Wheel of Time reread--Lord of Chaos
Mar. 24th, 2020 11:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
primeideal-the SF review is coming someday
-probably more FTL thoughts too
-Before we get to the various highlights/things that stood out, I'm going to start at the end. Because this book is overrated. Specifically, the final battle.
In book 1, we learn that there are these thirteen super-powerful magical people called "Forsaken" who should be in prison forever but are creeping back. At the end of book 1...the good guys kill two of them! (They get better, but we as readers didn't know this at the time.)
Book 3: good guys kill two forsaken.
Book 5: various parties team up to "kill" three forsaken.
(Book 2 is the Falme invasion/driving off the Seanchan with the Horn of Valere; book 4 is capturing Asmodean and makin' it rain in Rhuidean. Maybe less dramatic, but we also got all the Aiel flashback stuff in the middle, and a lot of people consider that a series highlight.)
Book 6 does have a good middle sequence highlight: Nynaeve's healing of Logain, Siuan and Leane/Mat learning Snakes and Foxes/Egwene being summoned to Salidar, meeting her toh, and being raised Amyrlin all takes place in the span of a few chapters.
However, the end that people rave about is basically "Our hero (male) is trapped in a box by some (bad, authoritarian) women. He escapes. His (male) underlings do a lot of violence and blow people up. Then they take the women prisoner, and force some other slightly-less-bad women to kneel to him and swear their loyalty."
The thing is, we don't really care about most of these characters. Masuri? Seonid? Kiruna? Nesune? Coinen? Blah blah blah, no one cares. (The interesting two are Verin and Alanna, apparently Rand never deals with Verin long enough to like get some useful information out of her.) As opposed to the Forsaken who we know are actually evil and need to be defeated, these Aes Sedai are at best being forced to kneel because prophecy, and at worst, it's kind of lazily "making women learn their place." I try to not be too much with the identity politics, but this isn't very creative or well-written.
I will say that having read "Warrior of the Altaii" was kind of what prepped me for realizing this. Because that also is a lot of "the terrible women beat up our hero, but he endured, because he had to to get revenge." I don't think it's necessarily deliberate, but Egwene's stoicism (even here with the Aiel, but also the book 12 stuff) feels more powerful because she actually has a choice and accepts the suffering anyway.
-On the subject of "was Taim intended to be Demandred at this point in the draft" (see here), a couple things stood out: basically two minutes into their first conversation, Taim is like "so, do you mean to kill the Forsaken?" And then when Rand is passing out the Asha'man badges, he's like "I'm the first full Asha'man, but Taim is the second." Taim: *winces, presumably at having to be second to Rand, yet again.*
-People were talking on Reddit about whether the Oath Rod being an Age of Legends punishment that dampens the anti-aging power of channelling was intended all along or added later. I'm pretty confident that this is when Jordan came up with it, based on the mentions of bindings in chapter 6 (the Forsaken dialogue) and the Aiel talking to Egwene about a Wise One who lived to be 300 and was still cut down in her prime.
-Maybe it's just me but this felt a little on the gross side with mentions of vomit and watery bowels...
-One thing I do like so far is that the power creep has been slow and gradual. At the beginning people had to travel long distances via the Ways. Now Rand can travel and eventually Egwene can too. But Nynaeve still can't consistently use saidar. (I think part of the problem with the later books is that not only are there too many POV characters we don't care about to keep track of, there's also a lot of "oh you thought these characters were powerful? Just kidding here are five more who can do everything they can and more.) But so far, so good.
-Prologue: Mesaana builds domino towers, heh
-2: "the winners write the history books" Taim to Rand. Historical revisionism, or just playing fast and loose with prophecy?
-5: Olver: "don't talk over me" Mat: "yeah you're right, I hated when people did that to me" awwww
-15: Egwene is having headaches (as an aftermath of Lanfear's attack in book 5?) even before Halima shows up. Also, the way the Wise Ones treat Cowinde and the bleak gai'shain (go find me a red grain of sand) is basically the same thing they do to Aviendha towards the end when they need to rush her along, you'd think she'd get wise.
-25: my new favorite super-minor character is Sarene, who not only is a logical White Ajah, she also has a secret vice of poetry.
"What if Moiraine only faked her death and came back as a Green? Can you even do that?" setup for Leane!
-37: Egwene's rumor-spreading plot basically revolves around Siuan, Elayne, and Nynaeve being able to tell lies, welp.
I might actually need some OCs for the fic I have in mind, probably less epic than last one.
PS. One of the Aes Sedai is like "we're going to need an Amyrlin who's as strong as Rashima." Rashima is a famous "soldier Amyrlin" who's only mentioned in this glossary, she and her Warders between them killed a bunch of Trollocs, Myrddraal, and nine evil channelers ("dreadlords") between them before dying in a blaze of glory. Foreshadowing?
-probably more FTL thoughts too
-Before we get to the various highlights/things that stood out, I'm going to start at the end. Because this book is overrated. Specifically, the final battle.
In book 1, we learn that there are these thirteen super-powerful magical people called "Forsaken" who should be in prison forever but are creeping back. At the end of book 1...the good guys kill two of them! (They get better, but we as readers didn't know this at the time.)
Book 3: good guys kill two forsaken.
Book 5: various parties team up to "kill" three forsaken.
(Book 2 is the Falme invasion/driving off the Seanchan with the Horn of Valere; book 4 is capturing Asmodean and makin' it rain in Rhuidean. Maybe less dramatic, but we also got all the Aiel flashback stuff in the middle, and a lot of people consider that a series highlight.)
Book 6 does have a good middle sequence highlight: Nynaeve's healing of Logain, Siuan and Leane/Mat learning Snakes and Foxes/Egwene being summoned to Salidar, meeting her toh, and being raised Amyrlin all takes place in the span of a few chapters.
However, the end that people rave about is basically "Our hero (male) is trapped in a box by some (bad, authoritarian) women. He escapes. His (male) underlings do a lot of violence and blow people up. Then they take the women prisoner, and force some other slightly-less-bad women to kneel to him and swear their loyalty."
The thing is, we don't really care about most of these characters. Masuri? Seonid? Kiruna? Nesune? Coinen? Blah blah blah, no one cares. (The interesting two are Verin and Alanna, apparently Rand never deals with Verin long enough to like get some useful information out of her.) As opposed to the Forsaken who we know are actually evil and need to be defeated, these Aes Sedai are at best being forced to kneel because prophecy, and at worst, it's kind of lazily "making women learn their place." I try to not be too much with the identity politics, but this isn't very creative or well-written.
I will say that having read "Warrior of the Altaii" was kind of what prepped me for realizing this. Because that also is a lot of "the terrible women beat up our hero, but he endured, because he had to to get revenge." I don't think it's necessarily deliberate, but Egwene's stoicism (even here with the Aiel, but also the book 12 stuff) feels more powerful because she actually has a choice and accepts the suffering anyway.
-On the subject of "was Taim intended to be Demandred at this point in the draft" (see here), a couple things stood out: basically two minutes into their first conversation, Taim is like "so, do you mean to kill the Forsaken?" And then when Rand is passing out the Asha'man badges, he's like "I'm the first full Asha'man, but Taim is the second." Taim: *winces, presumably at having to be second to Rand, yet again.*
-People were talking on Reddit about whether the Oath Rod being an Age of Legends punishment that dampens the anti-aging power of channelling was intended all along or added later. I'm pretty confident that this is when Jordan came up with it, based on the mentions of bindings in chapter 6 (the Forsaken dialogue) and the Aiel talking to Egwene about a Wise One who lived to be 300 and was still cut down in her prime.
-Maybe it's just me but this felt a little on the gross side with mentions of vomit and watery bowels...
-One thing I do like so far is that the power creep has been slow and gradual. At the beginning people had to travel long distances via the Ways. Now Rand can travel and eventually Egwene can too. But Nynaeve still can't consistently use saidar. (I think part of the problem with the later books is that not only are there too many POV characters we don't care about to keep track of, there's also a lot of "oh you thought these characters were powerful? Just kidding here are five more who can do everything they can and more.) But so far, so good.
-Prologue: Mesaana builds domino towers, heh
-2: "the winners write the history books" Taim to Rand. Historical revisionism, or just playing fast and loose with prophecy?
-5: Olver: "don't talk over me" Mat: "yeah you're right, I hated when people did that to me" awwww
-15: Egwene is having headaches (as an aftermath of Lanfear's attack in book 5?) even before Halima shows up. Also, the way the Wise Ones treat Cowinde and the bleak gai'shain (go find me a red grain of sand) is basically the same thing they do to Aviendha towards the end when they need to rush her along, you'd think she'd get wise.
-25: my new favorite super-minor character is Sarene, who not only is a logical White Ajah, she also has a secret vice of poetry.
"What if Moiraine only faked her death and came back as a Green? Can you even do that?" setup for Leane!
-37: Egwene's rumor-spreading plot basically revolves around Siuan, Elayne, and Nynaeve being able to tell lies, welp.
I might actually need some OCs for the fic I have in mind, probably less epic than last one.
PS. One of the Aes Sedai is like "we're going to need an Amyrlin who's as strong as Rashima." Rashima is a famous "soldier Amyrlin" who's only mentioned in this glossary, she and her Warders between them killed a bunch of Trollocs, Myrddraal, and nine evil channelers ("dreadlords") between them before dying in a blaze of glory. Foreshadowing?
