It’s that time again, motherfuckers! Time to bust out your barely-read copies of the second book in Robert Jordan’s epic 700 book series The Wheel of Time so we can do the Book Bonfire now and get it over with!

Follow the adventures of Rand, Mat, Perrin, Egwene, Nynaeve, Loial, Moiraine, Lan, Ross, Rachel, Joey, Phoebe, Chandler, Monica, Kramer, and Newman as they all take turns walking in one direction, then doing an about face and walking in the other direction! This 680-page brick raises the stakes by introducing a new slew of enemies, criminals, thugs, Koopa Troopas, and giant man-eating blobs! Revel in the mystery of fabled artifacts such as the Horn of Valere or the Triforce! And furthermore, th–

Ok, ok, I’ll play it straight. While the first book, The Eye of the World, has the characters pretty much sticking together in one group as they journey east (with a few brief split-ups), The Great Hunt splits the groups up into several factions with different missions. And then splits them up further! And then adds some new characters to, you know, shake things up a little bit! That is to say, the scope of the story becomes way more epic, but instead of keeping everything separated and expansive like your average A Song of Ice and Fire book, The Great Hunt managed to bring everything together relatively free of too many loose ends. Of course, Rand will kickstart a new quest that everyone agrees to join him in, but that’s why Book Three The Dragon Reborn is all about!

I thought the book started out slow. The Borderlands were loaded with visiting Aes Sedai, and we got introduced in this book to the various flavors! Red Ajah hate the men! Green Ajah are all nymphomaniacs! Blue Ajah are somewhere in between! Brown Ajah are sexually-repressed sociopaths who bury their noses in their books! We meet a whole slew of Moraine-y types, including an evil cunt named Liandrin and a not-so-evil nice lady named Verin. Most of the first 100+ pages saw them slowly unfolding the paths of the plot until they all finally set off on their own journeys: Rand, Mat, Perrin, and Co. to find the stolen Horn of Valere (and Mat’s evil Dagger of Uncontrollable Emaciation). Moiraine, Egwene, Nynaeve, and Co. to train in Tar Valon.

The first half of the book was enjoyable enough, albeit aimless to a fault and uneventful. At one point Rand, Loial, and Hurin (one of Lord Ingtar’s Shienaran soldiers) accidentally phase into another dimension and need to find a way to get back to their group, which is where it begins to pick up. Once we meet Thom Merrilin in Cairhien (YAY, HE DIDN’T DIE) and Egwene/Nynaeve start training Aes Sedai-style in Tar Valon (along with Elayne the Daughter-Heir and Min the Clairvoyant), the book is on a fucking roll. I particularly enjoyed the bits about the Great Game (Daes Dae’mar as it’s called), which is like some The Wire or Game of Thrones shit where the High Lords fuck with one another for funsies. I also greatly enjoyed the events related to the sul’dam and the damane, the Aes Sedai slaves of whom Egwene accidentally becomes for a brief spell. I never found myself rooting for anything in The Wheel of Time yet as I much as I rooted for Egwene just tearing the shit out of her sul’dam (the Leash Holder). I hope for many more such events to come as I plod through the next 13 books!

Good stuff? You betcha! Let’s hit the discussion questions, shall we? Fellow Book Bonfirites??

BOOK BONFIRE DISCUSSION QUESTIONS!

What do you make of Nynaeve’s initial training with Verin? Is she being too stubborn? Do you think the Aes Sedai are messing with her a little?
Nynaeve’s got a hot little temper and she’s not afraid to unleash it, Aes Sedai or no Aes Sedai. As Nynaeve and Egwene travel to Var Talon via ship on the river, Nynaeve becomes increasingly seasick — and, therefore, agitated — as the voyage goes on. There’s a point where the Amyrlin Seat (sort of like the Aes Sedai head honcho — her name is Siuan) visits their cabin and puts the two of them to the test, but Nynaeve hurls a whole batch of fuck-yous at her. Siuan uses the One Power to clamp Nynaeve’s mouth shut and lift her to the ceiling, but Nynaeve gets so fiery and pissed off that she’s able to channel the One Power through her white-hot anger and send Siuan flying hard against the cabin wall. Nynaeve is a badass.

Is Nynaeve being too stubborn? Hell fucking no. Someone needs to take these high-and-mighty “untouchable” Aes Sedai down a peg. Too much self-importance in that group of porcelain-skinned buttholes, if you ask me. Do I think the Aes Sedai are messing with her a little? Hell fucking yes. Someone needs to take Nynaeve down a peg, too. This whole book is full of people who need to be taken down a peg.

How does Rand try to disavow his destiny despite all signs and portents pointing to it? Why does he do this?
I don’t know. ‘Cause he’s a tall pain in the ass?

Rand tries to disavow his destiny because he doesn’t want to be a puppet for the Aes Sedai, and he feels that it’s entirely the Aes Sedai that are putting him up to all this. Little does he know, and he doesn’t know much anyway, that the Aes Sedai are all wrapped up in this shit, too. The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills, as they say. Everyone’s at the mercy of the magic Wheel whether you’re a highfalutin Aes Sedai or some little farming bitch from Nowheresville, Bumfuck.

Rand feels like he’s not in control of his own destiny anymore. All he wants to do is go back to Emond’s Field and return to normalcy. He’s very stubborn about this until he realizes that he’s screwed and normalcy is impossible. Eventually, he begrudgingly embraces his destiny and sets off to find Padan Fain and the Horn. Mostly, though, he’s invested in finding the dagger to save Mat. I wouldn’t have done that, Mat sounds like a sniveling weasel.

Compare Rand and Ba’alzamon from what is seen of the two when they face each other in the story.
No.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Once it picked up after a couple hundred pages, I enjoyed this one a lot more than Eye of the World. Rand, Loial, and Hurin’s phasing into some parallel world was intriguing and I’d like to read more about this phenomenon. The return of Thom Merrilin was an ABSOLUTE JOY and I’m pleased as punch that I get to see him involved in the story again.

The best parts were Egwene’s brief enslavement. Nothing hit a nerve so far in the series quite like Egwene getting shackled and tortured by some cunt. When Nynaeve and Elayne helped Egwene break free, and then Egwene slammed a pitcher in her sul’dam‘s stomach and clipped the collar around her neck, I was all like “yes sir, that’s the business.”

I’m sincerely looking forward to the next 13 books. Very invested in this.