Nope, the book was exactly the same as the first and I hated every moment!
Urgh. I knew this was coming but I'm still not prepared for it! I'm not sure what out of ten I would give the two books. It would be fairly low in comparison to my other favourite books at this point, which would sound worse than it is, because I haven't felt like either have been bad.
So what I'll do is try and sum up the main points at this stage and let you, Harebrain, take from it what you will. I'll try and avoid spoilers, but there are a couple of things I do want to mention especially that may almost leak into such.
Firstly, I think this thread shows that I did very much get into the book and -- being the rather involved reader that I am -- there were bits that were a surprise or had me trying to puzzle things out.
The book is different to the first, yes. I think a large part of this is helped by our going into many more and different POVs; this also helps to widen the story out a lot more, too. And Jordan certainly does pull out his own stuff in this book, as even some of the Tolkien elements are gone into a bit more detail and turn out to be rather different (I'm thinking of the winged beasties especially, they turn out to be...rrrr). Some of them (or one in particular) would hopefully make you as angry as it made me and I think Leish (heh! Leish
) I won't pretend that the characters have come on in leaps and bounds since the first book, but in this second there are a couple in particular that do grow and you learn more about -- hopefully feel more for, too. One, I would say, is Rand himself, even if you do still want to slap him at the start
I will say that at present I really don't fear for the characters lives much, or that the Big Bad feels particularly that (big and bad), either. Certainly the Trollocs haven't felt menacing since after their very first appearance and the bad guy in this book was a little melodramatic for my tastes at times (and the Dark One, I forget one of his many names, the fact that he actually and seriously calls people 'worm' and 'fool' just tickles me). Also, despite the fact that this book does of course have its own plot and intrigues and exploits, the overall structure does feel repetitive. A fair bit of travelling (though again, some differences and interesting bits with this), running from or fighting with Trollocs and culminating in a meeting with Everyone's Favourite Flame Face again at the end. To be very honest, I'm a little worried that we're heading to this same sort of climax in book 3; hopefully not, though.
OVERALL...I would say try it. Having read the book now, I can see Leisha's point. I think you
do need to read the second one to get a real feel of this series and what it can do (or shows the potential to do). There's enough to keep me reading on (the third book is on its way) but I can also see that it would be enough for others to decide it's not for them. Personally, as others have said, no you shouldn't have to get to an entire second book to decide if you're gripped or not...but in this exceptional circumstance, I'd say you do.
One thing that will thoroughly piss me off if it keeps happening is if every single ruddy woman who meets Rand immediately and completely falls in love with him. I mean, really. Two of them for certain have only spoken to him, like, twice, max. I'm not bothered if it's some kind of symptom of his Pattern Weavingness, it's ridiculous!
Other than that, the characters generally did more awesome things than annoying things for me this time around, which has to be a good thing
