7
8
9
10
11
The biggest offenders? That's nearly half the freaking series that you admit sucked.
I did not admit they sucked. I said they were a chore to get through. That is not the same thing. And they are not really filler at all once you get to books 12-14, which tie everything together quite nicely.
I agree that to some extent, all of his books could have been shortened if there was less description of Aes Sedai fashion, rooms, decorations, etc. But my personal opinion is that much of that detail enhances the story because it provides a clear idea of Jordan's vision for the world. So . . . I do not find that detail boring or overly problematic. Where it got tiresome is in books 6-11 (and particularly 9-11, where his disease was progressing). In those books it was readily apparent that Jordan was having trouble keeping his plot lines straight, as he apparently felt the need to repeat lots of the same details over and over and over. For this I fault his editors, as such problems could have been easily addressed during the editing process. Even so . . . the over all story Jordan crafted is masterful.
Didn't Jordan even leave one of the major male characters, one of Rand's groupies, I can't remember which was which, out of book 4 or 5 entirely?
Yes, Jordan left Perrin out of the fires of heaven (book 5), instead focusing on Rand, Mat, and other characters whose storylines become interesting over time. I'm not sure, but I suspect that this was due to the fact that by the time book 5 rolled around, Jordan's vision for each story arc was huge. I suspect that he kept Perrin out of that book to appease his editors by keeping the book to a reasonable length while still resolving the storylines he progressed in that book. A similar problem arose when Sanderson took over writing the end of the series. A memory of light was supposed to be a single book, but after consideration Sanderson and Jordan's family broke it into what ultimately became the last three books of the series - each of which was awesome.
If Tolkien wrote like Jordan the Two Towers would have been 700 pages about Galadriel's fashion choices and wouldn't have mentioned Aragorn at all.
I know that Jordan has been compared to Tolkien, but I honestly don't see the point of doing so. Every author has his own style, and in that way Tolkien and Jordan could not be more different. So to compare their writing styles is to compare apples and oranges. The only way Jordan and Tolkien are comparable is in the shear size, scope and detail of the worlds they created.
As for Jordan spending a lot of time on side conversations, etc. Overtime I have come to understand and appreciate those conversations as much as the fast moving parts of the series. By the end of the books each major and most minor characters have a fully fleshed out personality - much of which is developed through those side conversations and interactions. This lead me to connect with the characters in a far more interesting way than most books. Indeed by the end of the series many of the characters were so well developed that they felt like old friends.
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