A Crown of Swords

Summary: Rand, still recovering from the effects of Dumai's Wells, and still fighting to maintain his ever-more-tenuous grip on sanity, returns to Cairhien and begins to establish plans with Perrin for removing the Forsaken Sammael from his seat in Illian. Egwene comes to realize how various factions of the rebel Salidar Aes Sedai are trying to manipulate her, and finds a way to gather loyal allies. But most of this book concerns events in Ebou Dar, where Nynaeve and Elayne are searching for the Bowl of the Winds, a ter'angreal that can fix the weather. Mat, sent to guard them, finds himself in a worse predicament than even his luck can get him out of when he catches the eye of Queen Tylin.

Review: Although I gave this book 4.5 stars show more when I first read it, if you'd asked me about it before I started this re-read, I would have said that it was one of the boring books in the middle - a span that I had thought started after Lord of Chaos. But actually, on this re-read, I wound up enjoying this more than I had expected. All of the problems that plague the worst parts of this series are still present - there is a lot of sniffing, braid tugging, and skirt-smoothing going on, men still think women are impossible to understand and women still think men are too dim to reason with, there is a lot of unnecessary description of clothing and furniture and such, none of the characters seems capable of ever articulating what they're thinking, all of our three ta'veren think that the other two understand more about women than they do, etc. (Although Rand thinking that "Perrin has such a peaceful marriage"... I realize you are the Dragon Reborn and have other things on your mind and all, but seriously, NO ONE is that unobservant.) But many of them seemed at least somewhat scaled back from peak levels elsewhere in the series (although Elayne and Nynaeve fighting with each other is still present, and still tedious).

There are also not many chapters from Egwene, who is one of my favorites, or Perrin, who used to be one of my favorites, although when he is on-screen in this book he is spending all of his time being annoying about sacrificing everything and everyone for Faile, who is the worst (so maybe less Perrin at this point in the series is actually a blessing. Remind me of that once I get to Winter's Heart.) By this point, Mat has become one of my favorites, although he spends the entirety of this book being sexually harrased (and assaulted!) by Tylin, which bothered me a lot more this time around than it did on a first read through ten years ago - it's behaviour that would be totally unacceptable if the genders were reversed, and as is, I think Jordan probably meant it to read as funny or sexy, but it came across as severely gross and inappropriate. And then at the end Mat has a building dropped on him, which marks his absence from the next book, alas.

But, for as much time is spent on relatively inconsequential things, lots of big things happen in this book, or at least things that will be important later on. Min and Rand finally admit their feelings for each other and have sex (leaving Elayne and Egwene the lone virgins, I think?) Nynaeve finally breaks her block (this is likely responsible for the reduced amounts of braid-tugging) and meets up again with Lan. Mat buys his ring with the fox and ravens. We are introduced to Cadsuane, Moridin, the Kin, and the gholam. The Seanchan take Amadicia and Ebou Dar. And then, at the end, Rand kills Sammael, except not really, since it's mostly Mashadar that kills him and we're never really sure he's dead (except RJ said in interviews that he really was), and it's kind of anticlimactic and definitely one of the weaker endings. But all in all, this book went pretty quickly, with not too much bloat - at least not as much as I'd remembered - and while it's certainly not among the best books in the series, it's not the worst, either... although it's starting to be on the downhill slope. 4 out of 5 stars.

Recommendation: This is the series that made me a lifelong fantasy fan, so despite its abundant weaknesses, of course I think it should probably be read (or at least attempted) by anyone who likes the genre. Don’t start anywhere but the beginning, though. show less

Crown of Swords, the seventh installment of the Wheel of Time series, marks a turning point – and not one that led to better things. This was the book I picked up all those years ago with the reaction "???" Closely followed by "!!!" This was the book about which I made notes, still kicking around somewhere I'm sure, about how wide the margins got and how big the text got, and, subsequently, how much the word count lessened. This was where the series really began to look a bit threadbare.

It's still a shock to close the previous installment and open this one to see text a good point or two larger, along with margins squishing the text area down considerably. Also, there's the simple problem that, for a very long time … nothing show more happens. That was the complaint I heard from a lot of readers in a lot of reviews about several of the books, and I always refrained from jumping onto that bandwagon – but good grief. It's one of the only status updates I made on Goodreads in the first half of 2014, when I was conducting the Big WOT Read: "Three hundred pages in - the length of a good many books - and so far? Rand has gone from Point A to Point B, Egwene has had a headache and done some thinking, Nynaeve and the others have gone from Point C to Point D, and Mat has watched a horse race. The print is larger, the margins larger, the book is shorter, and NOTHING is happening. Now I remember why I stopped reading WOT." That's it. No exaggeration, no sarcasm – that's literally what happens. It's a bit mad.

In the second half of the book, a few things happen – still not much – but in a way it's worse. Because the second half of the book largely consists of Mat being sexually harassed, and … um… a couple of other things. Oh, and then near the end Mat has a building dropped on him, and that was it for him for a while. Was he dead? I didn't think so, because of all the prophecies that had been made for him that hadn't seen fulfillment … but I didn't know, because as far as I remembered his wondering where his flaming luck went was the last time his name was even mentioned for several books. My memory is not great, but I very clearly recall being outraged as I finished the next book – and the next – and the next – without any kind of resolution to the situation. Or even, iirc, any of the other characters even wondering about the situation. "Where's Mat, I wonder?": never happened.

The writing even at this point was still entertaining. The worldbuilding was still impressive. As I may or may not have said before, I have to hand it to RJ: he credibly came up with a number of devices which allow his characters to move great distances in short amounts of time, which kept the sprawl of the story from holding up the telling of the story. (THAT's not what holds it up.) Enough – just enough – happened to retain interest, to keep a reader (me, at least) from denting a wall with the book and giving up on the series entirely … in fact, new mysteries still popped up (along with lots of new characters) which … at this stage in the game it was a study in endurance.

The problem is … no, not The problem. There are a few. *A* problem is the well-worn rut the writing has fallen into by this point. Fallen, and in the classic bad commercial parlance, can't get up. Nynaeve, who should be a strong character, is a walking collection of tics – but then, most of the women are. I'd love to get hold of this book in an editable form, and remove all the braid-pulling, skirt-smoothing, stalking, glowering, and catfights. It would be a novella. If I was then able to remove all the instances in which men pondered how little they understood women, and women pondered how little sense men had … and if all mention of clothing, men's or women's, with the silks and feathers and scrolls on sleeves, and my lord why should I have to know what color every single person is wearing unless it's relevant (which, once in a great while, it is) … I think this review might contain more words than the abridged book. It's a shame; the braid-tugging didn't really start in earnest till book 3, to my surprise, and it was so nice without it. Once begun, though, it was an immediate flood of tugging and gripping and yanking and otherwise abused scalp. I counted, until I got bored with it; it was absurd. If I had the ambition – and enough fingers – I would keep track of skirt-smoothings in this book. The total count would be high.

Oh, and then there's the sniffing. Seriously, sir, have you ever actually met anyone who sniffed this much without being chronically allergic to everything? It becomes a sort of synonym for "Nynaeve was annoyed" or "angry" or whatever – and, sadly, Nynaeve is nearly always annoyed or angry. That just is not enjoyable to read.

If I didn't know for certain that Robert Jordan had a long and very happy marriage, I would honestly guess that he didn't know any women very well. Had, perhaps, only read about women in the more satiric types of fiction. Because my God are the women in these books ridiculous. The constant smoothing of – or gripping of – skirts, and of course the constant fussing with hair by characters who don't just go ahead and yank on it like Nynaeve.

It's all such a shame. It's a darn good story, even still. But it should not take chapter after chapter just to get a bunch of characters into place to work a spell, which is what happens in this book. Every female character should not be more of an idiotic termagant than the last one. A decent chunk of this one is spent with Nynaeve in a temper, Elayne pretending she's not, then Nynaeve apologizing and Elayne reacting with shock – Nynaeve! Apologize! Light! show less

2025 Aug 11

I am about half way through this book and I am not sure why it gets criticized as being the beginning of the 3-4 book slog in this series. I’m really enjoying it. I guess some readers just want the fighting action all the time. But I am enjoying the developing relationships and characterization.

One of the puzzles I am trying to figure out is the voices and past knowledge that keep coming into the story for both Rand and Mat. There is a real struggle there with who the think they are and who they want to be though it seems that Rand fights this whereas Mat just seems to go with it and not worry too much about it. Mat sort of acknowledges something weird is going on but doesn’t stress about it the way that Rand does. But show more then Mat isn’t experiencing past lives the way Rand is who feels like someone else is inhabiting his body with him.

And then more subtly is Birgitte who is unsure whether she is still the hero of the horn to be called now that she is in the physical world and no longer inhabiting the in between dream world.

I am find it very interesting how these three characters are struggling with who they are, who they were, and who they are becoming.

I’m not finding this a slog at all. show less

A Crown of Swords is the seventh book in The Wheel of Time. I’m not sure if I’ve reached the dreaded middle books that many people found to be tedious, but I’m still not bored myself. On the other hand, I can see where people might have lost patience with this book because some plot threads seemed to be at a standstill for most of it. I still felt like the story continued to move forward, though, and there were interesting things that happened.

However, I’m usually pretty content to read lengthy tomes in a series that I’m enjoying, as long as I enjoy the characters and the general story. Epic fantasy is my favorite subgenre of my favorite genre, and I try not to oversaturate myself with it, so that may be contributing to my show more level of enjoyment.

As with previous books, the rest of my review consists of random, spoiler-filled comments that I’ll put behind spoiler tags.
Starting with the end first… I’ll be really surprised if Sammael actually proves to be dead. I never trust an ambiguous death where nobody sees the character’s moment of death and/or there’s no body. More often than not, the author left that ambiguity for a reason.

I’m also curious who that mystery guy is who helped Rand near the end. My first thought was Logain, but Rand believed his face was completely unfamiliar and Rand saw Logain’s face in Caemlyn, so I guess it probably isn’t him unless he was disguising himself. My second thought was that maybe it wasn’t an actual, physical person at all, but rather that Rand’s interactions with Lews Therin have taken on a new dimension and now he’s starting to see him instead of just hear him. It could also be that Myrddraal guy, Shaidar Haran, or possibly a disguised Forsaken, working toward some darker, long-term purpose that requires Rand to be alive for now.

I was happy that Nynaeve’s block was finally released. I have this naïve hope that maybe now she’ll stop being angry all the time, but I know that’s a futile hope. :) The cover was kind of a spoiler for the scene where Lan showed up. As soon as Nynaeve ended up underwater, I suddenly realized what the cover was portraying and, since I had already been expecting Lan to show up at any time, I was certain the male character on the cover must be Lan. But at least I wasn’t spoiled about it until right before it happened.

I was never quite sure if the author intended for Queen Tylin’s pursuit of Mat to be funny, but I found those parts disturbing. “No” should be respected from men as much as from women. I did like seeing Elayne and (sort of) Nynaeve treat Mat with some more respect finally. I also liked seeing Elayne put her foot down and take a position of leadership among the other Aes Sedai in Ebou Dar.

Cadsuane seems a curious and ambiguous character. I haven’t decided yet if she’s good, evil, or just following her own personal agenda. I’m curious what the unpleasant lesson is that she’s going to teach Rand and the Asha’man as per Min’s viewing. The only thing I can think of is something to do with balefire. Either way, I expect something bad is going to happen sooner or later due to Rand using balefire too freely. show less

Well, this installment of WOT may be regarded as part of the "slog" but I think it is actually the book I have enjoyed the most so far. Am not sure why. It's certainly shorter. The characters are showing some signs of maturity although not many. I still hate Faile and prefer the Rand POV. My audiobook listening is on 1.75X which also speeds up the read.

Re-read July 2020
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Are you crazy if you hear someone's voice in your head? Is it normal to remember all the women that died on your watch, but not the men? Do you lead because you behave as a leader or because others see you as one? Can love cure everything?
Though there are more than enough adventures in this volume, it also provides a lot of opportunities for introspection and reflection for all the major heroes and for some secondary ones. Some of these reflections are discussed in details and some are only mentioned in a paragraph or two. In both cases no answer is given and the readers are welcome to their own conclusions.
What is apparent is that the major characters are growing and their musings and conclusions, their actions show more start to affect the world in a very significant way (well, maybe Mat is not there yet). show less

Halfway through this renowned epic fantasy series, I find that I'm hooked even if somewhat begrudgingly. For books of such lengths (>650 pages in hardcover) with barely incremental forward movement of the central storyline, I find them difficult to put down. I am reminded of a soap opera. Jordan weaves a plethora of storylines with flawed (mostly) empathetic characters each sufficiently developed, including, if to a lesser degree, his human villains, that I am captured by their personal stories. I still dislike his frequent depiction of the genders as two completely separate species unable to understand the other and often, thus, descending to dismissive or arrogant condescension. At times, I think Jordan does so in an attempt to be show more humorous, but it falls flat. Sophmoric sexism however tongue-in-cheek. Still, Jordan is masterful in creating unique different cultures and nations, each to admireable detail -- if still, in my humble opinion, being excessive in his detailed description of each character's, seemingly, daily change of clothing. This seventh novel's conclusion falls back to the worn out narrative device in that of Books 1 - 5: the final pages depicting Rand (the central protagonist) battling another Forsaken (major minion of the Dark One), although this time it is unclear if the villain is truly killed, despite Rand believing so. Jordan again peppers the book with a number of human insights and pithy comments, although some display the sexism I make note of. Examples are in the Comments section below. show less