Rating: 
Summary: Not what I hoped for
Review: I started reading this series more than 10 years ago. It was great! For a while. Then it started to become less than expected. Still I looked forward to the next book in the series. Now, after one less thrilling book after another, and the lack of anything from Mr. Jordan in a very long time, I have decided that if there ever is a 10th book, I will probably not buy it. For those readers who have not given up yet, I salute you.
Rating:
Summary: Here's Book 9, now pay me.
Review: Okay. I have read, waited, forgotten, read again, waited, forgotten. I started this series years ago, when it had promise, and like everyone else, I am sick of this drawn out drivel Mr. Jordan is passing for a fantasy novel. It all boils down to this: He is padding his retirement portfolio! What was originally going to be an eight to ten book series, has ballooned into the 'teens! Or more, from what I've heard! It's all about the Benjamins now. Too bad, as this series was one of the best, if not the best, since Tolkein. Then came Book Seven...then Eight...then Nine. God forbid Mr. Jordan should have a heart attack. We'd never know how the series ends.
Rating: 
Summary: Good, but could be better.
Review: I'll assume if you're reading this that you have some idea what is going on in this mammoth series. If you've read the first eight books and are wondering if it is worth your while to go ahead and commit yourself to the next book, then the answer is yes. After six absolutely superb books, Mr. Jordan's story began to suffer but he appears to be coming back to form with a ninth book that is much better than the seventh or the eighth. Unfortunately, I cannot give the book more stars for two very important reasons: 1 - the book is rushed, and by rushed I do not mean that there is too much action, but rather there exist a disturbingly large number of typos and grammatical errors (I know, I know, those who live in glass houses...). I cannot blame these on Mr. Jordan, but they refelct very poorly on the publisher. 2 - the plot has begun to move again, but it remains far too slow for my tastes. While I am certainly not one of the many readers who has asked Mr. Jordan to speed things up in terms of pounding out books quicker (I do in fact wish he would take his time and write them very well) or to tell his tale in fewer books (and in fact I don't care if he takes fifteen or twenty books to tell his story if they're all as good as the first six books were), but rather that not much happens in the books anymore. Once upon a time, in any given book, a major enemy would be defeated, a major enemy (or two) introduced, and some major portion of the prophecies would be fulfilled. Now we are lucky to get any of three in any given book. In summary, Winter's Heart is a good book and a fair addition to an incredible series. Mr. Jordan appears to have decided to move the plot along at a more reasonable pace but I wish he and his publisher would take a little more time with each book to make sure they are the well polished products his readers deserve.
Rating:
Summary: Blah
Review: The problem with this this book and in fact the series can be boiled down to one character- Nyaneve. If I have to read once more about how she "tugs on her braid with white knuckles." I'm going to go crazy. It seems in the last few books, the only thing that women do is give each other "cold stares and grimaces." I used to love this series, but really, finish it up,I started reading this series almost half my life ago.
Rating: 
Summary: Put this book down, and go read a REAL fantasy book!
Review: My advice to everyone who is still reading this endless, pointless series: Lay the book down, donate it and all others you possess to the local library, and then check out some real books in the sword/sorcery or fantasy genre.
My recommendations are: Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (since Jordan is basically copying its story, you may as well read what HE'S reading), Rowling's Harry Potter series, Le Guin's Earthsea Saga, and the Thieves' World/Sanctuary series (by various authors).
Tolkien, the grandfather of the genre, produced an excellent, compelling saga in 5 books (including the Silmarillion), developed the Elvish language (Jordan's "Old Tongue" cannot comapre to Tolkien's linguistic development), and best of all it's actually has an ending! Rowling's brilliant works have a genuine sense of wonder and mystery (which Jordan lost in Book #5 or thereabaouts), and they appeal to all ages. I know Potter fans from ages 10 to 70! And, if you want gritty, realistic, "adult" level fanatasy, you can't do better than the Thieves' World saga. Read this series, and you'll realize just how shallow, immature, and childish every single character in Jordan's world truly is. I cannot imagine anyone from Randland (especially the Aes Sedai) surviving more than a day in rough-and-tumble Sanctuary!
Finally, if you want simple sword-and-sorcery action that you can translate into Dungeons and Dragons games (I'm a gamer myself, so I'm not being facetious), read the D&D novels that Wizards of the Coast is publishing. They have fairly good plots (better than when TSR was printing them), have lots of action, and yes, they actually have beginnings, middles, and endings! I say this because from my experience, just about the only people who are still following this story ARE gamers like myself. And I feel you guys deserve much better than Jordan.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible, except the last chapter
Review: Found myself skipping over half the book due to elaborate details about womens clothing and their squabbles. Criminey.
1000 pages about women straightening their skirts and wondering if they were showing to much 'bosom' Excuse me, wasn't this an adventure series at one point?
Lost in the wilderness, they stumbled upon Redbook...and that was all she wrote. Jordan says he is going to write until they nail his coffin shut. He's nailing it shut himself..neat trick.
R.
Rating: 
Summary: He's Winding It Up!
Review: For all of those people complaining about the last few books give Jordan a break. He's about to come out with Book 10 in this series and you can't expect him to hit a home-run with every book. Having said that, I agree with the reviewer who said that Jordan has begun concentrating on one plot at a time. Everyone has their favorites but Jordan has said time and again that this story is about Rand and how he copes with having to save the world. Every other character either aids or hinders him in the pursuit of that goal. All the man is trying to do now is get everyone to the point where they can finally fight the Last Battle. Inevitably, some characters are going to suffer since he no longer has the time to write the 700-800 page books he was writing in the beginning of the series (because of pressure the fans put on him) and needs to kill some people off to get them in the right place at the right time. After all that, this book is pretty good at beginning to wrap things up. With the climactic ending we finally can see a glimmer of hope that maybe we will get to see the end before we all start collecting Social Security.
Rating:
Summary: Jordan, Back to Basics, I beg of you
Review: ...I read very quickly so I choose books on volume and very much enjoy escaping to another rich and vibrant world. I found myself repeating a line nover and over in my head "who is this character? and who cares!". So I decided maybe I would care if I knew more about them, so I reread the entire series and actually tookotes on the characters that I had forgotten about and skimmed over the first time ...I sat back and was literally STUNNED. That is one fantastic book! Originally I thought book 2 "The Great Hunt" was like Back to the Future II (you know - filler to get you to III). Boy was I wrong. It is a subtle, deft, imaginative plot manipulation that sets up the entire series and along the way, almost subliminally, brings one slowly yet completely involved with the main characters. Book six on - If I have to read about one more woman smoothing her dress because of thinking about a man I'm going to go POSTAL!!!! Here's my advice to Robert Jordan - whenever something was great and now it ain't you HAVE TO GET BACK TO BASICS!!! If it doesn't have to do DIRECTLY with Rand, Perrin, and Mat and to a much, much lesser degree - Elayne, Egwene, and 'I hope she dies soon' Nynaeve, THEN WE DON'T CARE!!! Oh yeah, and stop killing off the Forsaken one a book and then bring them back giving them a different name. It adds nothing except reader apathy.
Rating:
Summary: Step in the Right Direction
Review: As others have said, it's basically still lacking when compared to the first five books, but it's better than the last few. The last 200 or so pages are excellent, and give me hope that Jordan has not completely lost it. This was pretty much his "last chance" book for me, and he's partially redeemed himself. So what saves it? Well, more emphasis on action and main characters, and less on introducing yet more forgettable secondary and tertiary characters, and fewer new distracting subplots when we already have plenty. There's a lot of Mat in this book, and that's a good thing, because I find his adventures consistently more interesting than anyone else's. I really *want* to be interested in what happens to Perrin, but I just can't stay interested, and Faile is an unlikable and, to me, unnecessary character. Thankfully, only a few chapters of that couple are in this book. Also BORING and UNNECESSARY: the Prophet. Who cares about him? I'm taking off a few points because the first two-thirds tends to meander, as the previous few books did, and we really don't get to see anything of the Egwene perspective, which really should have more a presence at this point. There's a good deal about Elayne, but those chapters are mildly interesting so that's ok. Also, I wish there was some more of the Forsakens in the book. They do make a few appearances, but not enough, and they're so consistently inept it makes me wonder how they got to be so powerful or why anyone would fear them anymore. They need to win sometimes, kill some important people, do damage, wreak general havok, etc. Have I been reading too much George R. R. Martin? Yes I have :) There are spots where Jordan also reverts to his foot-stomping, ear-boxing, braid-pulling, glaring, whining, haughty-spoiled-ice-queen drivel, but fortunately he snaps out of it before I threw down the book in frustration. I wish someone would install an exlaimation point detector on his computer! To check for too many on a page! Because he tends to use a lot sometimes when writing from a female perspective! To show how emotional and disrespected they are! As if Rand could understand! How dare he! Anyway, I feel that if Jordan sticks with his six main characters, and the already-established plotlines, with some Forsaken, Ashaman, Aes Sedai, -angreal, and -Finn tossed into the mix, and continues to DRIVE THE PLOT FORWARD towards Tarmon-Gaidon, things will be just fine.
Rating:
Summary: A next book in a series.
Review: Many would say that Robert Jordan isn't capturing his original writting, as in his first 3 books in this series. I think this is false. It is false because many people fail to see that it isn't his writing that has gotten worse, it is the plot that has gotten smaller in the books. This isn't bad because it alows him to fill in detail he wouldn't be able to fill if there was action and adventure all through the book. This book certainly has more action that the previous 3, but it still fills the void of detail some people want more of.
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