Selvsagt er jeg en stor fan av serien, men jeg ser også at den har sine svakheter. En mann ved navn Werthead skrev dette på et annet forum om emnet.
Hva er deres tanker om emnet?Werthead wrote:The Wheel of Time's central desire is to rewrite the traditional, formulaic epic fantasy saga for the modern age. It even has a farmboy who discovers he has a destiny and sets out to save the world. However, Jordan subverts this nicely throughout the opening book of the series. His world is colder and more brutal than you'd expect and there is a nice sense of a society that is both familiar and alien at the same time (with women who have equal power to men in many nations, for reasons that seem fairly plausible). His sense of time and place is good, with the books coming across as an 18th Century drama set in a world of 14th Century technology. His attention to detail is superb in the first few books, giving his world a real feeling of weight. Although since outstripped by Bakker and Martin, Jordan's sense of history is also nicely well done and he understands the value of simultaneously pushing forward the current storyline whilst unveiling more of his world's painstakingly-constructed background. The Wheel of Time's immense depth of history, breadth of societies and general feeling of being a three-dimensional entity is easily its strongest point. Up until recently (the late 1990s), Jordan's world was easily the strongest secondary world created in fantasy since Middle-earth.
The writing is reminiscent of Stephen King, being nicely approachable and easy to read with occasional flashes of deeper ability. Jordan has fairly obvious archetypal characters, but gives them enough psychological depth to make them interesting. Mat's maturing over the series from a young rake to a guy with more of a sense of responsibility may hardly be the most original plot arc, but it is handled well, and Mat becomes by far the most interesting of the original cast by the time the books approach their climax. Perrin's grappling with authority and with his own inner rage makes an interesting subplot in later volumes, although this perhaps not handled as well as it could have been. The dilemmas faced by Rand, the central character, are perhaps closer to Paul Atreides at times than one feels entirely comfortable with, but are nevertheless more interesting than a stock fantasy author usually gives the hero. Rand's growing arrogance and stubborness in the second half of the series is an intriguing take on the 'power corrupts' motif. Jordan keeping Rand off-stage for much of the latter half of the series also keeps him fresh and interesting. There's no way the series could have lasted this long if it remained focused solely on this one character.
The storyline has a very nice evolution to it, starting as an action-adventure storyline and transforming gradually into a high-stakes political drama, then mixing the two together as the finale approaches. The scale of Jordan's world gives him a lot of elements to play around with and integrate into the story.
Now to the pace. The story evolves nicely up until around the seventh book or so. The ramping up of the threat the Dark One poses in line with the growing power levels of the characters is handled well, even though it feels a bit D&D-like at times: Myddraal, who pose a lethal threat to the characters in the first two or three books, are despatched like reeds in the wind later on as the characters continue to 'level up', necessitating the need for more powerful threats to be introduced (the shapeshifting gholam, the end-of-level bosses of the Forsaken, random element and recurring nemesis Padan Fain). There is also a problem, pointed out by SF ubercritic John Clute, that at times the storyline feels like it is bounching back and forth between random plot coupons: "We need to find the Eye of the World!" "We need to find the cursed dagger from Shadar Logoth!" "We need to find the a'dam bracelet in Tarabon!" "Quick! We must find the Bowl of Winds!" This can get wearying after a while.
Book 7, which for my money is the last 'good' book in the series, does a sterling job of setting up the penultimate phase of the story. Our heroes are suddenly all in place to move towards the ultimate resolution of the saga and, as Jordan said at the time, it was easy to see how the series could be wrapped up in perhaps three more books, making for an excellent ten-book fantasy series. However, Jordan dropped the ball. He tried a few experimental things which didn't work and his storylines got completely out of step with one another. The monster had finally slipped its leash, and it took Jordan three increasingly unfocused, tediously-plotted books to get it back on track. At the same time his writing skills slipped a little and you can sense the disillusionment with the series creeping in. Previously okay, if somewhat overdone, character touches suddenly become comedy caricatures of themselves (the braid-tugging, sniffing, folding-arms-under-breasts). Lots of chapters had nothing happening but the characters sitting around talking about the plot rather than getting on and advancing the plot. The Forsaken, the most feared servants of the ultimate force of evil in the universe, turned out to actually be the Keystone Cops. Books 8-10 (and 10 in particular) are pretty much reviled for not so much being bad in themselves (and they are) but also for sullying the memories of the excellent opening volumes.
But there is a bright light at the end of the tunnel. Book 11 was a lot better than that prior few books. Although some problems remain (the writing is still not as crisp and flowing as it was at the start and the pacing, although much increased, still isn't returned to furious page-turning status), there is a tremendous sense of the sun coming out from behind the clouds. The scenes at the end of the book do give you some hope that the end is finally in sight. And whilst Jordan is seriously ill, his condition has recently improved somewhat and he has claimed he can finish A Memory of Light within twelve months.
So there you have it: The Wheel of Time: IMO, the good outweighs the bad. Depending on your patience, you may find it worthwhile. I would seriously recommend skipping Books 8-10 and instead just reading online plot summaries, though.
