Wheel Of Time #2 - The Great Hunt
According to Goodreads I last read this book in January 2014. I also know that I first read it somewhere around 2005-06, based purely on where I was working at the time. So it appears I've fallen into a pattern of reading this series roughly once a decade.
I don’t give numerical ratings here on the blog, though I do on Goodreads and Storygraph since they’re a facet of the system there. I think they’re a silly thing, really, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t have very specific criteria that I use when choosing a rating. If I’m going to do a thing, I do it properly.
I rated The Eye of The World 7/10 (“Very good. Liked it and would recommend it.”) and I’ve rated The Great Hunt the same even though I think it’s slightly better than the first book in the series. There’s a part of me that has, for the first time, considered switching to a 100-point rating scale, but that way lies madness. All I know is that The Great Hunt isn’t “an outstanding work in its genre which I enthusiastically recommend”, which is my criteria for an 8/10, so 7/10 it is.
I enjoyed this reread a lot. As with The Eye of the World, I remember enough about the book that it felt familiar, but I’ve forgotten enough about it that it felt like I was experiencing it for the first time a lot of the time. There are some specific moments that I remember well - the discovery (and use of) the Portal Stones, Perrin embracing the wolves and masquerading as a sniffer, Egwene’s period of captivity with the Seanchan - and of course it’s impossible to forget Rand’s battle with Ba’alzamon above Falme, but most of the rest of it, plus how all of those things connect, felt new to me.
Something I’ve never picked up on before - likely because I hadn’t read New Spring (or, if I had, I’d forgotten about it) either of the other times I’ve read this series - is that Moiraine is a Damodred who was, at one point, in line for the Sun Throne of Cairhien. This is never mentioned in the book, which seems odd given that Rand is directly involved with Barthanes Damodred, who is embroiled in a power struggle over the throne. Moiraine isn’t give a surname in the glossary here, either, so I wonder if her Cairheiniean lineage is something Jordan didn’t decide upon until later in the series (or whether it’s effectively a retcon for New Spring). I’ll have to keep an eye out as I’m reading to see if and when it’s mentioned for the first time.
I think the pacing here is better than in The Eye of The World. The ending still feels a little rushed and unsatisfying, and the ‘mystery’ over the identity of Ba’alzamon isn’t particularly well-developed. There are some tiny clues that this is actually one of the Forsaken rather than the Dark One - him not knowing who blew the Horn, for example - but I don’t think they’re well-seeded enough. I don’t know how true it is that the series was originally planned as a trilogy - especially given Jordan’s initial deal was for six books - but if it is true then I wonder if the later reveal that this isn’t actually Shai’tan wasn’t planned from the start, which may explain why it’s not particularly effectively foreshadowed in these early books.
We’re still very much in the stage where this series feels fun and interesting and like it has big ideas, and I’m really enjoying watching all the various webs of messianic prophecy coming together to centre on Rand. I’m going to leave it a week or so before I start on The Dragon Reborn so that I actually get a few other books read in between these, but I’m looking forward to continuing this series again. I didn’t know these had become a comfort read for me, but it turns out they sort of have.