Subject: Re: Winter's Heart Thoughts - SPOILERS back

From: "Drew Gillmore" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2000 17:04:56 -0600

"Jim Hill" <[email-masked]> wrote:
: Laura M. Parkinson wrote:
: >[email-masked] (Jim Hill) rhapsodized in blue:

: >>>Okay, spoilers follow....
: >>Not anymore.
: Okay, they're back...

Whatever.

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: And wasn't it nice of me to throw a bone to the people with broken
: newsreaders?

And oh so resourceful of you to use just such a benevolant action to throw
down a back handed derrogatory remark.  Hill for Pres in '04.

Nothin' but love for ya', Jim.  My broken newsreader and I salute you.

: >>Are you serious?  Dick-all happened aside from two chapters, one in
: >>mid-book and one featuring the ObJordanBigFinish at the end.  Sure, we
: >>got lots of descriptions of snug coats slashed with color and the
: >>absence of good stout Two Rivers woolens but...what _happened_?  Damn
: >>little.  Bleah.  Bleah, and feh.  (Did any of the broads sniff in this
: >>one?  I don't remember any sniffing, but I have to say I sort of
stopped
: >>paying close attention around page, um, 30.)
: >
: >Nothing happened? Nothing *happened*? We've gotten more given to us,
: >and on a silver platter at that, than has happened in the past few
: >books put together, probably. AND in a good style, except for a few
: >dragging chapters.
:
: Comparison to the last two books as support for this one's quality are
: misguided.

Different comparisons.

Action was limited, information was a bonus.  Thumbs down on a couple dozen
pages of filler and two pages of throw away comments that should have come
three books ago, thumbs up that we finally got several of them all in one
book.

Thumbs up that the cleansing of saidin was not dragged out to Bowl Of Winds
proportion, Thumbs down that it happened in the _last_ _fucking_ _chapter_
and we don't get to see what even the short terms effects are.

We learned:

Osan'Gar was Dashiva.  (HA!)
Lanfear is Cyndane.   (HA!)
Semirhage is _almost_ _assuredly_ Anatha.(1)
Mat was in Ebou Dar, all along (You owe me, Donut Boy)
Tuon is The Daughter of the Nine Moons. (HA! and _DOUBLE_ HA!)

We did not learn:

For _certain_ that Taim is not Demandred or vice versa(2)
Who killed Asmodean(3)

: What happened?  Perrin's story was a goddamn waste, as the only thing
: that has changed since the end of POD is that the captives have been
: taken into the Aiel camp, and Perrin knows about the kidnapping and is
: in Hot Pursuit.  Or maybe not that hot.
:
: Mat, Thom, and Juilin decided to haul ass.  700 pages later, they'd made
: it to the stables, albeit with Tuon in tow -- and as for Tuon, all we
: learned is that she's on the mainland now with Semirhage posing as Anath
: the Truthsayer (or whatever the hell that title translated to; I'm
: hooked on Truthsayer because Gaius Helen Mohiam was cool).

Damn, Hill. Did you get the deluxe expando version?  My book only has ~650
pages.

We learned that the color flashes has to do with the Ta'veren Triumverate
and not as an association with the taint.

We learned that Perrin can be just as Ta'veren As He Wants To Be.  The last
scene where Masema allows the One Power usage was good, and a clear example
of the ta'veren twisting of fate on Perrin's part.

We learned that Faile likes to have her bare bottom smacked.

We learned that the gholam is still in Ebou Dar, for whatever reason. (4)

But for the most part, I agree.  The Perrin and Mat chapters were largely a
waste of time.  They really didn't accomplish anything except to position
everything a bit more.  Aiel, Perrin's Army, the Prophet and the remnants
of the Whitecloaks descending into what appears to be the new stronghold of
the Seanchan on this side of the ocean and the place that Mat is leaving
>from with a bountiful entourage.

All included, when this whole scene comes to a head we will have involved:

Faile, cousin to a queen and daughter to a general, in line for the Broken
Crown, married to a ta'veren
Morgase, Ex-queen.
Alliandre, queen of Ghealden and fealty sworn to Faile.
Tuon, Daughter to the Empress of the Seanchan Empire and favored in
succession, destined to marry a ta'veren.
Anatha, her "Truth Speaker" and quite possibly one of the more interesting
FS.
Amathera, former Panarch in Tanchico.
Galad, son of a queen and quite possibly a right to the Sun Throne in
Cairhien, currently high among the Whitecloaks, following a man who abused
his mother, and he is also brother to the Claimant to the Lion Throne.
Thom Merrilin, Morgase's former lover and skilled in the game of Dum an'
dum'er, also known as Pol'i'tiks.
Berelain, Ruler of Mayene and descendant of Artur Hawkwing.
Egeannin, Seanchan Royalty.
Bayle Domon, the only joe normal guy that has had contact with just about
_every_ major character save Perrin.
Three leashed Aes Sedai, three renegade sul'dam.
A whole shitload of annoying Shaido.

And then Mat and Perrin.

Now, if'n you're asking me, and I know you aren't but shut up and listen
cause I'm going to tell you anyway, I say that the next book could consist
of two chapters in which all of the above, save Mat and Perrin, die in
horrible agonizing pain, after which Mat and Perrin go "Oh Well" and then
go back to Rand, and I would be a happy, happy man.

: Rand completed the boning trifecta and despite the new bonding between
: the trio, neither Min nor Aviendha apparently thought to mention to
: Elayne that she's having two, not one.  Yet they must have mentioned the
: up-knocking, as all Elayne's retainers are being irritatingly
: solicitous.  Or maybe they did and she forgot, seeing as how it was
: necessary to infect her with Stupid Person Syndrome to get Hanlon close
: to her...oh, but when she turns the tables on that rascally Darkfriend
: Guardsman-Captain, we'll remember that POV where she thinks about
: Morgase's decision to teach her "Keep your friends close but your
: enemies closer" or "A spy in the hand is worth two in the bush" or some
: other Lini-esque folderol.

Trifecta?  You betcha.

I think she _is_ aware of Hanlon.  But I think it's foolishness, either
way. I'm rather pissed that Jordan didn't have Min or Rand bump into him,
just to have something set up and taken care of within the same book.  I
think that would've been a record for Jordan.

: >Since this is a non-spoilerfied thread now, I won't
: >give specifics, but damn... what do you WANT? The book version of the
: >Sistene Chapel, with illustrations and a free masseuse?
:
: What's up with Egwene, Galad, Gawyn, the shattered Whitecloaks, the
: White Tower, the Black Tower, the Forsaken, Bela, the various
: city-states other than Caemlyn, and so forth?  This book focused like
: the ObLaserBeam on our ta'veren lads and Rand's squeezes; for all that,
: Rand's parting Elayne like the Red Sea, splitting her like a high-flying
: stock, and cleansing the taint (which, in conjunction with the preceding
: sexual references brings to mind a fine joke that I learned in grade
: school) was pretty much it.

What *is* that part called, anyway?

: In other words, I was Underwhelmed.  As others have said, this and POD
: could have been joined into a single book with some 900 pages of cruft
: tossed aside and we'd've been good to go.  Set aside the last chapter
: for a bit, because I'm in full agreement that it was a ball's-out blast
: of good ol'-fashioned WOTness.  Rand spent a book trying to hunt down
: and kill a few guys that Fain got first.  He also got laid again.
: Perrin is so wild with worry over Faile that he hardly knows whether to
: want to howl or to wish Mat and Rand were around to help him deal with
: Berelain because they know how to act around women.  Mat met the
: Daughter and was almost absconding with her when RJ ran outta time.
: Nynaeve did some more braid-tugging but until her long-awaited team-up
: with Rand in the final chapter, her role in this book was to provide us
: with a lot of scenes featuring the goddamned annoying Kin and the
: goddamned annoying Windfinders.  Too much to hope all those uppity
: broads get the kneel-or-be-knelt treatment pronto.  Min's back in
: breeches with embroidered flowers that hug her hips snugly.  Egwene is
: still stuck wandering across Murandy as per POD.

I agree with you on many points.  Faile's POV could have been cut right
out, Perrin's section could have been winnowed to a chapter.  We could have
had the taint cleansing about halfway through the book, and spent the
second half dealing with the White Tower and other various subplots that
were overlooked.

But at this point, I'm happy with what I got.  It wasn't overwhelmingly
chock full of action and information, but for the first time in several
books, it _answered_ more questions than it introtuced.  And for my two and
half years and twenty bucks, that's just enough to keep me mildly
interested in what happens next, to call it "Bonus" and get on with my
life, such as it is.

: Daming with faint praise:  I _did_ really like that last chapter, even
: if one of you sunzabitches now has indelibly burned the image of a
: finger-steepling Mr. Burnsan'gar "EHHHX-cellent!"ing his way through the
: woods into my brain.

I missed that.  I'm going to have to go look that up.

What I _didn't_ like about the last chapter was the way that only _one_
Baddy apparently bought the farm, and that's not even conclusive.  However,
if'n Dashiva'gar _is_ dead, that means the whole gang that tried to off
Rand at the end of tPoD is dead, without Rand killing a one of them.

And no one even _knows_ Dashiva was a Forsaken.  That's something else that
bothers me.

But what happened to the rest?

I'll guess we'll find out in a couple of years.

--

Drew Gillmore    [email-masked]

1)  The same people that will argue against this will be the same people
that argued against Taimendred on the basis that it was "too obvious".

2)And _Bite_ _Me_ that they might have been right.  I've said before that I
won't take anything short of them being in the same room at the same time,
or one _conclusively_ dying and the other living on as proof to the
contrary.

3) And all of the sudden, when at last the Lanfear argument is in total
remission, the "SLAYERDUNNIT!" is going to go on the rise. Damn Jordan.
Damn him to hell for leaving this hanging.  Graendal still did it.

4) Although I think the whole "serial killer gholam" thing was a bit
overdone, and points to something amiss.  And just who else was the gholam
after in Ebou Dar? I thought for sure that he was going to follow the
Wonder Twins.