A Crown of Swords

This book is frustrating. I'd venture to say that at most 20% of the book are actual material that advances the plot. Which is really disappointing, as those parts are still very well-written. The rest of it are repetitive and reused filler material. Nynaeve's still tugging her braids, Elaynes smoothes her skirt, Egwene folds her arms under her breasts... and breasts, that word strangely comes up lot - a lot of implied nudity and sexuality too, as the book focuses very much on the females.

All the main characters are getting some spotlight, there's also some character development, but it's the same thing. Each of the main characters thinks the others are better at something - it was overused.

There's also a huge number of new characters because each main character is now with several more. The problem with this is that while Jordan describes and re-describes the main characters is painstaking repetitive (but one-dimensional) detail, the supporting casts are rarely described in a way to remind you who they were... ironic. It's a pretty tedious read. There are sections which are good, but you'll have to trudge through lots of filler material to get them all.

What I liked about this particular installment is that a few of the most powerful (and possibly too powerful) mechanisms of the One Power were being reined in. Balefire was only sparely being used. And it didn't solve all problems. Except for the ending, which I was kind of bummed out by. I mean seriously: balefire. Bam. Sammael dead. It's getting old..
Also Travelling! Travelling (with a capital T) is just too easy. So it was nice to see a distinction being made between Skimming and Travelling and that Travelling could not be used to travel in to the inner city because it might be dangerous. In my opinion it can otherwise just be way too easy to go from one place to the next. It is just too much of a comparative advantage.

Nynaeve finally loses the block and marries Lan. Thank the Light. I was getting kind of impatient with the braid tugging.

Jordan being Jordan, there are a lot of people that are “more handsome than pretty” have a face “made of stone” or “carved from wood”. Most characters are introduced by their appearance more than their abilities, stature, or the Light forbid: personality. That kind of bums me out. Also the excessive mention of necklines and arms folded under breasts, or necklaces dangling between breasts, kind of annoy me. On the one hand female characters can hold a high position or be of importance, but then they are degraded to being lustful objects, who clearly will never listen to a man.

But I guess that is just Jordan being Jordan.

There are some interesting character development moments for Egwene, Nyneave, Rand and Mat. That was good.

So all in all I enjoyed it. But I enjoyed Lord of Chaos and Fires of Heaven better. So “it was ok” which according to goodreads is 2 stars.

Well to start this review I feel like I need a chart of every character's name listed a-z in order to keep them straight. Between nicknames, fake names and new characters being introduced, it's just getting down right confusing. As for the story. The last one hundred pages of this book were the best; Jordan leaves the reader with a few cliffhangers. I almost want to skim through the next book to find out what happens to certain characters. As for the rest of the book, it wasn't bad, just slower than the previous. I think the search for the bowl was too stretched out. I understand there was a lot of character development for Elayne and Nynaeve, (development that I thought was about time!) but still, almost an entire book to find a single bowl was a bit much. I did like that characters that have not been mentioned much resurfaced and I am interested to know what changes they will bring. I also am curious about this true power harnessed from the dark one.

3.50/5.00

A Crown of Swords is an interesting choice for the name of this book. I have mixed feelings about this book of the wheel of time. While there are some plotlines which had interesting developments, a few were downright confusing. Some great moments, some satisfying conclusions, some unsatisfying “conclusions”, moderate worldbuilding, and slowed down pacing. A Crown of Swords is a “meh”.

Plot -> I enjoyed the Nynaeve-Elayne Plotline. Nynaeve finally gets rid of her block! But I was so disappointed... Is that all ? So she just went to the brink of death and then suddenly she surrendered... After reading Theodrin's story of getting her block removed, I was expecting something more meaningful. I actually had this theory that Nynaeve's block will break if she cuts her braid.... lol. That would have still been better than what happened here. Mat's plot line was so much fun and so much horror! Very unexpected for a WoT book, but it was certainly interesting to read. Egwene plays a smaller role here.. pretty much pointless for her to be in this book. Moghedien's plot was fun. Rand was bonkers in this book. The power is getting to his head. I did not quite follow the whole Illian invasion thing. It looks like Rand sends the spears to Illian earlier in the book, and then suddenly the attack is failing cause Rand was unconscious, and then somehow he invades anyway.. I think the whole Illian plot line was poorly executed. Worldbuilding -> Not much of new worldbuilding here. I was hoping for more with the Sea Folk, but it kind of felt really flat. The Wise Woman worldbuilding took so many pages! So slow! The magic system does not develop much. I am disappointed that RJ did not provide any answers in this book. He started new plot lines and mysteries but he failed to answer at least some of the world building questions. Every WoT book has had some good stuff in it.. Not much Tel'aran'rhiod in this book, which is disappointing. Character Dev - > Mat wins this category, I just love him. Loved the Mat-Birgitte friendship, loved how he protected his friends no matter how badly they treated him. Rand goes through so much in this book, the PTSD, the clausterphobia! The corruption of all the power that he is amassing.. His never ending battle with putting women in danger (although I think this should be a lesson that he should have learned by now), and finally the self-loathing.. .which is what RJ is going for so job well done. Cadsuane was fun! Sammael is so confusing! I am disappointed with Lan. He is treated like a piece of meat in this book, by all the women who control his life. Why does he let Nynaeve treat him like that... Instead of thanking him for saving her ass from the river, she just hits and slaps him! What a horrible person (I agree with Mat on this lol, at least someone acknowledged how awful she is). There is not much Elayne POV here so I could not appreciate her very much. Prose -> The pacing is slowing down.. but there are some really good things in the book. RJ's writing is pretty much the same, but I think he fumbled the ending here. The Mat-Nynaeve-Elayne part was written very well. The Ending for Rand was not done well at all.. The battle for Illian was a let down. Emotional Impact -> mixed for me... I did really enjoy the moment where the bubble of evil attacks Rand and Cadsuane.... It was finally Aes Sedai and Rand working together. Elayne taking command of the Aes Sedai was good. Mat's POV in general was fun and the whole thing about his rape was weird when the way Elayne reacts to it! OMG!

Warning: Not so much a review as a vomiting up of personal thoughts on the story so far. XD

Love, love, love, LOVE this series!! I honestly can't get enough. I'm so happy this goes on for ages. So much happens in this book, it's crazy. It gets tough to talk about it to other people. No one else I know reads this series, and any time I try to explain it to an outsider, their eyes glaze over and I feel like a droning History lecturer...

The amount of cultures fleshed out in this series is probably one of the things that blows my mind the most. I really love the individuality of the lands and how all the characters become kind of a big melting pot. The characters are maturing so fast, you often forget just how old they really are.

I really think Rand should just go after the Dark Lord. I don't understand all the hesitation. It seems to me that maybe the Dark Lord is lying in wait so he can gather strength. If they busted into his ‘prison', wherever that is, and attacked him before he's ready, they might have a chance. Prophecies that the majority of a cast of characters know about tend to be the ones in fantasy that are full of the most bs.

I do wish Robert Jordan wouldn't skip over certain bits...I REALLY wanted to be there for Lan and Nynaeve's wedding, if not for their wedding night. Mwahahahahaha!

I'm worried Mat and Tylin won't end up a thing... If the Daughter of the Nine Moons turns out to be a Seanchan, I'll be shocked as hell.

Still think Rand needs to put more trust in his friends, but his baby steps with Min are at least promising... I don't trust Cadsuane any further than I can throw her, but I feel Rand needs her around since I trust Min's visions.

I have a feeling the ‘man' in Shadar Logoth was the special Myrddraal, Shadar Haran, if not Logain (though why the latter would be there is anyone's guess) or one of the few remaining Forsaken. Either way, his helping of Rand against Sammael (also most likely alive) is suspicious. Lots of ‘why?'s throughout this book, especially at the end.

After despising Lord of Chaos, I was extremely worried about the next book. I was truly hoping the “slog” didn't start early for me. I can safely say that this book fixed all the wrongs from the previous book and I'm safely still a huge fan of this series. The ending battle wasn't as epic as Lords of Chaos but it was still a good one with more action spread out through the book. The prologue piggy-backed off the last battle of Lord of Chaos but it showed the battle from the perspective of the enemy which I loved. The world building of Ebou Dhar was awesome and the character progression of Mat, Rand, Nynaeve, and Egweyne were very enjoyable as well.

My main complaint with Robert Jordan with all his works is that he'll postpone writing a character for so long that I don't even remember what happened last with him/her.
Perrin and Loial are the example for this book.

On to the slog boys and girls

Clearly a filler book that moves the side stories along. For the first time repetition appears and I guess while its expected you still speed read some sections. Still some interesting pieces occur in the midst of it all and the end is surprisingly swift. The best thing about Crown is that its much shorter than previous editions and a relief in some ways. Three more to go before we see what Brandon does with this and I can't wait!

The second run through makes this much better. My respect for Robert just grows with every book as I read through the series again. Amazing

Ta mi się prawie tak podobała, jak The Fires of Heaven. Rand w końcu jest proaktywny i tak jak przewidziałem, zakończenie poprzedniej części bardzo go zmieniło. Mat i jego dialog wewnętrzny coraz bardziej mi się podoba i cała akcja w Ebou Dar była spoko z jego perspektywy. Perrin to niewiele robił, ale pewnie będzie coś więcej w kolejnej części. Wątek Egwene też jest interesujący i ze względu na jej okoliczności ona ma prawo być troch trudna do polubienia. W końcu widzimy spisek w spisku. Jedyny powód, dlaczego nie jest to 5/5 to Elayne. Jak ja jej nienawidzę. Za każdym razem, gdy wracałem do jej perspektywy, odechciewało mi się czytać. Już Nynaeve jest bardziej racjonalna od niej. Nawet w niektórych momentach perspektywy Mata jest ona nie do zniesienia. W następnej części podobno sporo stron jest poświęconych jej perspektywom, więc mam nadzieję, że zajdzie tu jakiś rozwój postaci.