Lord of the Wheel of Time

I found out yesterday that over the weekend Robert Jordan (aka James Oliver Rigney, Jr.), possibly my favorite writer, passed away over the weekend. He was working on the final book of his Wheel of Time series, the 12th book. At least two of those books reached more than 1,000 pages, and none of the paperbacks is less than 700 pages.

This is sad news, not just for his family but for his millions of fans. I remember the first time one of his books debuted at number one on the New York Times best seller list, Entertainment Weekly got one of the character's names confused with her profession, and had to print a correction in the next issue, undoubtedly due to passionate reader response. I believe each subsequent book has also topped the list, but they haven't made any more mistakes reporting it. For all their popularity, his books have continued to feel like a well-kept secret among his fans.

Around the midpoint of the series, I read Jordan claimed to have written as many pages of notes on the world and characters of the series as he had published in the books themselves. It's my hope his estate will publish some or all of these when the series is completed, which it undoubtedly will be, either by a family member or another author (see: Frank Herbert's Dune). It's a good sign that Jordan reportedly told the entire story of the ending to his family before his death, so between that and his notes I hope for a truly great ending to the Wheel of Time, as the author intended.

It's true, as many online fans have griped, that the second half of the series has suffered from a decline in quality, of the pacing if not the writing, but Jordan's accomplishment in the first six books has earned him a rightful place in the ranks of the greatest fantasy and sci-fi writers of all time. And even if the later books don't live up to the promise of the first, there are still flashes of greatness woven throughout them, and he had set the bar awfully high anyway. The end of book six, Lord of Chaos, is simultaneously the most thrilling, horrifying, and heartbreaking I've ever read, complete with an edge of your seat final page that leaves me begging for more every time I re-read it.

Rest in peace, and thanks.