Intruige, battles and strange magical stuff. (Lord of Chaos - Robert Jordan)

Member Name: Bryn Pearson

Product:	Lord of Chaos - Robert Jordan
Date:	28/03/02 (33 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: lots of plotting and intruige

Disadvantages: takes over your life

What would you do if you knew in all probability that the magic you could use was going to drive you mad sooner or later? What would you do if you believed it was your destiny both to destroy the world and to save it? What would you do if everyone you encoutnered was trying to use you to their own ends, most of which involved you being killed off at the earliest opportunity?

For a long time, Rand al'Thor's answer to the above has been to sulk, mope, resist and muddle along as best he can. Book six in the Wheel of Time series finds him with three cities to look after, as well as a warrior nation. There are enemies on the borders
and the female magic users ( a very political lot) are out to get him - some to render him powerless, some to cage him so that they can control him, some for reasons he isn't even sure of yet. It has occured to Rand that he doesn't have time to go aorund being sulky, there's too much to do, and he has to knuckle down and get on with it.

He's playing politics with nobles, trying o keep the female magic users off his back, fighting wars on several fronts and keep his errant love life under some semblance of control. This would all be significantly easier if he didn't have the voice of a mad man whose been dead for three thousand years batting around in his head. It would be easier still if his childhood sweetheart wasn't muddled up in the factions of female magic users. It would be a positive walk-over if the ultimate evil was not blatantly close to breaking out of its prison, and wasn't influencing the world enoug to cause a perpetually blistering summer.

Things are not going well for Rand.

Princes Elayne Trankard is refusing to return and take the throne he has secured for her, and her mother has made a pact with an army of nutters - a group much like the Sapnish inquisition. The Aeil warriors have split, some of them are opposing Rand, some of them are making pacts
with the magic users. The magic users are trying to manipulate the nobles, the nobles are trying to manipulate each other. There's a hostile force waiting across the ocean and to cap it all, Rand has started having other men trained in using magic. They too will probably go mad sooner or later. Assuming they live long enough to get the chance.

So, that's the main plot in brief. There are many smaller threads as well, just in case the above wasn't enough to keep you going.

This is largely a political book, with lots of vying for power and the like. There are some stunning fight scenes however, a daring kidnap and an impressive escape. There are threads of many lives all woven together in a very rich tale.

The trouble is, if you haven't read the first five, most of this will be almost totally incomprehensible.

Start at the beginning - "The Eye of the World" - lots of ops on Dooyoo for you to read as well. You need to have a lot of reading stamina to get this far - each book weighs in at around the 1000 pages mark - I can manage that in a week, but I am a freak. The other problem is that Robert Jordan hasn't finished writing the series yet - he's at least three short of finishing.

I have this nightmare that he might not survive to write the ending. I live in terror.

So, you were warned, get into this series and you are getting into something huge that may well take over your life. They are the best fantasy books out there though, so you might want to succumb.

Summary: