without male channelers going nuts and trollocks roaming around. To us in our time, advancement seems inevitable, but our own history shows it's not that simple.

I would not be one bit surprised if Padan Fain was indeed ta'veren. Weird stuff happens around him, he gets people to do things they're not normally inclined to do and often when something big is happening, Fain is either involved or at least close by. Cool theory. Has my stamp of approval. 🙂

Just looked it up in the WoT Wiki, and it was Latra Posae Decume, leading a large group of female Aes Sedai. The decision was named the Fateful Concord. In the Age of Legends the Aes Sedai were organized very differently, with ajahs being temporary groups with a common purpose, much more freedom in chosen occupations and the leader of the Aes Sedai was called the First Among Servants, which has much less of a feeling of absolute power compared to the Amyrlin Seat. But then again, trouble was seldom and far between in those days, so why bother with strong leadership. And then Mierin did an oopsy that the old Aes Sedai were woefully unprepared for. 😛

I don't think I mentioned reading New Spring after book 3 or 4. Those are bad moments for sure. 🙂 I was recommended by YTer Daniel Greene to read NS after book 5, but that was an older video, and he now recommends something else. I did it, so I can attest it's an okay moment but not ideal. It yanks you out of a certain storyline that I at least didn't want to get pulled out of, but it does give us something extra about a character you'll be interested in reading more about after book 5 ends, so there's that. Reading NS after the whole series is done will make it feel silly and inconsequential, so I'd be against that. So the final recommendations I read - reading it in order of release (so after book 10) or after the final Jordan book (so after 11) , make the most sense to me. Since book 10 ends in a cliffhanger of sorts, one could argue that's a bad moment, so my vote would go to after book 11 and before you dive into the Sanderverse. (PS. Don't worry about the author switch. Sanderson wrote good stuff and most people have some of his books among their WoT favorites. I have The Gathering Storm in my top 3, for instance.)

In your case, I recommend you read it between God Emperor of Dune and The Lions of Al-Razzan. 🙂

This makes the most sense to me as well. But I think everybody reads into this what they want, or what fits their background. For me personally, polyamory would never work, so I basically have a headcannon where I pick a side, and while in story Rand marries all three, in my head Rand in the very end will end up with just one of them.

Seconded. Definitely don't start with New Spring. Maybe upon reread, but TEotW is the perfect introduction to this world. I was recommended to read New Spring after book 5, which was an okay moment, but perhaps not ideal. It might be better to read it in written order, so between books 10 and 11, or alternatively after book 11 as a bridge between Jordan and Sanderson. Also I've seen it recommended as dessert after finishing the series, but that seems weird to me. I personally think reading New Spring either after book 10 or after book 11 would work best, depending on whether you can stomach taking time off after book 10, which ends in a bit of a cliffhanger (I could not 😉 ). What are other people's thoughts on this?

If Rand feels shallow to you, then my brain tells me you've read a different series than me, or you quit after book one, but then again in a different thread you mention rereading the series, which I haven't done yet. (In fact, I'm quite new to it, having only started it during the COVID lockdowns.) So either I'll start to see your point more upon rereads, or we're never going to agree. But still, shallow? Rand? And you prefer the TV-show? 🤯🤣 Yeah, the chances of us ever agreeing are slim indeed. That's okay though.

Hard disagree with everyone you mention, despite not even having read some of them. But I think that's because you misunderstand what I mean with strongest character. I mean from a writing point of view. I don't care how powerful or smart or whatever a character is. A strong character is a character with a clear personality, background, hopes and dreams, flaws and limitations to overcome, things to learn, relationships to have, screw up, and then mend again, or not, and so on. Rand grows the most out of any character I've ever come across in fiction. It's always clear why he does what he does, why he feels what he feels. He is the ultimate farmboy-to-demigod, rags-to-riches character, while coping with depression, madness, paranoia and immense pressure of the fate of the world and mankind being on his shoulders.