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A Memory of Light [FULL SPOILER DISCUSSION] Part 3


Stubby

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Kind of piggybacking on what Frog Eater wrote...does anyone see the point/necessity of Rand's harem? The only semi-realistic relationship he had was with Min. Those two were shown going through lots of stuff together, growing together, and then eventually caring for one another. The other two seem needlessly tacked on. At least Rand and Aviendha spent time together, but there was no real reason I can find that they had to become an item. Elayne made even less sense - they just magically loved one another.

Am I missing something? The few things that integrated those relationships seem totally unnecessary to the story, and the whole arc in general makes the world seem less relatable, rather than more.

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They seem necessary to me as a way to tie Rand to various factions and such.

It mostly seems like RJ had a few seperate ideas of how to handle Rand's love interest and family and decided in the end "Fuck it, I can do all of them!!!"

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They seem necessary to me as a way to tie Rand to various factions and such.

It mostly seems like RJ had a few seperate ideas of how to handle Rand's love interest and family and decided in the end "Fuck it, I can do all of them!!!"

Those were the only ways? Really? Rand bonding with Rhurarc wouldn't have worked? How about an uncle or cousin or something, some sort of family connection that he found from his father's side?

Elayne and Egwene bonding as close friends? Egwene falling for Elayne's brother? Rand avenging Morgase's supposed murder?

The second part of your post seems most accurate: RJ wanted a triumvirate of lady-folk attending his hero.

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Kind of piggybacking on what Frog Eater wrote...does anyone see the point/necessity of Rand's harem? The only semi-realistic relationship he had was with Min. Those two were shown going through lots of stuff together, growing together, and then eventually caring for one another. The other two seem needlessly tacked on. At least Rand and Aviendha spent time together, but there was no real reason I can find that they had to become an item. Elayne made even less sense - they just magically loved one another.

Am I missing something? The few things that integrated those relationships seem totally unnecessary to the story, and the whole arc in general makes the world seem less relatable, rather than more.

I agree that looking at the whole it doesn't seem at all necessary to add this bit of WTF to the story. I think it would have been more realistic to have Rand flirt with Min whenever she's around in books 1-3, have the childish makeout sessions with Elayne in book 4, have a brief fling with Aviendha in books 4-5, and then go back to Min for the rest of the story. That could show some growth and maturity for Rand. It would be pretty convincing that both Elayne and Avi would find Rand to be "not marriage material", so things could be left on good terms without stretching credulity.

One minor nitpick, but I found Alivia's character as a whole extremely unsatisfying. She is introduced as stronger than Nynaeve, and at the time that seemed like a BIG DEAL. Then Min gives the viewing that she will "help Rand to die" and it's like DOUBLE BIG DEAL. Then she hangs around the story for a long time like she's going to eventually actually do something. But in the end, she is just one of many fighting in the Choedan Khal battle, and again at Shayol Ghul. Her actual contributions in each of these battles are mostly irrelevant and could easily be made by any other character. Then after the Last Battle she does...nothing. She fufills the prophecy by doing a small favor for him, something any of his friends would have gladly done anyway. Seriously? Wasted character.

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Kind of piggybacking on what Frog Eater wrote...does anyone see the point/necessity of Rand's harem? The only semi-realistic relationship he had was with Min. Those two were shown going through lots of stuff together, growing together, and then eventually caring for one another. The other two seem needlessly tacked on. At least Rand and Aviendha spent time together, but there was no real reason I can find that they had to become an item. Elayne made even less sense - they just magically loved one another.

Am I missing something? The few things that integrated those relationships seem totally unnecessary to the story, and the whole arc in general makes the world seem less relatable, rather than more.

If you've read RJ's explanation why he came up with this idea, it's not a surprise it ended up being pretty pointless for the plot and it was inserted mostly because he thought it would be cool:

"Jason Denzel

Later on, Melissa made a joking comment about Rand and his three girlfriends.

Robert Jordan

Robert Jordan's reply was not what we expected. He explained that at one point in his younger life he had two girlfriends at once. They knew about each other, and they arranged dates for him so they could both be there. They were fine with it, and young Jim Rigney just went along with it. (Wouldn't you?) He figured that if he could have two girlfriends at once, then a guy like Rand could definitely do three.

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On the other, a few more deaths might have been more satisfying. I mean, of the characters we started out with, in Eye of the World, only Egwene and Bela (you bastard!!!) die, although pretty much all the others are on the brink of death but miraculously saved.

Don't forget Mandarb. Bella and Mandarb, free of their meddlesome riders, are now finally able to come together, and will "live" happily ever after, eternally frolicking in the fields of T'A'R.

One minor nitpick, but I found Alivia's character as a whole extremely unsatisfying. She is introduced as stronger than Nynaeve, and at the time that seemed like a BIG DEAL. Then Min gives the viewing that she will "help Rand to die" and it's like DOUBLE BIG DEAL. Then she hangs around the story for a long time like she's going to eventually actually do something. But in the end, she is just one of many fighting in the Choedan Khal battle, and again at Shayol Ghul. Her actual contributions in each of these battles are mostly irrelevant and could easily be made by any other character. Then after the Last Battle she does...nothing. She fufills the prophecy by doing a small favor for him, something any of his friends would have gladly done anyway. Seriously? Wasted character.

I'm assuming that RJ forgot to write her real purpose in the notes, and BS wasn't sure what to do with her but didn't want to leave her story hanging. So we got... that.

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I'm assuming that RJ forgot to write her real purpose in the notes, and BS wasn't sure what to do with her but didn't want to leave her story hanging. So we got... that.

Except we were told that the epilogue was almost exclusively Jordan. So he wrote the part where she "helps him die."

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Except we were told that the epilogue was almost exclusively Jordan. So he wrote the part where she "helps him die."

What did she even do to help him? Was it like give him a new set of clothes? I don't even remember and I read the book two weeks ago.

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It's not just the audio book.

The book drags in alot of places because of endless mind-numbing trolloc slaughter.

I think what really stands out in the audio book is the horrible dialogue and the sometimes less than mediocre prose, I swear sometimes it's like he spent less time on it than I do on the average post.

The more I think about the book, the more I dislike it, for me it was very unsatisfactory. Still, it's closure of a sort.

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I think what really stands out in the audio book is the horrible dialogue and the sometimes less than mediocre prose, I swear sometimes it's like he spent less time on it than I do on the average post.

The more I think about the book, the more I dislike it, for me it was very unsatisfactory. Still, it's closure of a sort.

I listened to the free chapter 2 audio book section that was made available prior to the release of the book and the interaction between Aviendha and Elayne was terrible. I dont think I could have done the whole book by audio.

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Kind of piggybacking on what Frog Eater wrote...does anyone see the point/necessity of Rand's harem? The only semi-realistic relationship he had was with Min. Those two were shown going through lots of stuff together, growing together, and then eventually caring for one another. The other two seem needlessly tacked on. At least Rand and Aviendha spent time together, but there was no real reason I can find that they had to become an item. Elayne made even less sense - they just magically loved one another.

I think it is one of the most poorly-executed plotlines in the series. I don't think it was a particularly good idea to have Rand falling in love with the three women, but it might not have been too bad if the relationships had actually been written convincingly. I think the relationship between Rand and Min works well (although he seemed to largely forget about her in AMOL, I think she hardly gets a line of dialogue in the first half of the book), but that just makes it more obvious how little of a relationship there is between Rand and the other two in the last few books. We're told repeatedly that he loves the other two just as much, but we're not shown it convincingly. I think Rand and Aviendha could potentially have made a good couple as well, but the relationship between Rand and Elayne feels more like a teenage infatuation rather than the relationship Jordan seemed to suggest they had. I don't even feel Elayne necessarily understands or knows Rand all that well, whereas the other two know him a lot better. I think in a previous thread someone commented that Elayne and Mat had better chemistry together when they were both together in Ebou Dar than Elayne and Rand do, and I think that is true.

The other thing about that plotline that was very unconvincing was why the trio all accepted their rivals. We were given cultural reasons for Aviendha accepting sharing with Elayne but when she hardly knows Min why she be willing to share with her, and why should Min be willing to accept sharing Rand with them?

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Except we were told that the epilogue was almost exclusively Jordan. So he wrote the part where she "helps him die."

She was probably meant to do other stuff before that.

The "help him die" bit was just a bit of misdirection.

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I think what really stands out in the audio book is the horrible dialogue and the sometimes less than mediocre prose, I swear sometimes it's like he spent less time on it than I do on the average post.

The more I think about the book, the more I dislike it, for me it was very unsatisfactory. Still, it's closure of a sort.

I'd really like to see what was RJ's and what was BS's so it's more obvious if all his contributions to the series were that bad or if he was just, like, phoning it in on this last one.

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I think it is one of the most poorly-executed plotlines in the series. I don't think it was a particularly good idea to have Rand falling in love with the three women, but it might not have been too bad if the relationships had actually been written convincingly. I think the relationship between Rand and Min works well (although he seemed to largely forget about her in AMOL, I think she hardly gets a line of dialogue in the first half of the book), but that just makes it more obvious how little of a relationship there is between Rand and the other two in the last few books. We're told repeatedly that he loves the other two just as much, but we're not shown it convincingly. I think Rand and Aviendha could potentially have made a good couple as well, but the relationship between Rand and Elayne feels more like a teenage infatuation rather than the relationship Jordan seemed to suggest they had. I don't even feel Elayne necessarily understands or knows Rand all that well, whereas the other two know him a lot better. I think in a previous thread someone commented that Elayne and Mat had better chemistry together when they were both together in Ebou Dar than Elayne and Rand do, and I think that is true.

The other thing about that plotline that was very unconvincing was why the trio all accepted their rivals. We were given cultural reasons for Aviendha accepting sharing with Elayne but when she hardly knows Min why she be willing to share with her, and why should Min be willing to accept sharing Rand with them?

Min, I think, is not fine with it. She accepts it because it's her vision and she's pretty damn fatalistic about that shit.

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The other thing about that plotline that was very unconvincing was why the trio all accepted their rivals. We were given cultural reasons for Aviendha accepting sharing with Elayne but when she hardly knows Min why she be willing to share with her, and why should Min be willing to accept sharing Rand with them?

Ta'veren/prophecy combo FTW!

Really lazy writing IMO. Without those two things it never would've happened, no way Min and especially Elayne accept such an arrangement.

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Can somebody please tell me that Bela/Mandarb ships are not actually real? For the sake of what little faith in humanity I still preserve?

Concerning relationships in WOT, most of them came pretty much out of the blue, to me. Especially Lan and Nynaeve.

And Rand's harem. There just never seems to be any feeling involved.

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Concerning relationships in WOT, most of them came pretty much out of the blue, to me. Especially Lan and Nynaeve.

And Rand's harem. There just never seems to be any feeling involved.

I'm actually glad for this. Can you imagine how many more books there would have had to have been if he had actually spent time developing the romantic relationships?

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