As some have suggested, the Wheel of Time (WoT, affectionately) has seemingly spun out of control by its later books. Many readers believe that Jordan’s tireless reassurances before his untimely death (“all is planned out, don’t worry”) may have been less than honest. More evidence of that here, as I reread the entire, 10,000+ pages and 3.4 million words of WoT in anticipation of the Jordan/Sanderson conclusion in 2011 (fingers crossed).

“The Great Hunt” picks up days after Rand has discovered he is the Dragon Reborn and has defeated Bel’al and Aginor at the Eye of the World. Training with Lan in Fal Dara, he and the rest of the Two Rivers crowd are soon to be swept off in their disparate directions. Nynaeve, Egwene, and later Elayne will be in Tar Valon. Loial, Rand, and Hurin do a great deal of Portal Stoning and Selene-guiding around Kinslayer’s Dagger and Cairhien. And Perrin, Mat, and Ingtar lead the Sheinar legions around this generally northeastern area looking for the Horn and the Shadar Logoth dagger. No non-readers have any idea what this means.

To sum, the story has three main threads (so few!) with only a rare deviation for the reliably boring Whitecloaks and rare Padan Fain interlude. As a re-reader, I can see the carefully stoked embers of the oncoming story (take, for example, a passing mention of Tuon when Bayle Domon is taken captive by Turak and the Seanchan - none of us paid attention to this the first time through, surely). My appreciation continues to grow for the WoT with the rereading, especially since structure and planning are still evident at these early stages in the epic. You cannot find much critique in the unfaltering pace, either. Which begs the question: at what point does WoT morph into something unrecognizable? Or maybe, with a second chance, it won’t.