The Fires of Heaven

ORIGINALLY POSTED AT Fantasy Literature.

For being such a long book (nearly 1000 pages in my trade paperback copy), amazingly little happens in The Fires of Heaven, and this is why so many readers have abandoned this otherwise interesting story. Approximately the first third of the novel contains so much recap and repetition that, if I'd had "my hair in a proper braid," I would have been yanking it as often as Nynaeve does.

The formula for the first 100 pages or so goes something like this: One or two lines of dialogue, two paragraphs of backstory, another line of dialogue, another couple of paragraphs of backstory... It felt like the proverbial "one step forward, two steps back!"

I managed to stick with it, though, only because I was listening to it on audiobook (and therefore only half listening while I accomplished something else at the same time) and because I wanted to write a review. Besides, I found it immensely entertaining when I could complete Robert Jordan's sentences for him... >...

In The Fires of Heaven, we never see Perrin or Faile, which is fine with me. There is an interesting plot-line involving Siuan Sanche, Logain, and Gareth Bryne. Rand's adoption of Asmodean is entertaining, too -- I like that we're not really sure which side Asmodean and Lanfear are on. The plot does finally move forward a bit, but it takes way too long to do so. The book could have easily been cut to half its size and been better for it. If I had been the editor, I would have taken a blue pencil to all instances of:
* females obsessing about the modesty of their clothing
* males obsessing about the modesty of female clothing
* needless skirt smoothing and straightening
* silk clinging to hips and breasts
* shivering or sweating that has nothing to do with the weather
* disgusted talk about not understanding the opposite sex
* braid pulling, tugging, and yanking
* sniffing
* thoughts or actual instances of bottoms being switched or spanked
* Nynaeve's cat fights

At this point, I'm quickly loosing patience as The Wheel of Time quickly looses steam. That's a shame, because the story itself is very good -- but it's just too hard to extract it from the dross.
Read more Robert Jordan book reviews at Fantasy literature. ( )

Although this was a long read, it was worth it.

Sometimes the story became a bit too long, I kept going on with it. And I'm glad I did.
I think the characters have grown more. I missed Perrin in this book though, and hope he will return in book number 6.

At some moment I found that too much of the same happened in this story, and that we've all seen that in the first 4 books. ( )

Book Five is done. Being it's summer, I'm really moving at a slow pace through these books, slower than I need to be. I had hoped to finish the series by the end of 2013 (with some time in between for some other books), but at the current pace, that doesn't seem likely.

Anyway, another good one is done. This is where Jordan gets a bit over descriptive and sometimes repetitive. I think this book could have been condensed down to a clean 400-500 pages (from it's 950+ in paperback form) with no loss to the essence of the novel. The first 900 pages seem to be maneuvering for the last 50 pages and it's big reveals. Strange to have not seen Perrin at all (except being mentioned briefly by one of the other characters), but if I remember from my first read through of this part of the series, that becomes a pattern where we won't see entire characters or plot threads for an entire book, then they'll be back next time. I am starting to forget what happens in the next few novels that I've read before, so it will be like coming at them almost fresh.

I thought by now, I'd be ready to move on to something else for a short break from the Wheel of Time series and I've got a lot of books I'm itching to get too, but I think I'm ready to jump right into book 6. ( )

Five down.. Eleven billionty to go. I'm still enjoying doing this re-read, but I'm starting to get a little sad. I guess in retrospect I imagined all of the big events happening spread out over the first ten books. Now I'm realizing that most of the stuff I remember has already happened... I'm almost to the time of slowness already. I never noticed it on my first two reads of the series, I'm not sure why, but I have a feeling I'll notice it this time. Oh well though, I'm still looking forward to continuing on in the series. It's worth it to experience the final book in all it's expected glory, with all of the back story fresh in my mind. ( )

This is what I think of as the beginning of The Dreaded Middle. Rand is becoming less sympathetic as a character, plot threads proliferate, bad things start to happen, and the focus of each individual volume becomes a lot less clear. The Fires of Heaven is still good, but not nearly as good as The Shadow Rising, and it's downhill for a while from here.

Note: In general, I can't review this series with any objectivity. I've been reading it since I was eleven years old, and it's thoroughly embedded in my brain. ( )