Octopus Overlords

I think I actually started reading the series in 1994. So this year marks an incredible 20-year relationship with these books. Crazy!

I started reading in September 1994 after a college friend recommended it to me. I finished last September - so 19 years for me. That's 7 years before I met my wife. Crazy.

stessier wrote:I started reading in September 1994 after a college friend recommended it to me. I finished last September - so 19 years for me. That's 7 years before I met my wife. Crazy.

I would have started reading it in the mid-90s, I think, which means more than half my life.

Picked it up in 1990 - squarely in the middle of 10th grade. I remember thinking the Eye of the World cover looked interesting, I had no idea what to expect.

I remember staying up all night to finish the Dragon Reborn, had to have been sometime in '92 - at the time, I thought it was the final book for some reason - ha! Trilogies were kind of a fantasy standard once...

I'd have to do some sleuthing to figure out when I started, but I think it was around 1991 or 1992. By the mid-1990s, I was reading the Robert Jordan Usenet group on a regular basis with people who dug deeply into analysis of who was who (especially among the Forsaken), what was likely coming, and so forth. It was the first series I'd ever done that with. Finishing this series was the culmination of two decades of "work," and felt like a triumph for me almost as much as it would have for Rigney if he'd made it to the end.

I just finished a book I bought in October of 1998... and it was only six hundred some pages.

1 down, 5 to go.

coopasonic wrote:I just finished a book I bought in October of 1998... and it was only six hundred some pages.

1 down, 5 to go.

Hah, I did the same thing. I was royally pissed after A Crown of Swords came out and didn't really advance the story much, since at the time everybody thought it was book 7 in a 9-part series, and it didn't seem remotely possible that the story could be wrapped up in a mere two more volumes. A Path of Daggers was the first book I ever bought, stuck on a shelf, and didn't read. For the next 14 years, ha ha!

I did it. Last night I read the last page of The Wheel of Time, a journey I started 22 years ago. I have to say I'm glad it's over. It really did pick up nicely toward the end.

Just finished book 7 - A Crown of Swords. I loved it and I'm proclaiming it my favorite book of the series. Previously, my favorite was book 5 - The Fires of Heaven. The prologue of book 5 is one of my favorite chapters! The entire series is very good, no duds so far. I definitely will be finishing it. Right now though I'm going to take a break and start reading Mistborn. I've read Wheel of Time for a solid year and need a break. I didn't really know much about this series until I stumbled upon this thread. My wife got me the first three books last Christmas and that's when I started it. I don't have much time to read and I'm a slow reader. I enjoy all the descriptions and character development that Jordan writes. I'm a type of reader that likes to go slow, tries to remember all the characters, and keep track of their movements on the map. So here I am 12 months later. Seven books down and seven more to go. I'm in no hurry to finish, I love the ride.

Thanks for the thread and recommendation!

Mistborn is light, easy reading. I still need to read the 4th book that is set in the same world (but is not really a part of the trilogy AFAIK).

Crazy talk. Some people are not awesome.

You can apparently watch it on Youtube.

But realistically, you should not. It is crap. The company made this and aired it for the sole purpose of retaining the rights, which coincidentally would expire on Wednesday if they hadn't. What this is going to do is tie up any future work on The Wheel of Time as they battle over the production rights in court.

Yeah, finally watched it. I thought Billy Zane was competent as Ishamael. The rest? Blech. This prologue is one of the most riveting chapters of fantasy I've read, and this 'pilot' was... not.

How about a real series?

Update: Wanted to share with you exciting news about The Wheel of Time. Legal issues have been resolved. The Wheel of Time will become a cutting edge TV series! I couldn’t be more pleased. Look for the official announcement coming soon from a major studio —Harriet 

They should definitely cast Idris Elba as Rand.

I haven't posted an update in this thread in more than two years, but I finally finished the Wheel of Time a couple weeks ago...roughly 19 years after reading The Eye of the World for the first time, and a little more than three years after starting the whole thing over!

I have to say that I really enjoyed the series and am very satisfied with the way it ended. We received a suitably epic ending to such a massive story, and Sanderson did a great job of wrapping it all up in Jordan's absence. While there were slow parts in the middle, I can't say that there was ever a book that I didn't enjoy, and the pace of the ending was incredible. Once I was into the last battle, I could hardly put the book down.

All of that said, I'm glad to finally have the WoT behind me and able to fully move on to other things. I've been alternating with other books for a while and can finally focus on another series in earnest...as soon as I read 'New Spring'

Zaxxon wrote:Yeah, finally watched it. I thought Billy Zane was competent as Ishamael. The rest? Blech. This prologue is one of the most riveting chapters of fantasy I've read, and this 'pilot' was... not.

Just watched the first fifteen second and am already trying to remember if those lines were anywhere in the books or if they paraphrased LOTR. Then I got to skip ahead to 2:40 before the production actually started, then got fifteen seconds of interior architectural detailing and gave up.

Finished my audiobook listen through the series a couple of months ago. Was much easier to follow for me that way. Really enjoyed how it wrapped up. Started a listen through the Malazan saga right after. Up to book 5 so far.

Cortilian wrote:Finished my audiobook listen through the series a couple of months ago. Was much easier to follow for me that way. Really enjoyed how it wrapped up. Started a listen through the Malazan saga right after. Up to book 5 so far.

I have never listened to an audiobook. I'm particularly terrified of them pronouncing ridiculous fantasy names differently than I do in my head and ruining everything.

Sometimes it reveals to me how something 'should' have been said. The worst thing is when they change pronunciations between books. You didn't say that word that way in the last book!

I started reading it in 1990, a few years after getting married. I loved the early books and I made it up through Knife of Dreams but I was getting pretty frustrated with Jordan by that point. Getting through the later books in the series was like Chinese water torture for me. I have the ones Sanderson wrote to finish up the series so one day when I'm in the mood I'll chug through them just to see what happens if nothing else.

Cortilian wrote:The worst thing is when they change pronunciations between books. You didn't say that word that way in the last book!

That would make me want to punch something.

ColdSteel wrote:I started reading it in 1990, a few years after getting married. I loved the early books and I made it up through Knife of Dreams but I was getting pretty frustrated with Jordan by that point. Getting through the later books in the series was like Chinese water torture for me. I have the ones Sanderson wrote to finish up the series so one day when I'm in the mood I'll chug through them just to see what happens if nothing else.

Sanderson made it fun again. Between Jordan leaving copious notes and having written many chapters (including the last one), his wife still being an editor and involved in the project, and Sanderson having been a fan, it went incredibly well. Sanderson was able to streamline what I think would have taken Jordan years and several more books to write, while getting all of the important points across. Some day I will go back and read everything in a row again (many, many years from now). It will be interesting to compare Jordan vs. Sanderson at that point.

Don't read this if you haven't finished the series:

I recently started re-reading the series and something in The Great Hunt is bugging me.

During the time Rand, Loial, and Hurin are separated from Ingtar they stay at at least two Inns. The second for several days and possibly up to a few weeks. Where was Rand getting the gold for this?

There’s no mention of him paying except a couple coppers to get into the room with Thom.

I've been told that a gleeman makes pretty good money, and can attract custom to an inn's common room.

I'm working my way through A Crown of Swords at the moment.

Isgrimnur wrote: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:07 pm I've been told that a gleeman makes pretty good money, and can attract custom to an inn's common room.

I'm working my way through A Crown of Swords at the moment.

But Rand was pretending to be a lord at that point. I don’t think innkeepers would give away room to the nobility. But who knows. It was Cairhien and everyone knows they are crazy.

Every few years I think that I should try this series again but never get around to it. I read each book as they came out but seriously hated it by book 8. I don't even think I finished book 8 before deciding that I was done. I know that Sanderson made the series better after Jordan died but was it that much better than it's worth trying to read those mind numbingly tedious middle books? Maybe read the first 5 again and then find cliff notes for 6-10?

Book 7 has certainly slowed me down a bit.

wire wrote: Mon Nov 13, 2017 5:47 pmEvery few years I think that I should try this series again but never get around to it.

I'm the same way. Lord of Chaos (#6) broke me, but when I did finally get through it, I managed to complete Winter's Heart (#9), at which point I vowed to stop reading until it was done. I'd love to do a series re-read and actually finish them all. Maybe they'll be a crazy sale on Amazon for the Kindle versions because there's no way I'm carrying those damn books again.

I think I've mentioned it elsewhere, but I let a friend borrow the original back in college. She was reading it on the bus between classes when someone struck up a conversation with her about it. They started dating and eventually got married. Never did get that copy back.

disarm wrote: Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:02 pm I haven't posted an update in this thread in more than two years, but I finally finished the Wheel of Time a couple weeks ago...roughly 19 years after reading The Eye of the World for the first time, and a little more than three years after starting the whole thing over!

Interesting timing. I've been picking away at the series since I was a teenager and only decided to power through it once I got over my concern that books on my Kindle might evaporate and I'd have nothing to show for it. I concluded the last book a week ago. It was massively easier to stick my Kindle in my pocket and pull it out when I had a few minutes than to try and lug around fourteen 1,200 page paperbacks.

Prior to that, I always got hung up around book 7 or 8, when entire sections were dedicated to players that didn't matter one bit doing crap that no one cared about and reading it was like rubbing sandpaper on my eyes.

Paingod wrote:

disarm wrote: Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:02 pm I haven't posted an update in this thread in more than two years, but I finally finished the Wheel of Time a couple weeks ago...roughly 19 years after reading The Eye of the World for the first time, and a little more than three years after starting the whole thing over!

Interesting timing...

Interesting timing? My post is from November of last year

Damn this ancient book series and the years-spanning posts that make me look a fool.

At least no one in this thread is tugging at braids or smoothing skirts.

This thread reboot is interesting timing for me as well. I just started listening to the audiobooks for the first time (they do pronounce some things a little different then I do in my head but they are very well done). I have read the complete series before and am a big fan. Love it as much now as ever. I was going to do one book at a time and intersperse other books as I went along however I always want to read the next when I finish the last so I am now 3/4 way through book 5 after about 4 weeks.

I agree with most that books 7-10 are weaker than the rest of the series. When I read them as they came out I got frustrated as well. I do think they hold up much better when you read the series as a whole with no waiting between books. I admit I do find it strange when people say they liked the first few but not as much after that. If someone doesn't care for the series as a whole fine, everyone's tastes are different. But I honestly have a hard time seeing how someone who liked books 2 and 3 can not like books 4, 5, and 6 just as much. Book 6 is awesome, it's still my favorite of the series.

On Jordan's writing speed: I think history has shown that Jordan gets too much flak for this. When the books were coming out I got just as mad and frustrated as everyone else but looking back Jordan had a steady release schedule that stands up really well when compared to today's writers. He wrote 12 books (which includes "New Spring" that is 122,150 words long, 1/2 as long as one of his full books). Here are the pub dates: 1990, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2004 (New Spring), 2005. (Nov 2000 and Jan 2003 so really 2 years also)

He actually spoiled people in the beginning writing a book a year, which for books from 251,392 words to 389,823 words is crazy fast. His later books only came out slow compared to his first books. 2 years a book for novels of this size I think is perfectly normal. Look at all the epic fantasy series writers of today, few go faster then 2 years a book and a lot take much longer (you all know the worst offenders).

xenocide wrote: Tue Nov 14, 2017 4:20 pmI agree with most that books 7-10 are weaker than the rest of the series. When I read them as they came out I got frustrated as well. I do think they hold up much better when you read the series as a whole with no waiting between books.

The Wheel of This Thread turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legends fade to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the third age by some, an Age yet to come, an age long past, a thought rose in the Mountains of Mist. The thought was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings or endings to the turning of the Wheel of This Thread. But it was a beginning.

On Jordan's writing speed: I think history has shown that Jordan gets too much flak for this. When the books were coming out I got just as mad and frustrated as everyone else but looking back Jordan had a steady release schedule that stands up really well when compared to today's writers. He wrote 12 books (which includes "New Spring" that is 122,150 words long, 1/2 as long as one of his full books). Here are the pub dates: 1990, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2004 (New Spring), 2005. (Nov 2000 and Jan 2003 so really 2 years also)

Uh, yes. It was nuts when people complained about it when he was writing, and it's nuts that they give him flak for it now. Hell, GRRM took 5 years to write book 4 alone, 6 years to write book 5, and TBD, but no fewer than 7 years to write book 6.

xenocide wrote: Tue Nov 14, 2017 4:20 pmI agree with most that books 7-10 are weaker than the rest of the series. When I read them as they came out I got frustrated as well. I do think they hold up much better when you read the series as a whole with no waiting between books.

I don't think they are weaker, but I did find it frustrating trying to read them as they came out. It seems like a huge detour but when you are able to read them back to back, it really provides a nice fleshing out of the story and I really enjoyed them.

I really loved this series.

xenocide wrote: Tue Nov 14, 2017 4:20 pm When the books were coming out I got just as mad and frustrated as everyone else but looking back Jordan had a steady release schedule that stands up really well when compared to today's writers.

Today's writers, except Brandon Sanderson.

stessier wrote: Tue Nov 14, 2017 4:49 pmI don't think they are weaker, but I did find it frustrating trying to read them as they came out. It seems like a huge detour but when you are able to read them back to back, it really provides a nice fleshing out of the story and I really enjoyed them.

It is all relative. This is my favorite fantasy series and I love books 1-6, so being "weaker" than those books to me does not mean bad. I still like 7-10, just not as much as 1-6 and 11 (and the end of 9). For me it's really 7, 8, and the first 1/2 of 9 that seem the weakest. I think of books 10 and 11 more as one mega book with 10 being more setup and 11 being more payoff, 10s release was the low point for me as the books came out because we got all this setup with not a lot of payoff especially after the awesome conclusion of 9 but once I read 10 and 11 back to back there was no issue what so ever.

I still feel the Perrin/Faile/Berelain story line and the prophet story line were both too drawn out (the prophet especially). And those 2 story lines being told together didn't help.

Fitzy wrote: Tue Nov 14, 2017 5:58 pmToday's writers, except Brandon Sanderson.

Well I don't know how fair it is to compare writers to the inhuman freaky fast writer that Sanderson is