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Knife of Dreams | Rating | |
| B | |||
| Robert Jordan | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| The Wheel of Time | The World of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time, New Spring, The Eye of the World, The Great Hunt, The Dragon Reborn, The Shadow Rising, The Fires of Heaven, Lord of Chaos, A Crown of Thorns, The Path of Daggers, Winter's Heart, Crossroads of Twilight, Knife of Dreams | ||
Perrin's wife is still a captive of the Shaido. Egwene is captive of the White Tower. Mat is trying to travel incognito with a Seanchan princess in tow. Rand is beginning to gird himself for the Final Battle that he knows is coming. And everywhere there are Darkfriends and Black Ajah, all trying to bring their own plans to fruition.
Jordan alotted no space, none at all, to recapping the story to this point. There is no hint how events reached this point; the book just continues on from the last volume. This saves readers from being told what they should already know, true, but a little reminding would have been nice. Not everyone will want to reread the entire series every time a new book comes out, after all, and it seems the author is expecting his readers to do exactly that. Or have a damn good memory, anyway.
On the good side - the very good side - Jordan seems to have heard his fans' cries at last. This book moves. Not so fast as Eye of the World, no, but things do happen. A confrontation that would in the last few books have taken literally chapters to build up in loving detail is sometimes reached in pages. Real progress is made along several plotlines that have been dragged out over the last two books or more, and some are even resolved. The events in chapter 24, for instance, would probably have taken around 200 pages to see through from beginning to end. Here, it took 35.
As a result, this is no placeholder. Any fan that managed to grit their teeth and plow on through the last two books is in for a treat. The individual characters' threads advance. The plot advances. The end is not yet here, but it is clearly on its way. It's a very nice reward for suffering through the last book or two. Any fan of Jordan who has been thinking of dropping this series as an overwordy, expensive excercise in treading metaphorical water should reconsider. Now is definitely not the time to give up.
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