Lady_Yasha

Ponies.

This has to be one of the best books for seeing the Age of Legends through the ter'angreal in Rhuidean. I still found it weird trying to adapt my imagination from contemporary medieval settings like the present day to the futuristic setting where jo-cars (anti-gravity technology) existed. The Breaking sounds even rougher when you're actually reading a first-hand perspective too, as opposed to just hearing how bad it was.

The thing I don't get is why they follow her at all. She's not fit to lead. She cannot admit that she could be wrong - an egregious fault in a leader that could also be a weakness. Good things seem to happen to her by chance but there's some measure of chaos preceding her success. I just read the part in Shadow Rising where Rand Portals them to Rhuidean and she starts acting immature and petulant, thinking that she's the most important thing there above He Who Comes With The Dawn and an experienced woman like Moiraine and even Aiel custom. And then she complains about it not being fair that everyone else gets to go to Rhuidean and she's faced with the threat of scrubbing pots. Scrubbing pots! Uh, Egwene, did you not listen when the Wise Ones were saying that some people never returned from Rhuidean, or went mad? Oh yeah, sorry, scrubbing pots, waaaaay worse than death or insanity. And she even had the audacity to think Rand and Mat needed to grow up because Rand make a joke out of nearly burning himself out (which, given his circumstance, he was fine and therefore had the right to feel relieved). Light does she infuriate me.

You know my opinion of Egwene better than most people so it comes as no surprise that I can't agree that she's a good character. Realistic, yes; she has flaws common to us all (I'm exercising one of them now in believing I'm right and you're all deluded) but that does not mean I have to like her as a character. Infact I hate her. She's everything in a person that you could find detestable in many others, with no redeeming qualities. If I had to sit listening to her I'd end up dipping her head in water with Air around her ankles. I dread reading chapters from her perspective because all we get is her arrogant world-view, how everyone should conform to her opinion and estimations, and how she advocates bullying towards people she disagrees with, as long as she's not the victim. As of yet she still has to apologise to Mat for being a horrible cow when he rescued them. She thinks because she can channel that gives her license to solve her problems by tying people up with Air, like a child. I really hope that on the Fields of Merrilor the supporters she's brought with her see the logic behind Rand's words and oppose her. She wants to oppose the purpose of the Dragon Reborn and prevent the Last Battle, but it's going to happen whether Rand breaks the seals or lets them decay by themselves. Instead she wants to leash him to the Tower like she said was a detestable thing when Elaida tried it. Hmm. As for the future of WoT, I'm quite content with what we have. Fourteen books is more than most fantasy stories get and from the reviews of advanced readers I'm sure A Memory of Light will tie it up nicely.

Day 20: "As Tam attacked again, Rand lifted the sword and-" Oh dear.

Yeah Windy, keep up man. Sheesh! It's okay Daniel, the rest of us got the joke

Being Brandon because everything else is fiction and he's rich anyway. Oh, and he has literature talent.

Poor Windy...

Well, my expectancies weren't shattered; this is a thread about Windy My only disappointment is that he didn't start it himself.

I am all of the combination of angry, sad, grateful, and happy at the moment. It's an odd mixture.

I can honestly say I haven't There's a lot you could do with Awakening that'd turn any scene into a Beauty and the Beast moment; just animate a wardrobe to flatten people and a candlestick to set someone's backside alight.

Day 12: "Enough talk. You will bed me now." ...is a little saucy I expect that weave will be something different to balefire though. Several characters have already used it, so maybe they discover a new weave more heinous than balefire.

Good backup on this one Chaos

The Lake District and Highlands in the UK are full of lakes formed high up in the mountains. Mostly glacial, and there's some formed by precipitate run-off from the rising water vapours from other lakes and rivers, that cool and condense into clouds which then deliver the water into basins.

One of the biggest concerns I have with her is that she feels she has the right to judge others while not applying it to herself. And she didn't so much as manoeuvre herself tactfully as she got everything handed to her. She wouldn't even have the lawful right to the Amrylin chair if the Salidar rebels hadn't tried to use her as a puppet. She's intelligent, there's no doubt about that, but she also feels like she's entitled to these things, like they should be handed to her. Rand, Mat, and Perrin all hated being called lords but she embraced "Mother." She takes things for granted, lies to her friends, and feels exhilarated when she steps on her closest friends' shoulders - I can't remember the scene verbatim but it had something to do with Egwene humiliating Nynaeve and feeling happy about it, not guilty that she'd just hurt someone that had looked after her in their youth. And she feels this need to constantly compete with Nynaeve despite the fact that Nynaeve is older and more mature, stronger in the Power, and she followed Nynaeve's advice in the past so why suddenly reject it all when she's made her equal? Egwene is content with becoming more immature the more power she's granted. Another time was when Siuan came to rescue her and Egwene just said, "I don't trust you any more." Well, sorry that Siuan has feelings and cares about you Egwene, and, you know, when you stopped responding in the Dream World she got worried and feared the worst? Nooo, just be a complete cow about it. She hasn't developed since the start of the series. Maybe she's more world educated but she's still childish and prone to making rash decisions often with poor consequences. And she still regards men without any worth - her treatment of Gawyn is ridiculous. She still has a lot of her old prejudices and can't see they're faults or doesn't want to fix them like every other character in the books has or is trying to do. There's also her treatment of Rand. At the end of the Great Hunt, when he almost died, she abandoned him to recuperate alone. But who stayed behind? Min; a girl that hardly knew Rand, understood he was the Dragon, that he could channel and would likely go mad and kill her, and yet she stayed while Egwene, a childhood friend and "to-be", fled. Which also shows she's a coward, especially when we see her thoughts in The Shadow Rising when she's telling Elayne in the privacy of her thoughts that Elayne can't have him. I was glad when Nynaeve confronted Elayne about him being the Dragon and she showed that she was still willing to be with him; that was a much needed middle finger to Egwene. She constantly talks about how Rand is promised to her in Eye of the World - becoming jealous when there's even the hint of another girl in Rand's encounters and yet she went off and practically tongue wrestled Aram (that hypocrisy) - and then when she realises he's the Dragon she doesn't want anything to do with him any more. Oh, and while we're talking about Rand, remember how Elaida trussed him up in a box intending to imprison him until Tarmon Gai'don? The very thing that even Egwene said was horrible and then tried to do exactly the same? She thinks that every thought that comes out of her mouth is flawless and even when she's proven wrong she'll skirt the issue and find some way to ennoble herself again, instead of admitting she's wrong. While re-reading I noticed that most things Egwene thinks or says just annoy me, and then I realised she isn't really unique, she's just a pastiche of all the annoying aspects of her culture and traits that other characters have grown out of or are trying to alter about themselves for the better. tl;dr: Egwene is a terrible character. Well written and realistic? Yes.

Oh man, the music is legen-and I hope you're not lactose intolerant because the last part of that is-dary. Perfect music to write to.

Because you watch the video for the music, hmmmmm...

For those interested I can post the quotes as I get them. They're short, but they make you think. Here's the first one: There's also a discussion about it over on Tor.com.

Mat blew the Horn, dead heroes returned. Coincidence? We don't know if it was sounded in the Age of Legends or not but that makes it no less real since its effects are clear.

It's an interesting thought; I'm sure someone will pull the thread back onto topic. I like Shivertongue's theory that Mazrim has gone insane already thanks to the Shadow and believes he's the Dragon Reborn, opposing Rand as a false Dragon. Maybe not the right theory but all are interesting.

Well space is not "nothing" as it's filled with sub-atomic particles that create radiation, heat, cold, clouds of gasses, etc. If the Physical aspect exists extraneous to life it can pervade every inch of the Cosmere where there is matter. Now, we've seen arguements around here before that deal with "thinking trees" and they're inanimate objects! If, for the sake of arguement, we assume trees have a Spiritual and Cognitive aspect, I'm willing to bet the underlying structure of that tree (ie. particles/molecules) is the cause. As it is with all living beings. Since converting mass to one form of energy would make more sense than trying to force a body into a realm with different laws of physics. I say this because in Shadesmar you need your Spiritual aspect to control your form in that realm, whereas you'd be employing the Physical and Cognitive to function in reality. OK, I'm rambling; look, elephant! Feel free to poke me with criticism, I'm just thinking out loud here and the aspects aren't my strong suit xD If Shadesmar mimics your physical location, could it not mimic space too? My point was, where there exists matter, there is a Physical aspect. Not sure about Spiritual though.

Neither do I, but it's good to present all the possibilities so someone who sits on the fence can look at the arguements and have a place to start investigating for themselves.

We know the names of the 13 Forsaken and I really doubt RJ would have written Nynaeve as one of them. Many of the characters have Talents, they can't all be unnamed Forsaken.

Despite the few easter eggs I don't think it's set in our world. An Earth analogue yes, where maybe in one Age they developed similar things to ours and names were similar. Remember, Queen Elizabeth did not rule the world; she was only the monarch of England and Ireland. So maybe there are a few parallels but they happened differently. Th world in WoT is created by the Pattern, there was no Big Bang and there is no end to the universe. The Creator designed the world and then left to go design other worlds far from Randland. There are parallel universes, we get that much from Moiraine's speech about the Dark One existing in multiple realities. Our world might have influenced Randland in the same way branching temporal possibilities do. You see a cupcake in a cafe, you either buy it or you don't but in the process you create two possibilities that, under string theory, both happen. Our Elizabeth didn't conquer the world, Randland's made different decisions that lead to her known-world domination. The Pattern is a web of intricate threads, all woven by the Wheel like a gigantic loom, and as long as the Wheel turns there can be no beginnings and no ends to time.

Half the time I don't believe my own theories, I just throw them out there to see what people make of them and then look into them more. I like discussing WoT with people since usually everyone has a lot to say about it.