Tag: Wheel of Time
-
Wheel of Time: A Case Study in Series Pacing
A few weeks ago, I delved into the pacing of a rather interesting novel, A Deadly Education. But that is one novel (admittedly, the first of a series), and it led me to ponder: compared to individual novels, what does the pacing of an entire series look like? And, with those thrilling sneak-peek images for…
-
Extended Book Series and the Fallibility of the Human Memory
As a fantasy reader, I am well familiar with book series. And although I’m just as fascinated by standalone fantasy and the rise of the duology (specifically for their tight narratives), I will never complain at stumbling across a book I really love and finding out that it is the first in four, or seven,…
-
The 3 Tiers of Fantasy World-Building
Last week, I wrote a post about genre writing and it got me thinking about how to know when a book has enough world-building and if it has enough of the right kind of world building. (The post was a setting study for Monsters of Verity if you wanted to check it out.) Rather than…
-
Let’s Talk Tropes: Minions
No, we’re not talking today about the little corndog shaped creatures from Despicable Me. Or, more accurately perhaps, it’s not all that we’re talking about today. When it comes to combat, there are two options for making the protagonist struggle: conflict of wit or conflict of number. That is to say, outsmarted versus outmatched. Is…
-
Five Branches of Magic Systems (Revisited)
Half a year ago, I wrote a blog post about different kinds of magic systems, hoping to be informative, not expecting it to continue garnering views in the way that it has. I certainly wouldn’t call it a throwaway post, but in the months since I’ve published it, I’ve come to realize that, although I…
-
End of the Year Reading Wrap-Up (2020)
The only good thing about 2020 was the sheer number of books I was able to get through. And there were some really good books on that list. There were also some epically awful books I somehow managed not to DNF, and those deserve an honorable mention. I’ve got my Goodreads books open and ready…
-
Making History (WoT Setting Study #4)
Well it’s been over a month since I did one of these. I think we’re due for another while I finish up Rage of Dragons. Today we’re going to inspect the history infused into Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series to see what lessons might be learned. Considering we will be discussing historical figures and…
-
The Making of Mythical Creatures (WoT Setting Study #3)
In continuation of our extensive Wheel of Time setting studies, I would like to turn a piece of world-building we have not touched upon at all, and that is the inclusion of mythical creatures. As with practically every other facet of world-building, Jordan was not content to pull from existing fantastical creatures, and chose instead…
-
The Prequel Debate
A short preface. Finishing the Raven Cycle crushed me. I tried for about two days to get myself to read the next book on my reading shelf, and just could not bring myself to even open it to the first page. I didn’t think a reading slump was an actual, real thing but apparently it…
-
Let’s Talk Tropes: The Lost Heir
In a genre that likes to play with monarchy, it’s no surprise that several fantasy stories have a big toolbox when it comes to throne-related tropes. For a genre, too, that frequently attempts to set its protagonist apart from everyone else, transforming them from something “common” to something “special,” it is perhaps also unsurprising that…
Katie Bachelder 