A Memory of Light
Even though the final book in Jordan's (and later Sanderson's) epic Wheel of Time series took me almost a month to read, I still finished the whole series in less than a year. Which I'm pretty proud of.
I hardly know how to begin talking about this book, because I really want to talk about the entire series. And it's hard to talk about the last book without talking about the whole series, because it's such a fabulous culmination of so many different plot lines and character threads. The series really is epic, and Sanderson sticks the landing.
Then again, I struggled with this book. From the beginning this story has been building to The Last Battle, so it was no surprise that the finale was essentially an 1100-page battle scene. Well, that's not the entirely fair. The book comprised several battles, which built into a very short war. The Last Battle itself occurred in a 250-page chapter, which took me three days to read.
Battle scenes bore me. I tend to skip them entirely. But I couldn't very well skip an entire book. So I plodded through, a little bit at a time. It wasn't just the battles that slowed me down, though. Plenty of scenes filled me with so much emotion that I simply had to walk away. I cried nearly every time Lan had a point of view, even though he's one of the characters I connected with the least. His arc was ultimately very powerful, though, and it left me on the brink of tears more than once.
Then there was Rand's battle with The Dark One, which kept giving me all sorts of anxiety. Even though I knew the alternate futures weren't real, they disturbed me more than anything else in the book. I didn't like seeing the characters I'd come to love being put in those situations, no matter how fantastical they were.
Maybe it was my strong emotional response that made it so hard for me to power through this book. Moreso than the battles anyway. As tedious as I found certain parts, I was overcome by joy, fear, hope, and despair more often than not. I kept having to walk away from the book in order to recover myself. Every time another character died I teared up, even when I knew it was coming.
I'm glad there were so many deaths, though. It gave a lot of weight to the book. Though I was disappointed that Egwene was the only one of the main characters to die. She was my favorite character in the entire series, and her death upset me more than anyone else's. I think it would have hurt a little less, though, if Mat or Rand had also died. If that had been spread out a little bit.
At the end of the day, I'm so glad I read this series. It was fantastic to spend a year in this world, getting to know these characters. And the ultimate lesson, that evil has to exist to balance out good in order to make free will mean something, was something that I really liked. The wheel continues to turn.
I only wish that I'd had this series earlier. It would have been a great counter-point to Lord of the Rings and The Sword of Truth back in high school. And I'd even heard about it back then. I almost did pick it up at one point, but the lack of conclusion and death of the author held me back. And if it hadn't been finished, I'm not sure I ever would have powered through the whole thing. It's long enough that I needed to know the ending was worth it before going in. I guess that all I can do now is provide it to my children. Give them a rich, fully-realized fantasy world where the women are just as good as the men. Because for all my problems with this series, it does treat its women better than most high fantasy.
I hardly know how to begin talking about this book, because I really want to talk about the entire series. And it's hard to talk about the last book without talking about the whole series, because it's such a fabulous culmination of so many different plot lines and character threads. The series really is epic, and Sanderson sticks the landing.
Then again, I struggled with this book. From the beginning this story has been building to The Last Battle, so it was no surprise that the finale was essentially an 1100-page battle scene. Well, that's not the entirely fair. The book comprised several battles, which built into a very short war. The Last Battle itself occurred in a 250-page chapter, which took me three days to read.
Battle scenes bore me. I tend to skip them entirely. But I couldn't very well skip an entire book. So I plodded through, a little bit at a time. It wasn't just the battles that slowed me down, though. Plenty of scenes filled me with so much emotion that I simply had to walk away. I cried nearly every time Lan had a point of view, even though he's one of the characters I connected with the least. His arc was ultimately very powerful, though, and it left me on the brink of tears more than once.
Then there was Rand's battle with The Dark One, which kept giving me all sorts of anxiety. Even though I knew the alternate futures weren't real, they disturbed me more than anything else in the book. I didn't like seeing the characters I'd come to love being put in those situations, no matter how fantastical they were.
Maybe it was my strong emotional response that made it so hard for me to power through this book. Moreso than the battles anyway. As tedious as I found certain parts, I was overcome by joy, fear, hope, and despair more often than not. I kept having to walk away from the book in order to recover myself. Every time another character died I teared up, even when I knew it was coming.
I'm glad there were so many deaths, though. It gave a lot of weight to the book. Though I was disappointed that Egwene was the only one of the main characters to die. She was my favorite character in the entire series, and her death upset me more than anyone else's. I think it would have hurt a little less, though, if Mat or Rand had also died. If that had been spread out a little bit.
At the end of the day, I'm so glad I read this series. It was fantastic to spend a year in this world, getting to know these characters. And the ultimate lesson, that evil has to exist to balance out good in order to make free will mean something, was something that I really liked. The wheel continues to turn.
I only wish that I'd had this series earlier. It would have been a great counter-point to Lord of the Rings and The Sword of Truth back in high school. And I'd even heard about it back then. I almost did pick it up at one point, but the lack of conclusion and death of the author held me back. And if it hadn't been finished, I'm not sure I ever would have powered through the whole thing. It's long enough that I needed to know the ending was worth it before going in. I guess that all I can do now is provide it to my children. Give them a rich, fully-realized fantasy world where the women are just as good as the men. Because for all my problems with this series, it does treat its women better than most high fantasy.
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