Damnit, they don’t have English books in the libraries here. Which means I’ve been forced to buy books that suck but which I’m hopelessly addicted to anyway. I consider Jordan a bad habit now, sorta like smoking, except I’d probably have better luck quitting smoking.
Just quit! You’ll be SO much happier. I stopped reading after TPoD, and I keep up to date with the plot via whatever other people happen to mention.
You picked the only things from the last two books which were memorable at all to me.
And I used to be a pious Wotist.
I bought “A New Spring” over a year ago, when it came out, and still haven’t gotten around to reading it. I’m reading the latest Clive Cussler novel instead (He’s so formulaic, he makes most formulaic plots seem fresh and new!)
No more, Mr. Jordan, no more!!!
What? There might be something significant about Moiraine in the next book? Ok, count me in!
Having never read the WoT books before, I really have to wonder how nothing could have happen in an entire book. What does the character do? What are the pages devoted to? Debates? Flashbacks? Foreshadowing? History? Biography? Fashion?
Flashbacks. History. Definitely fashion…I know more now about Nynaeve’s traveling dress and her braid than I do about the Forsaken…
The last book was roughly an 80% retread of the exact same time period from another group of characters’ viewpoint. According to the Wheel of Time Character Archive, there are over 1,700 named characters in the series. There are at least six different plotlines going on and about five different factions to keep straight.
And the man has three books to bring things to a climax.
sigh
I seem to recall roughly four or five chapters dealing with Elayne’s musings as she took a bath. No, that’s not an exaggeration.
I have developed a new theory to describe the amount of plot in a Wheel of Time book. Eye of the World has a plot value of 1. The plot has a half-life of 3 books, so that at the end of the 3rd book you will have read only half as much plot as in Eye of the World. Using this handy online half-life calculator, and solving for “ending amount”, at the end of the 11th book you will have read only 0.079 the amount of plot compared to Eye of the World.
Actually I haven’t found them to be all that bad, but I’m not as fervernt about reading them as I once was. Although I do suspect that there will be 13 books.
Did J.R.R Tolkien says LoTR is unfilmmable? Wheel of Times must be the scriptwriter’s hell!
I actually thought the extended version of New Spring was worth it, if only for the insight into the workings of the White Tower for a new sister raised without any special circumstances like the ladies we’re used to. Especially the testing part.
But man, I love me some Clive Cussler, too. 
I can’t tell them apart anymore, but I still keep reading.
Hey Draelin! waves
I am always a just a step away from giving up on the whole thing, but then I’ll remember:
The story of Manetheren
The end of EoTW
The end of TGH
The battle for the Stone
Rhuiden (both times)
Battle for Emond’s field
Battle for Cairhien/Caemlyn
The Band of the Red Hand
The Black tower
Dumai’s wells (holy fucking shit!)
The Choden’col
Say what you will about Jordan, he knows how to end a book. Now if he can only learn when to end it.
Things I need to see in the next book:
Logain taking out the M’Hael
Mat inventing artillery to counter ‘magic’ (has he found his bellmaker yet?)
Thom’s rescue of Moraine
The Ogiers march
I was wondering where you and your wife were on this one! waves
I have spent the last several years dreaming of Logain beating Taim until he cries like a little girl. It may be all that keeps me going.
Well, that and the look on Galad’s face when he finds out who Rand’s mother really was. 
btw-
do we know what Cadsuane’s deal is yet?
Because, personally, if I were Rand, I would have killed the bitch a loooong time ago. As in, during the first meeting. When i think of her, I think Captain Janeway of Voyager…
I got nothing on Cadsuane more interesting than that she and Verin seem to have the same ends. What they are … well, we’re still working on that.
I’d like to tear off her arm and beat her with it most of the time, though.
Now this is something that keeps me going. Galad always does what’s right, right? What the heck is he going to do here? Will he leave the Whitecloaks? Or will he decide that his oath to them overrides any duty he might have to a half-brother he didn’t know existed?
I think he might just commit suicide. One less character to keep track of. Hurray!
Oh, and also Verin once lied. I want to know what’s going on there.
And, given his parentage, there’s a distinct possibility that Galad can channel. I would very much like for someone to test him.
I think it’s been established by the rabid fan-base that Verin probably didn’t lie, there was just a bunch o’ word-twisting. I’ll have to look for the arguments again. Stonebow, you remember any of them?
What, just because both of Galad’s parents had children with someone else who can channel? You know, that never occurred to me. Interesting idea.
I am positive Verin lied, I don’t care what the rabid fanbase said. It’s actually very obvious. Jordan even brings attention to it.
TGH, p. 231:
“Moiraine Sedai sent me, Lord Ingtar,” Verin announced with a satisfied smile.
TGH, p. 675:
“I did not send Verin.” Moiraine frowned. “She did that on her own.”
There you go. Either Verin or Moiraine is lying, and since we’ve occasionally had the story told from Moiraine’s perspective, I think it’s probably Verin.
I’m pretty sure she lied… that her experiments with the tang’real let her figure out a way out of the oaths she took- somehow, she broke the bond of the oath rod. I think it’s alluded to in her early talks with Egwene in the Tower, and we know that it can be done in later books.
There might be other clues, but I forget at the moment.
Another bitch here. I can’t wait for the next book. Unfortunately, I’ve got all the others in paperback, so I have to wait a bit longer to keep up my matched set. Yes, the plot is dragging like a one legged racehorse, but I’m eating it up. I love the sprawling, I love the sideplots, the prophecies, the minor characters you never see again for 5 books until they pop up where you least expect it. Love it, love it, love it.
And the only thing that could make me change my mind, I think, is if the ending doesn’t make it worthwhile. I want the ending to be suitably epic, and all (OK, at least 90%) of the bits and pieces and plot threads to tie up and make sense. That’s all I want, and it it takes 20 more books to get there, so be it. (although I’m pretty sure he said he was stopping soon. Something like #14 or 15?)
I just pray we’re not stuck with another X-files ending, where everything is crammed in at the end and supposed to fit together in a way that makes no sense and was obviously never intended to do so. Or worse, a Dune ending, where things look like they’re about to pick up an then he dies, leaving it undone.
I suspect R. Jordan managed to finagle himself a Dumas deal, and is getting paid by the word.