A Memory of Light

MY REVIEW OF THE WHEEL OF TIME BOOK 14, A MEMORY OF LIGHT

Book description via Goodreads:

The Wheel of Time turns and Ages come and go, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth returns again. In the Third Age, an Age of Prophecy, the World and Time themselves hang in the balance. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

When Robert Jordan died in 2007, all feared that these concluding scenes would never be written. But working from notes and partials left by Jordan, established fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson stepped in to complete the masterwork. With The Gathering Storm (Book 12) and Towers of Midnight (Book 13) behind him, Sanderson now re-creates the vision that Robert Jordan left behind.

Edited by Jordan’s widow, who edited all of Jordan’s books, A Memory of Light will delight, enthrall, and deeply satisfy all of Jordan’s legions of readers.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass.
What was, what will be, and what is,
may yet fall under the Shadow.
Let the Dragon ride again on the winds of time.

And now, my review:

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The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. … There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was AN ending…

And here we have it, the long-awaited and much lamented fourteenth and final book in the Wheel of Time series. As one might expect, it is another long, deep, and detailed story that once again proves this series is the very definition of Epic Fantasy.

I have a very love/hate relationship with A Memory of Light. It absolutely lived up to being as epic a close as I ever could have asked for, I have no complaints there. In truth, here is just about 40 audio hours of epic battles with not a whole lot of filler in between. If epic battles are your thing, you really can’t go wrong on this one.

As with every other book in the series, as much as I loved this book the first time I read it, I enjoyed it vastly more this time around! This is one of those series that just gets better each time you read it.

However, that very lack of “in between” is also part of the problem.
I readily acknowledge that had there been the usual detail leading up to events and the logistics of getting to those events, this probably would have been a million word book instead of the only somewhat unwieldy tome we have. However, I’m left with a lot of questions about just how people got to where they were and what they were doing between glimpses.

But, before I go any deeper on that, for those who may not have listened to the audio of any of these books yet, I have a brief word on the narrators.
It’s hard to beat the team of Kate Reading and Michael Kramer recording an audiobook. Both have an impressive array of both male and female voices that at least come close to believability. Kramer has the advantage of superb control of tempo, making it clear in any given scene just how much tension is present, while Reading does just a little bit better with portraying accurate vocal inflections.

Okay.
Let’s take a deep breath and dive into this book, with all its faults and qualities laid bare.

But first, a few statistics.
This time around, my journey throughout the Wheel of Time took me 3 months and 11 days.
There were 15 books (including the prequel)
11898 pages
Over 4.4 Million Words
A staggering 19 days, 5 hours and 25 minutes of amazing audio
With 147 Unique PoVs and 1379 total PoVs
And a staggering cast of over 2200 characters

Whew.
It’s intimidating just looking at those facts.

Alright, so I’ve seen this question asked in a number of places so I want to address it.
Is A Memory of Light the best/greatest fantasy book ever written?

I’m sorry, but no.
Hard no.

Why?

Well, put simply, because it is wholly incapable of standing on its own.
You cannot, under any circumstances, pick up this book with no prior knowledge and enjoy it.
And why is that?
Because this book is, in its entirety, a climax.
More than 90% of this book is devoted to paying off all the things that have gone before it.
There is very little that is new here. There are no new plot lines, no new characters, almost nothing totally unexpected. When it comes right down to it, this book is the payoff for nearly 4 million words of buildup to Tarmon Gai’don.

So what does A Memory of Light do well?
From page one we hit the ground running. This is a book about the final battle. In my view, this book might as well have been titled Tarmon Gai’don or The Last Battle, as that’s pretty much all it is. We end up with a few really neat asides that have little to nothing to do with the last battle itself, but not many of them.

My favorite among them, however, is an amazing meeting between Rand and Mat. It is the first time the two men have met since Rand sent Mat to meet with the Aes Sedai in Salidar several books ago. Both have grown so much, in both maturity, strength, and skill. Both are directly responsible for huge numbers of people and both are needed for the world to survive.

Yet, for just a minute, we see a glimpse of the men these two childhood friends used to be.
In the midst of a negotiation that has the potential to make or break the future of the world, they embark on a little game of “Who Pulled Off The Awesomest Accomplishment.” It was a much needed moment of levity that also managed to remind us that these two men have done momentous things that will shake the world for ages to come. It also highlights just how self-deceptive Mat is, as it shows that the things he’s done really do matter to him, and he knows just how much impact he has had on the world. Despite his swearing to the contrary, Mat has become a hero, one whose name will be spoken of throughout the ages to come. With at least near to as much reverence as that of the Dragon Reborn himself, if not just as much. Or more.

Similarly, in other asides we see some awesome development between a few bonded sets of Asha’man and Aes Sedai, and it’s an incredible thing to witness. I love the way that we get to explore things that were unknown even in the Age of Legends and see some truly touching character moments along the way.

As one might expect, this is the most deadly conflict in the history of the world. Characters can and do die. And while I feel there was maybe a little too much miraculous survival, in the main the authors did not shy away from letting important characters die. I won’t say who, because spoilers. But each and every death is earned and brings us both melancholy and a sense that they are working toward a greater purpose. Their deaths all have meaning. More than one is intentionally brought about by the character in question.

Now, a few areas where the book doesn’t quite deliver as strongly as I would have liked.
As has been the pattern with these final three books, the quality of the prose and especially the dialogue just isn’t what it was when Robert Jordan was writing them. The trade-off, of course, is that Sanderson’s prose has much more immediacy to it and is, for better or worse, far less centered on details of clothing and environs than Jordan’s was.

And as I mentioned above, there is an element of… summarizing in this book that I found disconcerting.
Not in the main events or the battles themselves. Those are quite detailed, with a strong focus on the action of the battles themselves. While the facts of the battles might not be wholly realistic in and of themselves, they are still epic moments to witness. You can’t help the sinking of your heart when the tides turn against the heroes, and similarly you can’t stop yourself from cheering when they strike a victory, even if it’s a temporary one.

It’s the things that happen between the battles that I found problematic.
It almost had a feel of… the final season of the Game of Thrones TV series. All the broad strokes are there. The major points, or main events if you will, are all there. The big happenings are all detailed. But I was left a bit lost as to how people got there. One moment a character would be in a place doing a thing, then we’d break to another character, and when we’d come back to the first one they’d be in a totally different place doing a totally different thing with no explanation as to how they got there or what happened in the interim.

And there is that one chapter. “The Last Battle,” it is oh-so-creatively titled. And it goes on for close to 9 hours! (or a little under 5 if you’re like me and listen to audiobooks at almost double speed)

Okay, where do I begin?
First, the idea that we have a single chapter that’s as long as most books is extremely problematic for me. Not only is it a daunting endeavor to have to read what is likely a 150-page+ chapter, but it also comes off as lazy and uninspired when it takes place in a book that has chapter titles. The larger issue, however (at least for me), is that this chapter reads extremely choppy. It bounces around from character to character quite quickly, leaving almost everything unresolved until the very end. Incongruously, there’s also a fairly major timeline problem. There are a great many instances where you read an event, then pass over 2 or 3 or more PoV changes, then you come to another character and see a new perspective on that same event. I mean, I get that you can’t see all the PoVs at the same time, but if the book is going to very choppily skip from one character to another, it could at least keep the timeline close and relatively neat. I’m not asking for both smooth transitions and closure of a character’s scene along with a clean timeline, but at least one of them should not be too much to ask.

Now, much like in Towers of Midnight, we have a vital plot line that really should have seen a lot of attention, yet it’s treated as an afterthought. I’m speaking, of course, of Padan Fain. Or whatever you want to call him, as he isn’t really Fain anymore. There’s a glimpse of him in the beginning, another toward that latter 2/3 of the book, and then we truly see him for a minute just before we reach the end of his story arc. And I have to admit that for all that I wan’t a big fan of his part of the story throughout the series (I would have been much happier if Rand or Perrin had killed him back in books 4, 5, or 6), I’m a bit bothered by how he was treated here.

Similarly, it really irks me that we never had an answer about Asmodean. Back when these were still in the writing process, Brandon Sanderson promised an answer about what happened to the lowest of the forsaken, but it never came. At least, not overtly. I understand it’s spelled out in the appendix to ToM, but that isn’t the same thing. It should not have been that difficult to build a hard answer into the text of the books.

And finally, my last real complaint is about the “epilogue.”
Yes, I meant to put that in quotes. Because although the chapter is called epilogue in the book, it really isn’t one. An epilogue is something that comes later, after the close of the story. It’s to settle everything and show you what happens after all the fuss ends. Everything here should have been chapters, and we should have seen a true epilogue that showed us a least a hint of what happened in the months or years following the last battle.

I won’t talk about who lives and who doesn’t, as I endeavor to keep my reviews spoiler-free, but I have questions. A great many of them. About the surviving characters and what a few of them have become. And how they became what they are. And what it means for the future of the world.

Now, before you go thinking I’m just ragging on this book, understand that I truly did enjoy this book. I love A Memory of Light. I cannot, unfortunately, go so far as to say it is the best book in the series. That honor rests somewhere in the first four books, if I’m being honest. Probably either the first or the fourth. However, it is an essential part of the series and I love so many things about it.

As ever, Perrin is my absolute favorite character in the series. He’s one of the few characters in the series who isn’t suddenly handed a whole boat-load of power, and stays humble throughout. While other characters are walking around with heads so big it’s amazing they can fit through doorways, Perrin is just being his usual stalwart, loyal self. He’s the gentle giant of the series (although perhaps that title would be better placed on Loial). And while yes, he does rise to power over the course of the books, his journey is much more organic and, in my opinion, much more earned than most of the others.

He does eventually learn to stand up for himself, and with a little guidance he learns how to manage his wife relatively well. And, of course, through the Wolf Dream he becomes one of the most important players in Tarmon Gai’don. Without him, all would have been lost.

Mat really came into his own strengths here as well. It was fantastic to see him given the reins as he should, and to see how well he handled himself throughout. Of course, there are times he manages to do exactly the right thing purely by accident, but then, that’s pretty much the basis for his character after book 4. His luck and the memories he never should have had are a lot of what makes him who he is, despite his fervent attempts to deny all of it.

One of the greatest moments of the book belongs, unsurprisingly, to Lan Man’Dragoran. Those who’ve been paying attention have long known the incredible skill he possesses, and the mixture of restraint, honor, and stoicism that define him as a person. I don’t think there was ever any question that he would end up being absolutely pivotal to the Last Battle in some way. I won’t spoil it, let me just say that his sequence is the stuff that legends are made of. Things like his efforts are exactly the sort of thing that define Epic Fantasy as a genre.

Following shortly after Lan, however, is Egwene. Between her political power, her phenomenal strength in the power, and that incredible sa’angreal she possesses, I don’t think anyone doubted that she would do great things come the Last Battle. And she does not disappoint.

Even now, at the end, she’s still discovering new things that completely flip the world on its head.

Elayne, for me, finally redeems herself in this book. At long last, she lets go of a least a small bit of her High and Mighty I’m Better Than You attitude and makes the most of her situation. I’m not sure I agree with the realism of the position she is placed in, but she makes the best of it and actually manages to shine in that role.

In some ways, it is Aviendha who takes the battlefield glory, however. I love how much she’s grown as a person. There was a time that not only would she have been completely incapable of leading any sort of allied force in battle, but no one outside of the Maidens would have followed her. Not so now, however. Although there is some hesitation, among the Wise Ones in particular, she manages to lead her forces brilliantly. She develops and executes a plan that, although it encounters many problems and only barely resembles her intention at the end, still comes off beautifully in the end.

Even Min, against all odds, finds a place of strength and influence from which to work during the Last Battle and I have to admit that without her, the end result would have been far different. I have to give props to Fortuona/Tuan for thinking of such a useful way to put Min’s gift to work.

And speaking of Tuan, I honestly couldn’t be happier with how she turns out.
While yes, there are some fundamental problems with the Seanchan culture in general, and I’m still grappling with how I feel about the message it sends, I don’t feel quite so strongly about it as some reviewers have. Now, if it was ALL women in their culture that they leashed and treated as property, that would be an entirely different matter. But the correlations I’ve seen people draw about the Seanchan are not only patently wrong, but also highly irresponsible.

Logain, oh Logain.
Lord Logain Ablar. What can I say about him?
He’s been through so much, and so much of it horrible and forced on him.
I don’t blame him for becoming what he does. After all his travails, if anything it’s shocking he didn’t turn to the shadow himself, purely on account of being embittered at everyone who tried to control him.
And yet, in the end we finally see him become the person I always knew him to be. The honorable, just, noble man who was presented to us when we caught our first glimpse of him in The Eye of the World.

There are honestly so many amazing characters I could talk about, I could probably turn this review into a short novel of its own. However, since there is more than enough material to read just in this book, let me close with my final thoughts about Rand.

In spite of everything he’s already been through and all he’s grown over the course of the previous 13 books, Rand still has one lesson left to learn. The one lesson that Lews Therin Telamon never did, as it happens. The very one that keeps Demandred hunting for Rand on the battlefield throughout almost this entire novel. I won’t spoil what that lesson is, but it is well that he finally learns it and does what he needs to do.

There are other lessons he has yet to learn, of course. His battle with the Dark One is not what anyone thought it would be. How could it be? We’ve had enough hints of this by now that I don’t feel I’m spoiling anything by saying that the Dark One is not, in fact, an entity. Not as humans understand such things. Rather, the Dark One is a force. A power. Although he lies outside of nature, outside of the pattern, outside of creation itself, he is a force of nature that affects all things. And Rand finally learns that lesson.

I’m not entirely certain I agree with the conclusions the author(s) come to about what destroying the Dark One would mean, but that’s neither here nor there.

I honestly couldn’t be more proud of the person Rand has become. He finally learned that strength and hardness are not the same thing, and one of them is required of him as the Dragon Reborn, while the other is not. He still has the ability to surprise everyone around him, still has the ability to smile and laugh, in spite of all the horror around him, and he is supremely devoted to what he has to do.

And in this final bit, he manages to fulfill the last few prophecies in ways that we never expected, proving even to the Seanchan that their prophecies don’t mean what they always assumed they did.

I am left with a final question about Rand. Something that is touched on but not actually addressed in the book, and it’s part of why I’m so frustrated by the lack of a proper epilogue at the end. I won’t say more here, for the sake of spoilers, but it’s something I’d love to chat about with other folks who’ve read the entire series.

Now, it is a bit of a struggle to discuss the actual ending of a book that is, in almost its entirety, an ending. But for a moment, let’s talk about the actual climax. Not the supporting climaxes that are all about winning the physical battle and keeping Rand alive long enough to do what he needs to do (of which there are many, and each is epic enough to have made it’s own epic fantasy story), but the actual climax.

Rand’s battle with the Dark One.

As I addressed earlier, it is not the literal battle that Rand (and a great many others) always thought it would be. It is something much more… metaphysical. I won’t go into details as I don’t want to spoil it. What I will say, however, is that it turned out to be something far different that what I always imagined. And in spite of some reviewers’ cynical, embittered words about it, I honestly couldn’t have been happier with it. What else could have been its basis when we’re talking about a conflict between a force that is second only to the power of creation itself and a man infused with nearly that much power, whose destiny it is to overcome the Dark One and seal him away in his prison, a prison that exists not only in the current world of the heroes but in all possible universes, all possible dimensions, simultaneously.

And at the end of it all, Rand has yet one more surprise for us. A use for a sa’angreal that none of us ever considered. One that is capable of so much more than we ever thought possible.

My one complaint about this ending is that Rand clearly planned this all out in advance, yet despite spending considerable time inside his head we are never given any inkling of it. It comes across as lazy writing to me. Or cheating, if you prefer that term.

It’s just unrealistic that he wouldn’t have thought about his plans at any time when we were inside his head seeing his thoughts.

So, final thoughts.
After spending almost 3-1/2 months in this story, I’m definitely sorry to see it end. These characters have become some of my truest friends and I’m really not ready to say goodbye.
Some I had to say farewell to earlier than others, of course. There will always be a hole in my heart for the characters who didn’t survive the Last Battle. Each death was hard won, hard fought, and managed to do something epic in the process (yes, even those whose deaths didn’t seem to accomplish anything immediate).

There is definitely a part of me that is saddened to realize there were plans for sequel novels that we’ll now never see. I would have loved to see a concurrent book or series about Demandred and his activities throughout the struggle as well, as he clearly was very busy, between what he did in Shara and in other places. And later novels to see where the characters ended up after the Last Battle would have been amazing to see.

But I digress.
In closing, this is definitely one of, if not the single most epic fantasy series you’ll ever read and I’m convinced that every fantasy reader should read this series at least once in their lifetime.

For myself, I can’t wait until I forget enough of the details to start re-reading these again.
I suspect my third read through will be even better than the second was.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. … There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was AN ending…
-Robert Jordan

If you are so inclined, you can pick up a copy of A Memory of Light HERE. If you’re new to the series, you can pick up book 1, The Eye of the World, HERE