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I misspoke when I called this the Everybody Goes to Rhuidean book: it is, in fact, the Most People Go to Rhuidean, But Elayne and Nynaeve Go to Tanchico and Perrin Goes Home Book. For the first time in the series, the main characters don't all draw back together for a single finale.
Which is kind of key, from a structural point of view. I said in my discussion of The Dragon Reborn that Jordan's decision to not decide on series length was tantamount to taking the brake off the plot; to continue that metaphor, now he's removed the steering wheel. There's no longer any kind of balancing factor to keep the various parts of the narrative properly in harness. If the series had a predicted length, Jordan could have used that to decide when to complicate and when to conclude different strands; if he kept everybody together, that would have restrained the fractal growth and kept the length in check. Dump both of those, and you're pretty much relying on instinct and a healthy dose of luck to make the whole thing hang together.
And we all know how well that worked out.
It has other ramifications for pacing, too. I'm indebted to John Scalzi for pointing out the natural consequence of multiple points of view: if you write a 120K book about one character, that's 120K words of forward progress on that character's plot, but if you split it among three points of view, now you've got only 40K devoted to each. Naturally it will feel like "less happens," in terms of forward movement. The beginning of this book shows how you can partially get around that; a Rand pov scene will advance Rand's plot, but a Perrin pov scene can do the same thing if Perrin's hanging out with Rand. In fact, if you step back and look through The Shadow Rising, Rand doesn't actually get much perspective -- more than in TDR, but that's not saying much -- but the difference is that Perrin and Rand and Elayne and Egwene and various other characters spend time around him, so despite that lack of perspective, he doesn't reprise his role as Sir Not Appearing in This Book. He appears; you just mostly aren't in his head. Once people separate, though, it's going to start slowing the plot down.
( If you were one of the people asking about Odin imagery, answers lie within. )
I was going to conclude by talking about women in general -- the girls, Lanfear, Faile, Min, the Aiel and the Sea Folk -- but the more I think about it, the more I think that's a post in its own right. (Especially since this one is already so long.) That may or may not happen before I get to The Fires of Heaven (which is the book where I really don't remember anything that happens in it) in a couple of months; we'll just have to see.
Which is kind of key, from a structural point of view. I said in my discussion of The Dragon Reborn that Jordan's decision to not decide on series length was tantamount to taking the brake off the plot; to continue that metaphor, now he's removed the steering wheel. There's no longer any kind of balancing factor to keep the various parts of the narrative properly in harness. If the series had a predicted length, Jordan could have used that to decide when to complicate and when to conclude different strands; if he kept everybody together, that would have restrained the fractal growth and kept the length in check. Dump both of those, and you're pretty much relying on instinct and a healthy dose of luck to make the whole thing hang together.
And we all know how well that worked out.
It has other ramifications for pacing, too. I'm indebted to John Scalzi for pointing out the natural consequence of multiple points of view: if you write a 120K book about one character, that's 120K words of forward progress on that character's plot, but if you split it among three points of view, now you've got only 40K devoted to each. Naturally it will feel like "less happens," in terms of forward movement. The beginning of this book shows how you can partially get around that; a Rand pov scene will advance Rand's plot, but a Perrin pov scene can do the same thing if Perrin's hanging out with Rand. In fact, if you step back and look through The Shadow Rising, Rand doesn't actually get much perspective -- more than in TDR, but that's not saying much -- but the difference is that Perrin and Rand and Elayne and Egwene and various other characters spend time around him, so despite that lack of perspective, he doesn't reprise his role as Sir Not Appearing in This Book. He appears; you just mostly aren't in his head. Once people separate, though, it's going to start slowing the plot down.
( If you were one of the people asking about Odin imagery, answers lie within. )
I was going to conclude by talking about women in general -- the girls, Lanfear, Faile, Min, the Aiel and the Sea Folk -- but the more I think about it, the more I think that's a post in its own right. (Especially since this one is already so long.) That may or may not happen before I get to The Fires of Heaven (which is the book where I really don't remember anything that happens in it) in a couple of months; we'll just have to see.
