Just to clarify, I love Mhoram and The First.

A very interesting discussion! I think Donaldson tries to do better, and to a large extent succeeds in doing better, on gender than most male writers born in 1947. That said, the Chronicles are a series written by a man born in 1947 and conceived by him in the early 1970s, first published in 1977, a...

Very thoughtful and interesting. My own feeling ever since ROTE has been that Jeremiah would be a primary character. It's certainly true that the Linden-Jeremiah bond is one of the most central elements of the Last Chronicles, and after discovering SWMNBN in AATE I would not be surprised if we disco...

2) Berek never had a white gold ring. He knew about it (probably from the Theomach and Linden), but he didn't own one. I am going to have to verify this because I am certain that he did. If not, then why would anyone have mistaken Covenant for the reincarnation of Berek, identified by both his half...

I picked "Wherever dreaming goes" because I'm pretty certain that the Worm will have done its vermicular duty and destroyed the world (including all the other places mentioned) before the conclusion, and the stakes in the final denouement involving Foul the Creator, She, Covenant, Linden a...

I think we'll find that Linden will be absorbed by She, but with her health-sense will then emancipate She and her constituent women from Her/their madness. This will be a central element in the denouement of the story. In making this prediction I admit that I'm influenced by a possible parallel wit...

Linden Avery walks into a refectory in Revelstone, accompanied by Jeremiah and Anele. They sit down at a table and wait to be served. An attendant approaches them and asks "What would you like to eat?" Linden replies "I'll have the roast lamb, thanks." The attendant says "Ve...

In the chapter "Interference" the bogus TC (Roger) tells Linden that they and Jeremiah have re-emerged "two hundred leagues" (IIRC) from Revelstone. Now it is far from uncommon for characters in epic fantasy to use archaisms such as "leagues" and "ells" to des...

Hue of Bone's original image is almost a dead ringer for my spontaneous "mind's eye" image of covenant. I say "spontaneous" because the thought came to me this year that someone leading Covenant's solitary existence on Haven Farm, living off the proceeds of his novels and dealing...

If Nom's defeat of Ceer and Hergrom in TOT is any indication, the Masters would be no match for a host of raving Sandgorgons (plus skurj) in a direct physical confrontation. However they can communicate mentally with the Sandgorgons, which could enable them to confound the influence of samadhi Sheol...

Q: How do you know when Linden Avery's flight has arived at the airport?

A: When the engines are turned off, the whining continues.

Verily, I am ever apt to be limerent and uxorious, conceiving my exigent devoir to be irrefragable.

Here's another thought. At some point in The Last Dark Linden and friends need to find a way to get past the combined might of samadhi -in-the Sandgorgons, the skurj , and several thousand Cavewights, and this challenge could well drive her to a desperate response. The quellvisks seem to have had bo...

Foul has been utterly absent from The Last Chronicles, after the translation and apart from his possession of Anele in Runes. Makes you wonder. We have no real sign that he's acting at all in the events going on. Yes I noticed that as well. I think he has less to do, this time. He has "farmed ...

Without money, I have wondered how the Lords maintained the population of Revelstone, where did they get the food, clothing, uniforms, etc. from? They do not appear to have levied taxes on the Land (without money how could they?), yet they maintained a standing army (a very expensive thing to do). ...

Seeker, I agree. That was definitely a WTF moment for me. (I commented on this in the Reading Along thread.) It may have been in character for Roger--who the hell knows, we don't really know much about him--but it certainly took me out of the moment. And it was so emphatic, too! "Suck-ER!"...

I'll need to go home and look through my copy of TFC, but it could be that clingor was a product of the lore of the Lords and Loresraat, and that if this is the case it's plausible to suppose that knowledge of it may have been lost or suppressed by the Clave.

TheWormoftheWorld'sEnd wrote:TOT, were there only minor (not outstanding MBI) moments? Or is there something I'm forgetting?

I'd say Covenant coming out of his stasis, speaking Nom's name, and then defeating the Sandgorgon and releasing it, to telling effect, qualifies as an MBI.

OK, having read this entire thread, and having just completed the first half of AATE, my own take at this point is quite close to Vraith's. In fact I don't think I disagree with anything Vraith has written so far. I think we will learn (and in part already have by the end of Part 1) that SWMNBN is, ...

Let's remember that SRD has mined Judaic religious language, symbols and names extensively thoughout the Chronicles. Think of the elohim, the names of the Ravers, Jeremiah, for starters. Now, in Judaism, the Deity must not be named. In Kabbalah the Deity, who must not be named, has a feminine dimens...