Monday, January 04, 2010

Wheel of Time chapter arc reading guide

Okay, so you want to start reading the massive Wheel of Time series consisting of 14+ books, a dozen primary characters, thousands of minor characters, 3 dozen plotlines, and by the end about 5 million words.

A bit daunting, to say the least.

So, on my last read-thru of the series, I set about to create a way of keeping everything straight. Originally, I constructed a timeline that would enable a network to produce TV episodes at the same rate events were happening in the books. Yes, squish 14 novels into the span of 3 and a half seasons of television (and that's still not compressed enough).

Long story short, I chopped up the series into little digestible bites, or arcs, if you will. Each arc has one obvious protagonist, one or two sub-plots (or thereabouts), and a beginning, middle, and resolution.

I made it easy. And if anyone ever dares to do a Wheel of Time television series, I can assure you this would be the episode guide they would follow.

And a completely different experience for WoT fans who've read it forwards and backwards already. Or if they want to skip those... less satisfying characters/plots.

Well, seeing is believing:

*Cut!* For the new guide, see:
http://astralspirit.blogspot.com/2010/11/wheel-of-time-arc-reading-guide-wotarg.html


Lurker

3 comments:

Anonymous said...
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Peter Ahlstrom said...

I think the basic issue with your list is that events happen too slowly. At the very least I would combine episodes more or less like this:

1, 2, 3
4, 5
6, 7
8, 9
10, 11
12

Lurker said...

Slowly? Do you have any idea how much happens in the first novel compared to the later ones? Or how many characters and locations?

That said, here's how I would combine 'em:

1, 2;
3, 4, 6;
5, 7, 8;
9;
10, 11;
12;



Lurker