My favourite aspect of Jordan's writing is his many characters, and how they're all kept individual and given their own distinct voices, even when all they get is a couple of lines. Most writers can't do that. My close-run second favourite thing is how he doesn't insult our intelligence by explaining everything; he'll leave a few cryptic clues and let the reader work out the puzzle.



EoTW 'feels' like less of a WoT book than any other in the series, to me. I get the impression Jordan was still finding his feet and working out the details of his world while he was writing it. The characterisation of Moiraine - remember that staff? jeez - was especially glaringly odd. I think it he'd had the opportunity or inclination to re-write it, it would be a very different book.



Hail and Hallelujah, there's someone else who doesn't like Elayne! *weeps with happiness* while she can occasionally be amusing, most of her scenes in recent books have made me want to bite something. She keeps nearly getting killed in stupid, preventable ways, which wouldn't bother me, except that she doesn't stop to think if she's putting the people around her in danger too. Examples - early in PoD, playing with the ter'angreal. Remember that little hedgehog that snared Faile, and later Perrin? Or the one that gives you such a headache that you can't channel for hours afterwards? The lot of them could have been passed out on the ground when the Seanchan turned up. Did she listen when Vandene tried to tell her this? No, she did not. Elayne made an a'dam once, so she knows best.

(also, remember when she found the book ter'angreal, the AoL ebook reader? She did not even realise what she had found! There could be priceless information preserved in there, both historically and tactically, and it's rotting in a storeroom somewhere! For that alone, my estimation of her intelligence sank into negative numbers.)

As has been remarked upon, her decision making becomes - if possible - even worse after she learns of her pregnancy. Utterly convinced of her own invulnerability, she throws herself into hideous danger, heedless of the many terrible things that could happen and still leave her able to bear children. What if she was stilled, or burned out? Her bonds would be snapped, killing both Birgitte and Rand! Or what if she was kidnapped, forkrooted, and kept in Mellar's basement? Her babies might be born healthy, but she'd be wishing for death long before they were.

Of all the characters we have seen, Elayne is the only one who has not changed and grown over time. Elayne the Queen is still the same thoughtless child who thought it was a good idea to have a friendly chat with an armed peasant in a secluded garden, with no idea who he was and not a guard in sight.



I don't know if 'misogynistic' is the word I would use for this - perhaps chauvinistic would be more accurate. And the sad thing is that all three characters had opportunities to stop and analyse their own prejudice, and do better. And they didn't. Rand, surrounded by Far Dareis Mai, was never able to see past their gender and accept them as warriors. Mat never made the connection between Tylin's behaviour and his own. And Perrin kept trying to send Faile 'out of danger', instead of treating her as an equal, capable of choosing her own risks. (though of all three of them, Perrin at least showed improvement, which the other two did not)



I always assumed the 'three women' thing was a bit of harmless wish fulfilment on the part of the author. It certainly does stretch credulity. I don't see why there needs to be three of them; Min has done a fine job of loving him, being there for him, on her own.