I read ToM a few months back and finished Sanderson's War Breaker a few weeks back as well, that was a great book and I can totally see the connection between the God King and Rand. I can't wait for Elantris and The Alloy Of Law (a standalone Mistborn sequel set years after the trilogy!) they will be just as excellent as his other books.
i've been looking over some of the first comments and i couldn't help but laugh at a comment about robert jordan from six years ago, "he could conceiveably die before he finishes"
Well. I can't find my original posts in this mass, so I'm just going to have to ask again.
I'm in the first third of book 7 (aCoS) and still am unsure of the entire mythological concept.
Using memory, the WoT wiki, and the original Wikipedia, I have figured out some stuff. The Wheel of Time is fueled by (I think) the True Source, which is comprised (I think) of Saidin and Saidar (pardon any misspellings there). The Wheel has seven spokes, each representing an Age. As Ages pass, they are forgotten and eventually re-spun by the Wheel, making a pattern of sorts.
Now, the Dark One was imprisoned on...what, the beginning of creation? Here's where things get more than fuzzy. The Dark One started acting up in an Age and so the Wheel made the Dragon, a Champion of the Light, to stop the Dark One. I can't find anything on it, so it may be just in my head, but were there many Dragons in time, and is the Dark One itself a part of the Pattern's design, or is the Dark One's plan to (stop the Wheel? Destroy the Pattern?) something special, only recently occurring? I know Lews Therin re-sealed the Dark One, but were there any Dragons before him, in another time? One of the things I can't remember were in the books or not was someone, a Forsaken perhaps, telling Rand that they had fought countless times, and that Rand had lost most of the time (or the Dragon had, not Rand of course).
If there have been previous Dragons, what makes Rand so special? Is Rand, perhaps, the last chance, the last Dragon? Also, where did the Forsaken come from? I remember one, Asmodean maybe, had been close Lews Therin's power and was jealous of him. Were there Forsaken in the past as well, or are they new to the Dark One's plans?
Now that the savvy fans are done wrinkling their noses at my limited, broken knowledge, can any of you rightfully explain it to me?
I'm no expert, so don't quote me on any of this, but it's my understanding that a lot of that is never answered specifically in the books, and that most of the mythology is left to be pieced together by fans from vague hints. I figure the Dark One trying to undo everything is nothing new, and I think Ishamael did taunt Rand with the line about Dragons having failed countless time in the past but that came from the mouth of a Forsaken and so is fairly suspect to begin with, plus it doesn't make much sense if we believe that the DO's aim is to trash the wheel, after all it's apparently still turning.
Prior to Lews Therin it's been suggested there were other Dragons, but I believe it's still up in the air whether a turn of the wheel is a near perfect repeat or if it's just a vague repeat of general events with entirely different players. I personally don't think it's a case of one Dragon for every age, but I don't think that's been confirmed or denied. As for the forsaken all of the current ones are from the previous age with LT, but again I don't think it's been stated whether previous turns had forsaken, if there were the same number of them if they had the same kind of personalities etc etc.
The answer to your questions, essentially, is that if the fans haven't made a note of it on the wiki or any of the fansites then it's something RJ left intentionally ambiguous.
Book seven bites the dust. Dammit, I can't believe The Aes Sedai have the damned Bowl, but they didn't use it! They've spent, what, two or three books trying to get their hands on this thing? Just use it! And then--as with what happened to Church at the end season 3, with calming Andy--the Seanchan show up and, I'm positive, fuck it up. .
Looking for book 8 now, but I'm a little scared with some of the reviews I've seen--some are bad, some good. I never liked the chapters dealing with random characters, and that's what many reviewers say it almost entirely is. I know I'll read it (after book 8, it's smooth sailing with no purchases until 12), but how long it takes me to finish remains to be seen.
I almost gave up on the series at Crossroads and I've been an avid reader of it since 1995! I've been holding off finishing the series until it's complete but from what I've heard it's heading towards a brilliant ending. I'm going to reread the lot soon in preparation for the final book this Xmas!
Just bought book 8 and started it up. I hate these prologues...at least this one isn't 100 pages. So, does anyone know how much of the last book will be the final battle? Any guesses?
As I said in post #3571, I think there is still way too much unresolved stuff for the "final" book to wrap it all up and still have much room for the Final Battle.
-Several Forsaken that we didn't see at all in ToM -no idea what's going on with Mordeth/Padan Fain -a whole lot of stuff that Rand needs to figure out with the Asha'man and the Black Tower -further stuff inside the White Tower -Caemlyn has just been invaded -the Seanchan are supposedly in chaos with their leaders all murdered but Tuon doesn't seem to know (where would she get the resources to continue the invasion of Randland if the main Seanchan continent is in chaos?) -We have no idea about the mysterious "Dragon shall kneel before Tuon" prophecy -we have no idea what the Sea Folk are up to -there is still the unanswered question of the mysterious peoples who live on the Randland continent beyond the Aiel Waste.... -speaking of which, Aviendha has taken off for the Three-fold Land and has foreseen weird stuff that needs to be explained
Look at how long it took to resolve all of Perrin's crap in ToM. If everybody's storylines were to get that same treatment then we would be in for 2 or 3 more books.
My sister recently read up to book 11 and she is confused as she can't remember whether or not something has happened and she forgot or has missed or just made up in her mind entirely, and that is when does Aviendha train the rebel Aes Sedai or the Circle in how to use combat magic?
-the Seanchan are supposedly in chaos with their leaders all murdered but Tuon doesn't seem to know (where would she get the resources to continue the invasion of Randland if the main Seanchan continent is in chaos?)
Except Robert Jordan never intended to resolve that in this story, he created a world that had shit going on beside the Final Battle. Originally he wanted to write another series with Tuon and Mat.
I assume a lot of the other stuff you mentioned (the Randland continent etc) have been left unexplained because they are not relevant to this story. but maybe Jordan had planned other stories.
Brandon Sanderson said it was a tentative release date and being the latest possible date that Janet his publisher is happy announcing but it could come earlier, just read his latest blog.
Unfortunately that's just the USA cover, the European one is going to be much duller, take the cover template for example (1, 2), A Memory of Light is probably going to be White.
I was okay with the uniform look for our versions while I was catching up with the paperbacks, but since I'm going to end up with both hardback and paperback versions of the last three it would have been cool to have them be a bit different.
Been while since i read the books, however I believe that he will seal away the dark one, as you have the bad/good balance in the world, but more important the whole wheel of time thing means the seal needs to be made whole again so that it can be broken. Nevertheless, I wouldn't put it past Jordan/Sanderson to have rand change, as he/lews therin at some point think it is cruel that people have to relive their mistakes (lews' take on it i believe) so something, i.e death of the dark one might be done to disrupt the wheel of time.
I had wanted to reread the whole series before aMoL came out, but ended up enrolling in school and had no time. its kind of sad though, because it will probably be my last read through, whenever I get to it. I've been reading that series for over 15 years, a lot of my life has been spent exploring that world, and I hate to think that this will be the last excursion there.
