Rating: Summary: "Will no one rid me of this troublesome author?" Review: I started reading this series when the first three volumes were already in paperback...I was but a lad ....now I wonder if this overblown incredibly sluggish "epic" will be over by the time I get social security in 12 years. Can't anyone stop Mr. Jordan from writing on and on and on.......? I guess as long as we are dumb enough to pay (not me, I borrowed a friends)he will keep churning it out. We the readers are the true forsaken! I've read J.R.R.Tolkein 12 times... and you Mr. Jordan are no Tolkein! It was pretty good stuff though...for the first five books. After that memory of who is who and what is what fades fast. To add insult to injury you expect us to shell out for a reference volume...just in case we want to go back and look at the characters and concepts you discarded...or maybe you have fogotten them too! Perspective readers beware! If you start this series you may not live to see the end of it...Hey! what if Mr. Jordan dies before he finishes?!!!...Oh no!..what if he has a son to carry on endlessly? JUST LIKE CHRIS TOLKEIN!!!!WE'RE DOOMED!!!
Rating: Summary: crossroads of what? Review: I have to say that I was completely disappointed, along with the rest of Robert Jordans fans. I cant say that anything happened at all in this book. Instead of one great story, it now seems like youre reading a few separate stories that go nowhere. Jordan spends a few chapters on each, then just kind of ends the novel in some random place. I believe that Jordan has it in him to continue writing books like he did at the beginning of the series, Im just beginning to wonder if he wants to. This book was like one giant prologue. Just a bunch of filler. And I have to agree, he brought in way to many characters that have nothing to do with the main story. Way to many names to remember. I just have to wonder, after two years, what took so long? He could have summed this book up in a quarter of the pages... I just hope Jordan hears what his fans think and decides to make something happen next time
Rating: Summary: TO BOLDY GO WHERE NO MAN HAS GONE BEFORE.......... Review: ...That's what I now feel like, when reading this trash. I feel lost in space... JORDAN, what has become of you? I think I know where you're going with this. Allow me to illuminate. Your trying to expand the story, get everyone in this fictitious world involved. You're trying to give it a more global sense. That is all well and good, but you haveforgotten one of the most essential traits that any good book worth its' weight in gold has "SUBSTANCE." That's what's missing, no more, no less. AS S. King would say, (A fellow colleuge Mr. Jordan would do well to take notes from) "I cry your pardon Mr. Jordan, but a mans got to say what a mans got to say." This last installment is, for the lack of a better phrase, worth its' weight in cow manure. There is nothing wrong with the adding of new characters (Even though, I think, it is was to late in a story to be doing such a thing.) God! Work some magic. Make me love them, enjoy them, or even hate them! Don't give me stale people and expect me to embrace them like long lost friends. There's a saying that goes, "The little things make up all the big things." It is not "The little things make up the big things, so forget about the big things." Mr. Jordan is apparently a believer in the former because that is what he has done. He is so wrapped up in the syntax of things, that he has forgotten the origin, the core, and "The Biggest thing." Which are the people that we have grown to love; Mat, Perrin, Egwene, Nyaeve, Lan, Elayne, Min,Thom Merrilin, Rand Al'Thor and yes, even morraine. (I'm pretty sure she's not dead yet.) Yes, they are all in this book, but they feel dead to me. There's no more depth to them than there was four books ago. In closing, I just want to say that I am very disappointed in you, Robert Jordan. You have taken my trust and squeezed every penny out of it. I hope you burn in hell because that is what you have put me through. Rest assured that I would not be contributing to your bank account, with your next installment. I'm gonna cut my losses and move on. Perhaps Mr. Goodkind has not fallen to the wasting disease that you have so obviously embraced.
Rating: Summary: Where's Jar Jar?!? Review: I hate Wheel of Time. What was once a proud piece of my Bookcase (including 8 first editions bought the day they came out) has now become a joke that almost makes me weep. Many defend this series saying that 'this book is a transition!' and 'blah blah blah!'Wasn't "Path of Daggers" a 'transition book?' I already know that "Winter's Heart" was a 'blah blah blah.' I guess this one is a direct 'Transition to Blahh Blahh Blahh' all in one... I borrowed this travesty from a friend that still backs and supports Jordan's cause (obviously) and felt pain while reading it. In the end I had only one question: "Where is Jar Jar Binks?" Where is he Robert Jordan? Please... I want to know. I'm embarrassed that I actually helped this man make money by recommending him to people and buying his books. Ashamed and embarrassed. I figure this'll net him another 50 Mill or so, so why should he stop? Keep on trucking Jordan. About a month of work every 2 years doesn't sound bad for that kind of cash. You'll have to subtract my [money] from now on though. Have fun reading the next 10 or so books folks. I'm not joining in on the 'adventure' anymore.
Rating: Summary: An all time low Review: Crossroads of Twilight completes a death spiral that has plagued the last few Wheel of Time books. There is no central plot at all, and most of the attention is given to Faile, Perrin, and Elayne, who, as always, DO NOTHING. Plenty of company here, 'cause NO ONE ELSE DOES ANYTHING EITHER. Half of the book takes place before/during the Cleansing, anyway. Zzzzzzzz... Don't waste your money buying the hardback. Borrow it from a friend or a library, or if you're a die hard fan you can wait for the paperback. Idea: Just skip it. You can easily find a summary paragraph that will tell you everything you need to know. Zzzzzzzzz...
Rating: Summary: milking the cash cow Review: If you were a ... like the rest of us and preordered this book you have my sympathies. One major event happened in this book, the cleansing of saidin, and it wasn't even discussed. Instead we were "treated" to 700 pages of bit part characters it would take a spreadsheet to keep track of. Hopefully I'll have the self control not to buy book 11. I'd donate this book to the library except it would be a disservice to the reading public. One star is too generous.
Rating: Summary: Crossroads of Twilight Review: "The Wheel of Time turns and Ages come and go, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth return again. In the Third Age, an Age of Prophecy, when the World and Time themselves hang in the balance, a wind rises in the mountains of mist . . ." A wind carrying despair, despair for the myriads of WOT fans, who since 1990 have spen hundred of hours, reading and rereading these books. 13 years and 10 books later what started out as a incredible good reading, have turned it to something more excrutiating than chinese water torture. I am at this point reading the series just because my incredible curiousity wants to know how it ends. I am now considering waiting for the final book to come out and just read that, like a soap opera i think I can miss a dozen episodes or so and still be on top of what is going on. The books is excrutiatingly slow, we spend hundreds and hundreds of pages hearing about life as an everyday rebel Aes Sedai, or in a travelling circus, or pursuing and ever increasing number of rebel Aiel. If anyone in this book moved at the pace of the book, and whit it seems they do, the final battle will come and pass them by, while they are still trying to figure out who is who, and if they can trust their childhood friends. And hearing about the many misunderstandings between the two sexes. Although this might be real, i think RJ should stop writing a convulated Men are from Mars, Women from Venus. The characters have evolved from what seemed to be complex well described characters with personalities, into confusing mixes of real world cliches. Buy George Martin, so far his three books are very promising and will hopefully not involve into a RJ money milking keyboard puncher. Did RJ die/disappear and a ghost writer write the last few books. Did he loose any inspiration he had, or did he grow senile and forgot how he was going to end the book. I would not consider myself an RJ basher, i have read the first six books half a dozen times atleast, bought two copies of each of them because the first set was lost in a move. I have read book 7-10 one time, and regretting it. I am loosing hope, the Dark One ($$$) is winning.
Rating: Summary: Once again, Nothing Happens Review: The first 3 to 4 books in this series were thoroughly enjoyable. The characters were consistent and the reader could keep track of them. The rest of the series has been nothing but an almost constant stream of new, and uninteresting characters, with no significant plot events. This book follows in the same vein. It takes over 400 pages to even reach the point where the 9th book leaves off. And absoluelty nothing happens. If the 11th book fails to further the plot, I will no longer read Robert Jordan. I'm tired of the same scene involving a bunch of petty, bitchy, women arguing...over and over...
Rating: Summary: Slow progress but still good writing. Review: Folks expecting vivid battle scenes or significant plot advancement in the series will be disappointed. As with the past books, however, Jordan's writing remains superb and he continues to paint vivid pictures of the characters and their environments making this an enjoyable read in the story. Some might say monotonous and tedious, but I still had trouble putting it down. Much to many's chagrin, I'm sure, more time is spent on character development than advancing the story. While it is enjoyable to watch the characters continue to mature into the roles that "fate" has led them into, I wish Jordan had tossed in a few hundred extra pages (bringing it to the length of some of the earlier books) to advance the story and perhaps bring one of the major plot lines closer to a resolution. The series is showing no signs of drawing to a close anytime soon (which in some ways is a good thing) but those people chomping at the bit to know what goes on with the characters will want to pick this up as quickly as possible. Those who haven't bought it yet and still thinking about it may just want to wait until closer to the next book's release to read this one. Rand doesn't get much coverage in this book, but this isn't the first time for that. I only hope that book 11 doesn't skip over the plot developments Jordan pushed along this time around in favor of those not covered. Don't expect to be happy at the end. This book ends leaving the reader just as anxious to see what will happen next as the end of Winter's Heart, and a lot of anxiety over the same things.
Rating: Summary: The Wheel of Time has a flat.... Review: Robert Jordan is still not over the 7th Book Itch. Unlike fellow Charlestonian, Citadel Grad, and author Pat Conroy; RJ is evidently spending too much time walking the beaches of Kiawah and staring at his fish. Absolutely minimal action and no real plot development. I have read all the books in this series, and feel incredibly let down by this lazy apparently last minute effort. To add insult to injury, we are to wait 2+ years for more disappointment? Oh Goody. A tough critique from a loyal fan Mr. Jordan, because we all deserve better than this.
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