Knife of Dreams: Book Eleven of 'The Wheel of Time' (The Wheel of Time, Book 11) Mass Market Paperback – November 28, 2006

Almost there. Book 11, the last of the Jordan books. By now I believe Jordan knew he was sick.In the reread before The Gathering Storm, and after 20 years, new perspective on the series has come to light. One that Jordan was dying as the final books were generated.We also learn that as the series gets popular, Jordan can afford to hire assistants to work for him and try to keep track of all the elements. But that must have been a waste of money.Still errors exist in the grammar. Then the errors of characters who have met previously running across one another, the fans did a much better job for free then the paid staff. The Hubris of Jordan, and the horrible description of battles in what is a series that is to culminate in a battle. By a man who went to the Citadel. Perhaps that claim is false. The teach military history at the Citadel, tough perhaps Jordan flunked all the medieval history elements which is where fantasy battles reside.But why stick with a series for so many books. I have told how the author breaks the rule of Show don't Tell, by telling and telling and telling even more. We have POV errors though maybe not as bad as others. (Listen to the Audio Books where they try to keep each chapter by the sex of the first POV character. That becomes confusing, especially trying to hear when each of the readers tries to sound like Rand or another character from a different POV.)The answer is that 1800 named characters make a rich story. The Travelogue and history fest of this prophecy coming to fruition, even where it does not make sense in so many places, is full and enrapts you in its depth.Knife of Dreams does have too much Tell again. The chapters of each of the Protagonists (more than one, another rule broken) get started and pick up speed, and then switch across the world to the next... A few Arcs are tied up, but too many are left hanging.The time frame again is too much is happening all at once, when before months were given to developing the growth of the characters. These are all still young people who are making decisions way beyond their years and experience.But better then several of the last, and the end may be in end sight... If left to Jordan, he was probably told to finish it at 12. With his death, stretching the 12th book into 3 books, so 14 books may be a sop to his memory. Just being content that it is nearly finished, and nearly complete means getting through this book, finally there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

So much better than book ten. Found that to be tedious. This was exciting start to finish. Answered questions and gave and end to stories that were left hanging.

While it still doesn't compare to the first four or five books, Knife of Dreams is probably the best novel in the Wheel of Time series since Fires of Heaven. The good news is numerous plot lines advance and the writing shows the effect of a full editing cycle. The bad news is that the good writing here oddly illuminates how much of a hole author Robert Jordan dug for himself with the mess of the previous novels - with it being made very clear even a writer of his talent probably won't be able to resolve the plethora of details even with another couple of books. I take a star off for letting a number of details and characters slip along with another half star for a pace that at times returns to near-plodding, but I'll round it up from 3.5 stars to four for the progress here that makes me have high hopes for the next book.It is outright scary to think of how many top selling authors have come and gone since Jordan started this series. In 1990, Lemony Snicket was a sophomore in college, J. K. Rowling had just taken that fateful train ride back to London, and most of the top sellers on the sci-fi/fantasy lists hadn't been published even in fan magazines. My rating here is standalone and does not reflect my frustration with how Jordan has dragged this out; read my reviews of Crossroads and New Spring if you doubt that. (Incidentally, Jordan claims to never have read a review on Amazon, having stated that "if you're going to get your heart checked out, would you go to a doctor (professional reviewer) or walk up to a guy on the street?" Oh well.)Although not spectacular, Knife of Dreams finally gives hope again. Without spoiling things, many plotlines raised in the last few books advance. Perrin's attempts to recover Faile, Mat's escape with and courtship of Tuon, Elayne's struggle for her crown, and a few miscellaneous issues resolve. More significantly and more satisfyingly, Jordan really does make progress on some plotlines that have been promised since the first few books - Egwene's struggle to truly be the Amyrlin Seat, the implications of Lan as Aan'allein, and miraculously, even some movement on the long (1995!) dormant Eel- and Aelfinn plotline. There are also some remarkable new point-of-view (Tuon, Loial!) perspectives that add to the details of the world without having to write hundreds of pages. Finally, the book also shows the effort of being at Tor for more than a month before publication like the last four or five novels; Jordan isn't allowed to go off into tangents - and thankfully, no major new characters get introduced - and in general the writing is generally crisper.Unfortunately, it's not enough. Jordan has created so many irrelevant plotlines and characters from the sixth book onwards that even with a workmanlike effort to clean up here the mess is still very much present. A glaring result is that the main plot - what the Dragon Reborn is doing - not only receives merely cursory attention but also doesn't show up until Chapter 18, or 385 pages into a 760 page book. The not-particularly-engaging Windfinder and Tower-divided stories get far too much coverage without moving much, a number of major characters besides Rand (like Min, Nynaeve, and Aviendha) get very little stage time with more minor players like Galina and various Shaido characters receiving far too much, other interesting plots like the Forsaken move barely at all with minimal coverage, and of all the advancements above only the Egwene line really feels satisfying. (If Jordan had advanced the other main characters as much as Egwene this would have been a much better book.) The problem is clear. The last really good WoT book, Fires of Heaven, had roughly four or five major plotlines; this has at least ten thanks to the mess of the last few books. While Jordan and his editor state unequivocally that this will be finished in one more book (thankfully planned to be completed before any more prequels), all the new material he's added makes this doubtful and is now standing directly in the way of a great wrapup.Jordan's goal was to have fans sweating by the end of the book; for me, I didn't get there as this doesn't qualify as a cliffhanger by any means. Over the summer, I actually reread all the previous books and the good news is the bad ones make more sense as part of a sequential order - and at least Jordan is somewhere close to his old form, so this isn't bad. But then again, it's not great either. Still, it deserves 3.5 stars and is worth buying in hardcover rather than waiting. For the first time in years, I look forward to the next novel.September 2007: My sympathies to Jordan's lovely wife Harriet on his recent passing. For those who are interested, the notes he left as the basis of the massive final book, A Memory of Light, will be completed and published in 3 separate books by Brandon Sanderson.