Hi Guitarman.

Well  unfortunately I agree on at least some of your cryticisms.  Jordan rather forgets that occasionally people do! trust each other, whether a married couple or kingdoms in an alliance, heck you've probably noticed that the Forsaken really aren't so scary sinse they spend so much time trying to actually out plot each other they rarely have time to do anything evil to everyone else!
Jordan also has a problem writing out characters as well, which means unfortunately your getting to the point in the series where there are so many people  just rattling around you don't really care about what they're up to, or at least I didn't.

As regards the forsaken and the seals, remember the forsaken were sealed in along with the dark one himself and have started to appear as the seals weaken over time, thus they weren't powerful enough to break the seals. You will find out more about this later, also I can promise that in the final book you find out just what the dark one's plans for the world are, so have patience with that one.

In general I enjoyed Wheel of Time, but I disliked the constant influx of pointless characters, the way that from books 5-10 the plot slowed down and just went through permutations, and indeed the sexism, sinse why the heck must every female character bicker pointlessly? And why the heck must every female character, be they a queen or an ais sidai or a hero of legend end up doing some man's laundry? Really jordan is quite disturbing with that one :d.

All that being said, the world, the culture, the legends and the backstory are very well done. unfortunately if your on book 7 you've got another few books to go before things start picking up, but I will advise you to go on. For me, the series really started improving at book 11, and then ccontinued to get better when Sanderson took over the writing in book 12, and I will say the final book and ending in Book 14 is very epic!

So, while I do think WoT is a series with it's problems, it's still well worth perciveering through, albeit I can think of series I like better.

I agree about the female character bickering, even though for most of the series I found the female characters such as Egwane were doing much more interesting things than the male characters, particularly Rand, I shal wine constantly Al thor.

I wouldn't so much say any plot element was pointless, rather it's the way Jordan deals with it. In The great hunt, the seanchan are genuinely interesting with being such a different culture and providing a serious threat, yet one not connected with the dark one. They even have what was I believe supposed to be a profound effect on Egwane when she is their prisoner, however again rather than them being an interesting and dynamic faction, they just seem to prevaricate for most of the book, and while again things come to a satisfying conclusion with them later I did feel like all the other plot elements they were rather too badly drawn out.

One of the intrinsic problems with Rand and the Thinking Jordan seems to have in a lot of WoT is that there were times when i wasn't sure Jordanknew what kind of fantasy he was writing.

On the one hand we have characters with emotional relations to each other, complex dealings and alleagences and counter plots, making a realistically complex and confused world.

On the other we have a very mythological, Conan the barbarian style fantasy where mighty rand mightily slaying his way with mightiness across the Battlefields of legend! this really became a problem in some of the battle scenes, indeed you have not got to it yet but there was one particular battle where I quite dispared of this conflict.

This really creates problems for Jordan with a lot of characters, particularly his male ones who tend to fight constantly, and is one reason why generally my favourite bits of Jordan's writing were in the first few books before things got political and draggy and legendary, when it was just about three boys and a couple of girls who were going to be ais sidai leaving their village and getting tied up in things none of them really understood in very distant and often incomprehensible places like the I'eel waste.

I will say with Credit to Jordan things were picking up just before sanderson took over, and I found book eleven much better at finishing plots.

If you enjoyed Mistborn you will enjoy the end of the series, sinse I found it quite similar in style even if not in world or events.

While I am not exactly one of these people who thinks Sanderson is next to God in fantasy terms, i have enjoyed his books, particularly Stormlight, which in many ways feels like Wheel of time done right (or at least it does thus far, where it goes in the future we'll see).

I have to say for this sort of epic story with politics, realistic characters and great world I'd rank George R R Martin Tad williams or possibly Robin Hobb over Jordan or even Sanderson (although Hobb's stuff is slightly different in emphasis), although I do enjoy both even if not quite as much as  MArtin or Williams.

On my Iphone at the moment I have the first two Kingkiller books by Patric Rothfuss who is predicted as the next big fantasy writer and who I've heard very good things of. I'm quite looking forward to starting on those, though I'm busy with Doctor who audios at the moment.

Nothing other than what I wrote in This topic

I've read a lot of random stuff sinse that topic, from Doctor who novelizations to the latest Harry Dresden book, and the end of Tad Williams' Shadowmarch series, however nothing more similar to Wheel of Time than what I already recommended.

Indeed I would still say Martin's game of Thrones and both of the fantasy series (and indeed his none fantasy series), I liked more than WoT.

@Guitarman, Shadowmarch is awsome, I finished the series quite recently, but pretty much anything by tad williams is (I have not read bobby dollar yet but I'd be surprised given I've never read a single bad book by Williams).

I wouldn't say hobb is like WoT precisely because of what you said about characters, sinse where that is where Jordan (and to a lesser extent sanderson), falls down, it is one of Hobb's strengths, Hobb also tends to write about one character for most of her books, Fitz Shivelry, though actually my favourite series of hers was still Liveship traders which concentrated on multiple characters much more than either of the Fitz series, though being as I also like Pirates I was probably a little predisposed to like that series :d.

I fully agree with you on characters, and as I said there was a hilarious bit in WoT with battles that made me laugh, I believe at the end of book 8 though i will wait until you get to that bit before actually saying why I found it funny sinse it would be a bit of a spoiler otherwise.

I disagree on Sword of Truth being like WoT, ---- accept for also being rather sexist. I enjoyed the first book as a sort of fun fantassy, albeit one with some really shocking moments, however the series just went down from there sinse each book was  essentially a repeat of the first, more torture, bigger monsters and a different magic puzzle each time. Where WoT had a distinct world and culture, Goodkind kept making up different lands as he went on and different creatures and magic.

My biggest problem with Goodkind though was the way he had rto ram his politics down everyone's throat to the point where it actually affected the story seriously. i got really sick about reading wrants of how good life was and how evil anyone who thought people should be equal was, indeed he sort of demonized those who disagreed with him so much they were completely impractical! ---- heck how exactly does an army successfully conquer anywhere while keeping the population of every city they capture alive to torture for days and days on end, while destroying all the fields and crops and constantly expecting to survive, really the organization just got insane! In the end I admit I finished the series to book 11 more out of duty than desire and I certainly haven't read anything he wrote after that.

Wizards first rule I did like, and the other books occasionally had some nice character moments, but those became fewer and fewer as the characters of the sereies basically just turned into ways for Goodkind to spout his own views.

Glad you took my advice about the Ducnton books they are awsome, though I have to say where as I regard the first trilogy, Duncton wood, Duncton Quest and Duncton found as some of the best books I have ever read and indeed reread them every so often, the second trilogy I just thought were good. Certainly worth reading, but not as phenominal as the first. audio versions exist in the Uk but I'm not sure about else where.

I am looking forward to starting Rothfuss, I've heard some very good things, though tearing myself away from the dr. who audios I'm listening to right now will be a challenge .

I don't think there are many series exactly! like WoT other than Sanderson, and even he has his own style, however different authors have different strenghts, some of them even better strengths than Jordan, which is why I tend to like a huge range of boks.