a very good epic book series. The writer, Robert Jordan, just died last month while writing the final book in the 11 (12 if you include the prequel) book series. Every book is ferociously good. It is fantasy / medieval. Very cool stuff. I heard one of the cable channels was gonna take a crack at it last year, don’t know what happened. Anyway, at the end of each of his books he said he was gonna keep writing until they put the nails in his coffin - and he was right. hopefully he’s got enough notes that someone can finish up the last book.
I burned out on this series a couple books back. My friends and I were crazy about it in high school, but I just felt it went on too long and got too big and complicated for its britches. The last volume I read (can’t remember which one), felt stuffed full of peripheral characters who crowded out the main story arcs, which were slow to move anyway. I couldn’t take it and sadly gave up, with the intention of reading the last chapter of the last book when it came out to find out what happened.
Still waiting…
I’ve had to beat these books out of my basket with a stick the last few times I swung by Half Price. Maybe I’ll see if I can’t pick one up. Is Wheel of Time the first book?
the first book/prequel is New Spring:
http://www.tor.com/jordan/newspring.html
the REAL first book is the Eye of the World:
http://www.tor.com/jordan/eyeoftheworld.html
I like this series because he would describe places in such detail that you could actually see the place.
The first 5000 pages of the series are pretty good, the next 8000 are all unnecessarily lengthy descriptions of the pouring of spiced wine and shuffling papers and wringing of hands. They could’ve called Book 10 “Clerks” cos it was a lot of administration.
Don’t forget the braid yanking and arms crossing.
:D:D:D
That always drove me nuts. What girl yanks her braids in fits of anger, anyway?
His editor/wife has approved an author to write the last book in the series. It is supposed to be out some time in the Fall of 09. I have read all of the books and I love em. I love the fact that the books are extremely long other wise I get through them too quick.
I think the wheel of time is a matter of taste. I like them because they’re so detailed, it’s like a movie inside your head (like someone said above). Also, I actually like it’s so verbose you have to occasionally skip paragraphs. . .means when you obsessively read and reread and reread-for-the-twentieth-time the series there’s always something new you missed the first dozen or so times reading it 
And I think the characterizations are the best in fantasy, at least that I’ve read (I admit I don’t read very many fantasy authors, I’ve been burned too many times by the abundance of soft and even hardcore porn written by SF and fantasy authors).
Joe
I loved the beginning of this series, but I gotta admit, while I was still out there getting the latest book on release day, my patience with the second half has been wearing a bit thin. Theres some really good plot lines and events that happen, but I just feel that there were too many seperate story threads, and rather than taking an abundance of threads and weaving them together like some other authors I can think of, these threads kinda spread out and do their own thing, only occasionally intersecting. Basically I felt that in the second half of the series, its spread way too thin, generating alot of mildly interesting threads, but failing to weave them together into a single magnificent tapestry as was done in the beginning.
Actually the reason I’ve been growing tired of the series is the very same reason I’m incredibly anxious to see how the whole thing resolves, because I have to hope that at some point all of these events are gonna bring everything back together for a magnificent finale. Hopefully the hired-on author thats completing the last book will be able to work it all out in a way that complements the series
boy i hope that made sense…