Scan barcode
A review by mightyjor
The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan
3.0
3/5 stars
For 2024 I made a goal to read and finish the entire Wheel of Time series. I should probably have tried to read one of them before I committed to that, because...no. That's not happening in a year.
I do still intend to read the whole thing, but spread out over 3-4 years, allowing about 3-5 books a year. I might trim this down starting next year, but my big concern is Epic Fantasy burnout before Stormlight book 5 hits and I'd like to reread that series before December so I'm freshly caught up. Instead, I think I'll do about 4 books this year and see how I feel. A lot of people say the series really hits its stride by book 4 with that being a fan favorite, so it seems like a good place to set a break point for myself so I can come back to it with fondness rather than misery if I were to put it down after a book I hated, which I fully believe might happen during some of these later books if the rumors are true.
So what did I think of this one? You might think I hated it. I don't. I actually enjoyed quite a bit of it. My really insulting summary of it would be The Fellowship of the Ring, but twice as long with half as much happening. On the plus side, the prose itself is actually very easy to follow along with, unlike some other classics. The trade off is that it's not nearly as poetic as something like Tolkien, but few things are. I guess it's not that old, but it feels like it could have come out today and there's nothing overly distracting about the prose, at least in the first book. I've heard mockery about phrases that pop up over the series but I haven't seen them used yet.
The plot itself is extremely basic on the surface. It feels like a very 'this happened, then this happened, then this happened' sort of story. I never felt like the drama ramped up in any meaningful way or that our characters were in any real danger. It's saving grace is the ending reveal: not the final battle at the eye of the world, that was boring. I mean the moments when you think the heroes have won, then you realize that something isn't quite right and no one really knows what happened or what is going on. While it might have felt sloppy if I wasn't in the right mood for it, I was honestly expecting a hokey happy ending and was thrilled that there was actually something deeper going on. I would have liked to actually know where our heroes were going and why for most of the book, since it really just feels like they're running from trolocks , then from white cloaks, then from the fade, the from dark friends, and we don't really get a sense that theyre moving towards anything. I mean I know that they're trying to go to the eye of the world or something to stop the dark one...but what does that even mean? How? You're sending a couple farm boys to battle the ancient God of Evil? What's even the plan here? It just made most of the book feel like a boring chore to get through.
That said, I actually liked spending time with our characters. I think it was nice to finally read about these legends in one of the most popular fantasy series of all time, to see the famous moraine and rand on the page and learn about their personalities.
Speaking of which, let's talk about characters since I know they're a big part of the series and I'm curious how I'll feel when it's all over:
Moraine and Lan are easily my favorites of the bunch. I love every second we spend with them. The Lan/Nynyeve romance came out of freaking nowhere for me but it wasn't a huge part of the book so I'll ignore it. Moraine is by far the best though. All the fireballs and fire walls were a little corny, but I really enjoyed the subtler uses of her magic. Her talking about the interrogation of Padan Fain near the end was chilling. The way she puts her duty above everything and having to mother a bunch of idiot teenagers to try and save a world that's falling apart is brilliant.
Perrin, Matt and Rand I find equally interesting, though I felt most engaged by the Perrin chapters. It seems like he's actually taking whatever is going on seriously and knows he's got some crap to figure out or someone's getting hurt. Mat seems like he doesn't realize he's got crap to figure out, and Rand knows he's got crap to figure out and just wants to kind of ignore it. So yeah, Perrin is the clear winner of the bunch.
Egwaine and Nynyeve were insufferable. Every scene with them in it they were either bullying someone or bragging about themselves. Egwaine is younger so I can forgive it a bit more, and she is there for Rand in the end which I like, but Nynyeve. Ugh. It's going to take some work to win me back with her. She reminds me of the Trunchbull or something.
I hear that the series really becomes it's own thing soon, so I'm really looking forward to that shift. I might read a few books in between and then pick up book 2 in a month or two.
For 2024 I made a goal to read and finish the entire Wheel of Time series. I should probably have tried to read one of them before I committed to that, because...no. That's not happening in a year.
I do still intend to read the whole thing, but spread out over 3-4 years, allowing about 3-5 books a year. I might trim this down starting next year, but my big concern is Epic Fantasy burnout before Stormlight book 5 hits and I'd like to reread that series before December so I'm freshly caught up. Instead, I think I'll do about 4 books this year and see how I feel. A lot of people say the series really hits its stride by book 4 with that being a fan favorite, so it seems like a good place to set a break point for myself so I can come back to it with fondness rather than misery if I were to put it down after a book I hated, which I fully believe might happen during some of these later books if the rumors are true.
So what did I think of this one? You might think I hated it. I don't. I actually enjoyed quite a bit of it. My really insulting summary of it would be The Fellowship of the Ring, but twice as long with half as much happening. On the plus side, the prose itself is actually very easy to follow along with, unlike some other classics. The trade off is that it's not nearly as poetic as something like Tolkien, but few things are. I guess it's not that old, but it feels like it could have come out today and there's nothing overly distracting about the prose, at least in the first book. I've heard mockery about phrases that pop up over the series but I haven't seen them used yet.
The plot itself is extremely basic on the surface. It feels like a very 'this happened, then this happened, then this happened' sort of story. I never felt like the drama ramped up in any meaningful way or that our characters were in any real danger. It's saving grace is the ending reveal: not the final battle at the eye of the world, that was boring. I mean the moments when you think the heroes have won, then you realize that something isn't quite right and no one really knows what happened or what is going on. While it might have felt sloppy if I wasn't in the right mood for it, I was honestly expecting a hokey happy ending and was thrilled that there was actually something deeper going on. I would have liked to actually know where our heroes were going and why for most of the book, since it really just feels like they're running from trolocks , then from white cloaks, then from the fade, the from dark friends, and we don't really get a sense that theyre moving towards anything. I mean I know that they're trying to go to the eye of the world or something to stop the dark one...but what does that even mean? How? You're sending a couple farm boys to battle the ancient God of Evil? What's even the plan here? It just made most of the book feel like a boring chore to get through.
That said, I actually liked spending time with our characters. I think it was nice to finally read about these legends in one of the most popular fantasy series of all time, to see the famous moraine and rand on the page and learn about their personalities.
Speaking of which, let's talk about characters since I know they're a big part of the series and I'm curious how I'll feel when it's all over:
Moraine and Lan are easily my favorites of the bunch. I love every second we spend with them. The Lan/Nynyeve romance came out of freaking nowhere for me but it wasn't a huge part of the book so I'll ignore it. Moraine is by far the best though. All the fireballs and fire walls were a little corny, but I really enjoyed the subtler uses of her magic. Her talking about the interrogation of Padan Fain near the end was chilling. The way she puts her duty above everything and having to mother a bunch of idiot teenagers to try and save a world that's falling apart is brilliant.
Perrin, Matt and Rand I find equally interesting, though I felt most engaged by the Perrin chapters. It seems like he's actually taking whatever is going on seriously and knows he's got some crap to figure out or someone's getting hurt. Mat seems like he doesn't realize he's got crap to figure out, and Rand knows he's got crap to figure out and just wants to kind of ignore it. So yeah, Perrin is the clear winner of the bunch.
Egwaine and Nynyeve were insufferable. Every scene with them in it they were either bullying someone or bragging about themselves. Egwaine is younger so I can forgive it a bit more, and she is there for Rand in the end which I like, but Nynyeve. Ugh. It's going to take some work to win me back with her. She reminds me of the Trunchbull or something.
I hear that the series really becomes it's own thing soon, so I'm really looking forward to that shift. I might read a few books in between and then pick up book 2 in a month or two.