A Memory of Light (Wheel of Time, Book 14) Hardcover – January 8, 2013
Author: Visit ‘s Robert Jordan Page ID: 0765325950
Review
“The battle scenes have the breathless urgency of firsthand experience, and the . . . evil laced into the forces of good, the dangers latent in any promised salvation, the sense of the unavoidable onslaught of unpredictable events bear the marks of American national experience during the last three decades, just as the experience of the First World War and its aftermath gave its imprint to J. R. R. Tolkien’s work.” The New York Times on The Wheel of Time®
About the Author
Robert Jordan (October 17, 1948September 16, 2007), a native of Charleston, South Carolina, was the author of the bestselling The Wheel of Time®, with millions of books in print.
BRANDON SANDERSON grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska. He lives in Utah with his wife and children and teaches creative writing at Brigham Young University. In addition to completing Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time®, he is the author of such bestsellers as the Mistborn trilogy, Warbreaker, TheAlloy of Law, The Way of Kings, Rithmatist, and Steelheart. He won the 2013 Hugo Award for “The Emperor’s Soul,” a novella set in the world of his acclaimed first novel, Elantris.
Series: Wheel of Time (Book 14)Hardcover: 912 pagesPublisher: Tor Books (January 8, 2013)Language: EnglishISBN-10: 9780765325952ISBN-13: 978-0765325952ID: 0765325950 Product Dimensions: 6.3 x 2.3 x 9.6 inches Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies) Best Sellers Rank: #24,957 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #1172 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Epic #7102 in Books > Literature & Fiction > United States
NOTE: I tried to make this review as spoiler-free as possible but still enjoyable for people that have read the book. You might not want to read it if you want to go into the book with an absolutely blank slate, but none of the book’s surprises are spoiled if you do read it.
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I know there are no endings to the Wheel of Time and this is merely AN ending, but I still can’t believe the Wheel of Time is over.
This book is a perfect ending. The main theme of the Wheel of Time has always been balance between two opposing forces – saidin and saidar, Darkness and Light, good and evil. The resolution of the story carries that philosophy to its logical place – there’s no other way it could’ve ended.
Don’t go into this book expecting all your questions to be answered – some are, but a lot aren’t. It feels right, though – there are far bigger things going on.
Most of this book involves battles. Tarmon Gai’don is the Last Battle, and the stakes are truly desperate. The book does a great job of conveying the scale of this conflict, even though it’s exhausting to read about. Any less, and it would’ve been too easy to win. The usual "no one dies" approach that the rest of the books have does not apply. Some very bad things happen to very good people, and death seems better than some of them. Our heroes are outnumbered and outmaneuvered, and it shows. Even at the end, you’re not left feeling like it’s been a great victory – you’re horrified. There’s still hope, though, and that’s what matters.
Of course, it’s not all bleak – there are several moments where characters are really awesome, including some unexpected ones (Gaul, you are the man).
The Wheel of Time is finished. That’s a statement that’s going to take a while to get used to. The first volume of the series, The Eye of the World, was published in January 1990. George Bush Snr. and Margaret Thatcher were still in power and the Cold War was still ongoing. Fourteen books, four million words, eleven thousand pages and over fifty million sales (in North America alone) later, the conclusion has finally arrived. Can it possibly live up to the expectations built up over that time?
It is a tribute to the plotting powers of Robert Jordan, the writing skill of Brandon Sanderson (who took over the series after Jordan’s untimely death in 2007) and the hard work of Jordan’s editors and assistants that A Memory of Light is – for the most part – a triumphant finale. Given the weight of expectations resting on the novel, not to mention the unfortunate circumstances under it was written, it is unsurprising that it is not perfect. The novel occasionally misfires, is sometimes abrupt in how it resolves long-running plot strands and sometimes feels inconsistent with what has come before. However, it also brings this juggernaut of an epic fantasy narrative to an ending that makes sense, is suitably massive in scope and resolves the series’ thematic, plot and character arcs satisfactorily – for the most part.
It is a familiar viewpoint that The Wheel of Time is a slow-burning series, with Robert Jordan not afraid to have his characters sitting around talking about things for entire chapters (or, in one case, an entire novel) rather than getting on with business.
All kidding and snark aside, I feel like a widower leaving the cemetary after a soured marriage has ended with the death (by natural causes) of a bi-polar spouse. Tonight on the Red Line I fnished the final volume of ‘The Wheel of Time.’ The passionate book affair of my youth that grew stale, bitter and embarrassing before rekindling into acceptance, fondness, and nostalgia has ended. Thank the Light.
Some thoughts with, forgive me (or don’t forgive me. Bite me), spoilers-
THE GOOD:
– Egwen al’Vere. I always knew this was about Egwene, and in the end, she delivered and left the stage without needing an encore.
– Rand al’Thor. After passing through what Joseph Campbell called the Apotheosis in ‘The Heroe’s Journey,’ Rand became likeable again, and I was again invested in his success.
– al’Lan Mandragoran. Yes, he is the grizzled, gruff, wounded archetypical hero we’ve seen numerous times, often wearing the face of Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, John Wayne, etc., but I’m a sucker for that character everytime.
– People died, almost too many. While not ballsy enough to go all "Game of Thrones" and kill off principle characters when the story needed to go there (except once), neither was the Last Battle a gutless "Deathly Hallows" finale that only offed C-list players.
– The point of view (as with George RR Martin’s novels, but for different reasons) slid off the main characters a lot. This annoyed many readers, but I think was necessary as we have spent over 9,000 pages with those characters as written by Robert Jordan before he died, and each moment spent with those characters as written by another author put the reader in peril of tripping over something that would not have rung true.
A Memory of Light Wheel of Time Book 14 Robert Jordan A Memory of Light Wheel of Time Other Book 14 and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle Wheel of Time Book 14 Hardcover January 8 Dragonmount A Memory of Light The Wheel of Time Complete information about A MEMORY OF LIGHT the final Wheel of Time book The novel was first published on January 8 2013 in hardcover and 14 A Memory A Memory of Light Wheel of Time 14 by Robert Jordan Dec 04 2013 A Memory of Light Book 14 of the Wheel of Time Jan 08 2013 Sharon rated it 5 of 5 stars A Memory of The Wheel of Time
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