The Readthrough of Time: The Great Hunt

Book two of the Readthrough of Time is complete! The Great Hunt is the second book in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, and our readthrough began, appropriately, with the first book in the series, The Eye of the World. I found The Great Hunt to be about as good as Eye, and about as frustrating at times, too. My complaint stands on the books so far - Jordan, when writing about things that are exciting, appears to be one of the best. When I'm interested in what's going on, I can't get enough. Unfortunately, the books often take some time to get there, and that's often difficult, especially when you see how much book you have left. The end of this was better than the end of Eye however, and I'm excited to jump into the third book sooner rather than later.

As before, come beyond the jump for some scattered thoughts and another bonus.

* In similar form to Eye, Jordan didn't waste a ton of time getting the ball rolling. We know where we're at, and things start moving along almost immediately. Of course, then things feel really, really slow for 300 pages, but in terms of roping you in immediately, he did a great job here.

* I mentioned in the previous post that Loial was my favorite character, and I was happy to see him front and center again. The visit to the Ogier Stedding was a great touch as well. I'm glad to see Loial continue to get attention...

* ...as am I excited to see more about the Aes Sedai. The Nynaeve initiation and the capture of Egwene were probably my favorite parts of this book in particular, and highlight a problem I have with a lot of fantasy fiction, where the seemingly secondary stories end up being more interesting to me than the main story. Two books into the Wheel of Time and I'm hitting that hardcore with the Aes Sedai side of things in particular. I'm not sure how long that will keep going with these books, but the way Jordan does successfully bring everyone back together regularly is an asset to at least fixing this in my own brain.

* With one exception, I have found the growth of Rand as a character to be fascinating. It definitely gives the idea that Rand is incomplete at this point, and we're learning new things about him around the same time he is, and it may not be all that unique, but it certainly feels different. With that said, I feel as if Rand is suffering from Stupid Plot Device syndrome - following Selene to Cairhein didn't seem to make a lot of initial sense to me, and kinda still doesn't. I don't really get it.

Overall, though? Still interested, still engaged, still involved. I'm definitely looking forward to the third book.

---
And now for something different, Macmillan Audio was kind enough to offer us a sample of the audiobook for The Great Hunt. If you're looking to catch up/reacquaint yourself with The Wheel of Time, the audiobooks might be your route. You can hear a sample of The Great Hunt here, and, if you're interested, purchase the audiobook at your audiobook retailer of choice.