Reading her PoV, one thing strikes me. The biggest flaw to Brandon's writing is that when characters start talking, we stop seeing their points of view.
It's funny, but I think I noticed something like that with tGS, namely, the Warder bonds. Where Jordan used that as a supplement to dialogue and body language, for Rand and Min to be noticing how the other felt, and their internal reactions to things (much like Perrin's scents), in tGS, they only noted the bonds when the other party was out of their presence. Aviendha is aware of Rand's bond, except when he is actually in front of her in the cover scene, and Min and Rand mostly only note the bond's input when the other one leaves the room. IIRC, the bond never comes up in the Dominion Bond scene, and that should have been a key factor in Rand's torment. Instead, he is often describing her emotions in terms of facial expressions "she looked shocked" or seemed amused or the like. I had thought he just was forgetting it, or missing its significance but maybe it's of a piece with this tendency to drop the stream of consciousness.
I noticed that too. I thought the Domination Band scene was where the bond would have been really significant. Wouldn't Semirhage the great torturer have mined this? Wouldn't her pleasure of controlling Rand have increased knowing that he could feel every bit of the pain he was forced to inflict on Min, and Min could feel his pain at doing this? Perhaps in Min's panic, her shining love for Rand which he always feels through the bond will be dimmed, and that will drive him over the edge to touching the True Power...
There was so much that could have been done to enhance the richness of that scene. But, as you said, Brandon missed it.
Even in this chapter. Rand feels Aviendha come to Merrilor. We know from the Prologue that she comes straight from Rhuidean, exhausted and depressed over what she saw. Rand didn't feel this? And he hasn't seen her since Arad Doman. How come he doesn't wonder about her after he feels her arrive? Why isn't he worried about how Elayne and Aviendha will receive the changes in him?
And why don't we get Egwene feeling the sorrow and anger and fear that obviously had to be coursing through Gawyn when he learned Caemlyn was burning?
All these opportunities to flesh out non-PoV characters in these scenes, and we get none of it. Presumably, Brandon will waste a paragraph or two detailing Gawyn's reaction when we first get his PoV, long after the event in question.
If you have to call someone "my friend" three times in a couple of minutes, he isn't.
28/09/2012 11:59:13 AM
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The only people I've ever heard say "my friend" are foreign street vendors
28/09/2012 01:19:00 PM
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Sanderson's handling of character interractions is pathetic....
28/09/2012 06:43:48 PM
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Now see, here I don't fully agree, or at least think it's a matter of taste.
28/09/2012 07:21:09 PM
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Sorry, that's just not true...
28/09/2012 11:33:59 PM
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I posted something very similar at DM. Reposting...
28/09/2012 11:46:07 PM
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Re: I posted something very similar at DM. Reposting...
29/09/2012 01:51:20 AM
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Yes!
29/09/2012 02:26:39 AM
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I complained about this regarding the Forsaken chapter
28/09/2012 07:34:25 PM
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I've long since accepted that Sanderson uses inaccurate terms like "powerful"
29/09/2012 05:44:11 AM
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To be fair, the last Moghedian PoV by RJ might have changed her a bit.
29/09/2012 03:27:31 PM
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Yes. The last time it happened to me it ended with the taxi driver fined by the NYPD.
29/09/2012 07:05:26 AM
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The burning question to me, after reading all of the comments above, is this...
29/09/2012 08:50:50 AM
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Piggybacking on someone else's established characters and near-climax-point plot?
29/09/2012 03:04:03 PM
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Both of you disgust me
29/09/2012 04:13:16 PM
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To be fair...
29/09/2012 04:36:52 PM
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True ... He may not be perfect, and he certainly made some strange choices
29/09/2012 05:37:29 PM
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B-Sand is not a ghost writer
29/09/2012 06:35:16 PM
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Didn't say he should.
29/09/2012 09:07:45 PM
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What is it you want?
29/09/2012 09:39:36 PM
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We want to bitch about an inferior product. Duh.
29/09/2012 10:00:09 PM
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Hmm that's true I guess. Sad though *NM*
29/09/2012 10:07:25 PM
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It is what it is
30/09/2012 12:52:20 AM
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You do know this isn't his series, right?
29/09/2012 04:19:00 PM
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Do you see us going to Mistborn boards to rip his series? Part of the problem is what you say.
29/09/2012 09:57:54 PM
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Apologies for not being clear: I'm only referring to WoT. Haven't read any of his other work...
30/09/2012 06:56:08 PM
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I'd agree that I like his original works more than his WoT books
01/10/2012 06:17:33 PM
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It's fairly simple....
30/09/2012 09:55:52 PM
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Thanks for that insightful response...
30/09/2012 10:37:27 PM
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Try reading something instead of judging. I recommend the Mistborn trilogy *NM*
01/10/2012 01:14:24 AM
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It's more...
01/10/2012 01:05:18 PM
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Re: The burning question to me, after reading all of the comments above, is this...
11/10/2012 08:22:27 PM
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I have an acquaintance who uses "my friend" as punctuation of every sentence.
05/10/2012 02:47:40 PM
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