Kris’ Book Reviews

It is the third book of the Wheel of Time series, and probably my last review of this series. The book starts similarly to the “The Great Hunt”, and probably will end also the same as two previous books.We start off few months after the end of previous part, the final battle that was presented there wasn’t really final (again!), and the Dark One isn’t dead. Rand (the new Dragon), Perrin, Moiraine and the soldiers from Shienar are hiding in the mountains. Rand is afraid of his powers, and eventually, after a Trollock attack on the camp, escapes from his friends. Al’Thors escape and Moiraine search for him is one of the three plots that make up the book.

The second plot involves Matrim Cauthon who regains his strengths in Tar Valon, and tries to leave Aes Sedai city. The last plot is about Nynaeve al’Meara, Elayne Trakand and Egwene al’Vere search for the Black Ajah.

The main problem with the book is that it is not as exciting as “The Great Hunt”. The pace is slower, there are too many descriptions that could be deleted without hurting the book. The new species introduced (darkhounds and grey man) appear in the Wheel of Time world almost out of nowhere, nobody mentioned them in earlier books. This makes me feel that the series was born in Jordans head after the first, and/or second part success, I really would like it to be more thought thru and added more gently to the series. Some characters suddenly show new powers that they didn’t used earlier and it is not enough to say that they kept it secret (they didn’t use them even when their life were in danger).

To sum up, the book is not as good as my Wheel of Time favorite “The Great Hunt”. Moreover it can make you wonder why the pattern is so similar to the previous books. I really hope that the following books will be better, but I will definitely have some time off from the Wheel of Time.

Rating: 4 out of 10

Buy (hardcover) The Dragon Reborn (The Wheel of Time, Book 3)
Buy (paperback) The Dragon Reborn (The Wheel of Time, Book 3)

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 9th, 2006 at 3:52 am and is filed under Book Reviews, Fantasy, Robert Jordan . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.