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Crossroads of Twilight (2006 initial read; 2010 re-read) Larry Send a noteboard - 10/05/2010 02:00:06 PM
OK, so I've finally reached the point where the review series' title is misleading. This tenth volume of the WoT series, Crossroads of Twilight, came out in January 2003 in the US. However, for reasons I stated in my last commentary, I did not actually read the book until three and a half years later.

Over the years, this book has borne the dubious distinction of being considered the "worst" WoT book of them all. Even fans of the series tend to view it as containing mostly extraneous material that could and should have been included in the previous two volumes with no loss in narrative flow (if anything, narrative flow would have been sped up, these people would argue). This book is held in such low repute that back when I was a moderator for two of wotmania's forums, there were people who kept urging me to "review" the book just to see how much fun I could have in ripping it apart. So I agreed to do so almost four years ago. Too bad this one clip is the one preserved piece of that epic parody walkthrough, as I did do a part with the infamous "Elayne bath scene" where I spliced quotes from that chapter with the opening scene of Modris Eksteins' excellent World War I cultural history, Rites of Spring (the automobile graveyard, for those who are curious).

So I suppose I am at the point where those who've taken exception to my commentaries on the series are hoping that I'll be so disgusted with the horrible prose, the mostly flat and dry characterizations, the execrable plotting, and glacial pace that I'd do a Roberto Duran and cry out, "No más, no más!"

But there's this funny thing called developed tolerance. If I can tolerate the increasingly tepid subplots, most of which are repetitive in feel (Nynaeve and Elayne are headstrong, view men dimly, get in trouble, luck out in the end, for example) and with little in the way of good character development (I know Jordan tried to develop his characters, but most of those attempts felt a bit forced and rather odd in their timing, to say the least), like I have over the course of this series, then Crossroads of Twilight isn't going to be noticeably worse than most of the preceding volumes. If anything, it is more of the same. Adam Roberts, who's reading this series for the first time and has been commenting on one book a week for the past two months, had two interesting posts that include guesses as to why this might be the case with the series, particularly in its second half. Many readers want "safe" and "more of the same" and in Crossroads of Twilight, they get plenty of both.

I suppose some might wonder what "safe" means when in the story there are ghosts and the beginnings of reality itself becoming unraveled. From a narrative point, yes, the stakes are raised higher, but on a thematic level, there is nothing really threatening about what's happening. The readers "know" that the characters will eventually triumph and that a return to peace and justice will (largely) occur. There are no challenges to how the reader perceives the meta-story or to the reader's preconceptions of the world surrounding them (the "real" world, not the faux "world" of immersive fantasies). What's left inside the narrative, especially this one, is such a focus on the material aspects of society (the teas of various sorts being sipped, the grains purchased, etc.) that for me, the whole thing feels like a bourgeois model of a fantasy rather than anything that truly "lives" or "breathes" any sense of difference; things are what they are, semantics-wise, in the fantasy world as they are in the "real" world. The character concerns are virtually the same, once you strip away the setting and lurking evil, with those of merchants and industrialists rather than with farmers and artisans of the medieval and early modern eras (WoT purportedly being set in a Renaissance-level society minus firearms). While for many readers this makes it easier to get inside the characters' "heads" and to enjoy what's happening (since they can understand their motives better), for some, such as myself, this is a jarring event that makes the "fantasy" appear to be more than a commodification of folk beliefs and practices.

As I said above, Crossroads of Twilight is merely more of the same. It just continues the pattern (pun?) set down in the earlier volumes. Nothing much is advanced, and in fact almost 3/4 of the novel is devoted to covering the other characters' reactions to what was occurring in the Cleansing scene at the end of the previous novel. There are no resolutions to speak of and one little cliffhanger at the end. But even that cliffhanger doesn't mean a character is threatened, but more something that will depend on the next two books in the series for it to be resolved. Again, the basic pattern just repeats here, with nothing much to praise and little to condemn that hasn't already been condemned in the previous novels. Just more of the same, just the way the author probably hoped the readers would like it.

But for me, Crossroads of Twilight was just another bourgeois fantasy that aped the mannerisms of more dangerous, challenging fantasies. As I'm now passing the halfway point in the next volume, Knife of Dreams, can't say there's any change to the overall structure or attitude within the series. It's not good, far from it, but by this point, the reader has imbibed enough sauce from reading this series to be numb enough to continue on. Since I've already reviewed the twelfth volume, The Gathering Storm, a little over six months, Knife of Dreams and the prequel New Spring will be the last two WoT books discussed here. The sameness is almost hypnotic, but I can break this wheel of (reading) time, I know I can!
Illusions fall like the husk of a fruit, one after another, and the fruit is experience. - Narrator, Sylvie

Je suis méchant.
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Re-reading WoT Ten Years Later - 16/04/2010 06:07:40 AM 2861 Views
The Eye of the World (1997-2000, 2010 reads) - 16/04/2010 06:08:54 AM 1325 Views
Ah, jumping on Roberts' bandwagon... - 16/04/2010 09:17:08 AM 1066 Views
- 16/04/2010 03:32:41 PM 992 Views
Re: The Eye of the World (1997-2000, 2010 reads) - 16/04/2010 06:29:53 PM 1051 Views
I think you misrepresent me - 16/04/2010 11:15:34 PM 950 Views
Re: I think you misrepresent me - 17/04/2010 02:56:53 PM 974 Views
Re: I think you misrepresent me - 17/04/2010 09:45:25 PM 920 Views
Re: I think you misrepresent me - 17/04/2010 10:59:20 PM 1077 Views
MA in History? Is there a more useless degree? - 16/04/2010 09:56:36 PM 911 Views
PhD or MA in Classics - 16/04/2010 10:15:51 PM 863 Views
Yes, whatever degree you have/are studying for - 16/04/2010 11:12:55 PM 905 Views
MBA. Sorry - 17/04/2010 04:38:03 AM 925 Views
There's lots of jokes about MBAs, unfortunately - 17/04/2010 09:46:28 PM 925 Views
Interestingly, I disliked EotW because of its 'youth appeal' - 17/04/2010 12:33:55 AM 1028 Views
Funny how takes can change, huh? - 17/04/2010 12:55:05 AM 1028 Views
Funny, I started my own first-ever reread not long ago. - 17/04/2010 02:16:35 AM 1000 Views
Must be something in the water, no? - 17/04/2010 02:28:23 AM 1016 Views
Gah! - 18/04/2010 12:30:17 PM 901 Views
I thought you meant it! - 18/04/2010 05:29:55 PM 1015 Views
Pfft! - 18/04/2010 08:11:36 PM 913 Views
I'm glad I didn't start with EotW - 19/04/2010 04:16:03 PM 877 Views
Seems Tor is now tweeting about this commentary - 19/04/2010 06:31:39 PM 1088 Views
Re: Re-reading WoT Ten Years Later - 16/04/2010 06:26:51 PM 1012 Views
It'll be interesting to see if I hit a "wall" - 16/04/2010 11:13:55 PM 921 Views
Aww... - 16/04/2010 07:58:27 PM 1013 Views
That's next month or June - 16/04/2010 11:12:02 PM 877 Views
Be sure to send me a noteboard then . - 17/04/2010 03:45:46 AM 899 Views
Oh, I'd post it at this site as well, perhaps - 17/04/2010 03:51:19 AM 853 Views
Yeah, but I only lurk in the OF when I'm interested in getting new books... - 17/04/2010 04:00:14 AM 867 Views
Ah - 17/04/2010 09:47:37 PM 872 Views
Malazan 9 is out? - 17/04/2010 09:58:23 PM 741 Views
Been out for several months - 17/04/2010 10:24:15 PM 845 Views
Can anybody please explain to me - 17/04/2010 08:45:18 PM 1062 Views
It's hard to explain - 17/04/2010 09:42:16 PM 1103 Views
was thinking the same thing *NM* - 18/04/2010 03:59:36 PM 601 Views
Re: Can anybody please explain to me - 19/04/2010 04:17:39 PM 752 Views
The more posts from this larry guy I read, the more I think......... - 18/04/2010 08:56:34 AM 1040 Views
Interesting metatextual analysis there - 18/04/2010 09:47:43 AM 1066 Views
Nice, but in the future... - 18/04/2010 04:04:07 PM 944 Views
I know... - 18/04/2010 08:11:18 PM 897 Views
If you don't like WoT....Don't read it - 19/04/2010 12:36:06 AM 864 Views
Aren't you being a bit presumptuous there? - 19/04/2010 12:53:00 AM 1278 Views
... - 19/04/2010 12:59:33 AM 1037 Views
Re: ... - 21/04/2010 03:41:08 AM 1005 Views
Re: The more posts from this larry guy I read, the more I think......... - 18/04/2010 10:26:12 AM 1050 Views
I am disappoint - 19/04/2010 01:17:20 AM 1039 Views
- 19/04/2010 01:24:29 AM 905 Views
Who the hell are you? What the hell are you doing here? - 19/04/2010 06:48:56 PM 1033 Views
Oh crap, a troll! - 02/05/2010 08:53:36 PM 874 Views
The Great Hunt (1997-2000, 2010 reads) - 19/04/2010 09:22:40 AM 1025 Views
I guess I'm just weird. - 19/04/2010 06:44:59 PM 1108 Views
If anything, I suspect my reaction is the minority one - 19/04/2010 09:20:25 PM 1047 Views
It's interesting you thought this about The Great Hunt. - 19/04/2010 07:06:57 PM 850 Views
Yeah, I almost gave up this series after The Eye of the World too. *NM* - 19/04/2010 08:38:25 PM 535 Views
My actual introduction to the series was A Crown of Swords - 19/04/2010 09:26:19 PM 984 Views
By the way... - 19/04/2010 09:44:59 PM 782 Views
Ah, that. - 19/04/2010 09:53:02 PM 867 Views
My experience has been different: - 19/04/2010 09:04:27 PM 970 Views
That may indeed be the case - 19/04/2010 09:27:36 PM 1156 Views
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Lord of Chaos (1997-2000 initial reads; 2010 re-read) - 30/04/2010 01:33:37 PM 1144 Views
A Crown of Swords (1997-2000 initial reads; 2010 re-read) - 02/05/2010 03:30:39 PM 996 Views
The Path of Daggers (1998-2000 reads; 2010 re-read) - 04/05/2010 03:20:12 PM 826 Views
Winter's Heart (2000 initial read; 2010 re-read) - 07/05/2010 01:35:13 PM 816 Views
Re: Winter's Heart (2000 initial read; 2010 re-read) - 08/05/2010 09:43:31 AM 928 Views
But I must - 08/05/2010 09:59:42 AM 752 Views
Re: But I must - 08/05/2010 02:57:03 PM 846 Views
I just think of bath porn - 08/05/2010 03:12:29 PM 1020 Views
Crossroads of Twilight (2006 initial read; 2010 re-read) - 10/05/2010 02:00:06 PM 922 Views
Knife of Dreams (2009 initial read; 2010 re-read) - 13/05/2010 03:27:53 PM 1069 Views
New Spring (1997 read (novella); 2010 read (novel)) - 14/05/2010 07:39:40 AM 1000 Views

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