Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

PREQUEL TO MY REVIEW I shook my head incredulously. Light, of all the bloody ashes... I look over to the book. It lies there, as plain as it ever been, as plain as the horns on a trolloc. 700 pages. 700 bloody pages?! Blood and ashes. Of all the boneheaded, stubborn things... Well, there's nothing for it now, I decided, and with a sniff of my nose I looked up from the book, and with a hard sniff, a sniff that in Ebon Dar might make strong men faint and women gasp, I turned sternly towards the keyboard. A memory flashed in my head unbidden. I am not sure where it came from; it could be from any of the nine books that I read before in this series, memories that would have been long resting in the cold, return shelves of the library, or in the scandalous embrace of another. "Blood and ashes," I muttered through my teeth, and despite the gentle weather, I shivered and drew my coat closer to me, folding it carefully. "I never saw run-on sentences before that extended this long," I brooded darkly. That is, if a reader can brood, and I detected a twinkie in the hard, frozen reaches of my freezer. Readers are just supposed to FAWN at Robert Jordan, and this is most decidedly out of the ordinary. "I am going to write the review," I decided, and light be blasted! But what is it that the review needed? Is it a woman? I frowned, and wringled my nose, a move that is more a force of habit than out of irritation. Women! What does Robert Jordan find so hard to understand about them? I wondered. Light! By the way he talks about them once every paragraph, this novel is more fit as the pre-puberty study of a taraboner stable boy than a fantasy novel! I shook my head, quickly banishing the thought. No, no... perhaps there is some grander conspiracy at work here... The ageless face of an Aes Sedai looked out at my memory, laughing at me, tugging suggestively on my lower intestine and her braid at the same time. That did it, I decided, I'm really going write a review this time. The memory at the edge of my consciousness tugged again at her braid, hard, and bit her lip as hard as she can. Light, would that woman ever shut up? Women. I can never understand them. I've decided to read the words more carefully, however, the names just started to give me a headache. Bevedine or Beradine? or maybe it is Bevin and Moadine and veradine and bevelleihillbillienineOtwoOneOdine. I can never remember their faces. Only the songs, like some rude limerick, ring mockingly at my ears... "There once was a man with a name like Jordan, sold his book and want to be like Tolkien, so he went out one day and started to write, and next thing you know he screwed the children of light... whitecloaks that is, Altarian sea... " I sighed, put down my keyboard, and rubbed my eyes. Light! I must be getting on with the review. CHAPTER ONE: TIME TO BE GONE The Wheel of Time turns, and Books come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Book that gave it birth comes again. In one Book, called the Tenth Book by some, a Book yet to be written, a Book already burned, a yawn rose in the Crossroads of Twilight. The Yawn is not the beginning, there are neither beginning nor endings in the Wheel of Time (not if Jordan is still paid by the word.) But it is a beginning. BEGIN REAL REVIEW OK look here guys, I admit, the first few books had been fun. And you know why? I got one word for you. DragonBall. It is pretty cool when Goku went out and kicked some ass each episode huh? Yeah, one forsaken each book. Super Rand attack. But let's face it. There's only so much that he can DO, before we realized that the Wheel of Time is about as complicated as Pokemon when they are still out there collecting Gym Badges. "I defeat the Aiel Guardian! I receive power-up -- Heron Mark V. 2!" Yeah. The guy is running out of ideas. So what does he do? Can he save some shred of dignity and credibility by ending the series gracefully, in an ultimate episode of Wheel of Time Extreme! (tm) and a final showdown between Super Rand W and the Dark One? No. He tries to make it into a series of intrigue, of mystery, of boring dialogue. Which is pretty sad folks. I mean, that kind of depth takes PLANNING. It takes EFFORT. Also, it takes the wisdom of seeing a dead horse, and refrain from beating it. If you want an in-depth novel, I would suggest Gene Wolfe. Now that is complexity without obfusication, and true depth folks. This book is like watching the Thought of the Day from the Jerry Springer Show.