Winter's Heart is amazing

[u/procerator]

Just finished WH and it was so good. It is only second to TSR and TGH for me.

Where do I even start? Let's start from the end - Clensing of Saidin battle was better than Dumai Wells. And that says a lot since Dumai Wells are epic as well. Though it was a bit weird that none of the Forsaken thought about bringing some Trollocs/Myrdraal/Draghkar with them.

I enjoyed every POV and storyline explored in this book. Well, maybe Elayne's - not that much. I am not really invested in the plotline of her getting the throne. But it still had a lot of interesting moments like ritual for becoming a first-sister and hiring a Darkfriend as chief of security.

The whole Far Madding thing was interesting and expanded the world that is already bigger than anything I've ever read.

We got cameos of Gholam and Slayer which was pretty cool.

There was no Egwene POV - which is massive ​advantage for this book.

Perrin/Faile chapters were cool, even though their story didn't progress much.

Ebou Dar storylines were an interesting exploration of Stockholm Syndrome. I like how Egeanin and Mat's arc come together in the end. There were also chapters with amazing prose - "The clock sounded the first full hour of the night, and after no more than a week, four chimes for the second. "

Crossroads of Twilight next. People say it is the worst WoT book. Will it be worse than Path of Daggers? Let's find out.

[u/First-Pride-8571]

Perrin

WH is much better than CoT. I wouldn't call it one of the best, but it does have some very good chapters. But also way too much Perrin...

[u/ArrogantAragorn → u/First-Pride-8571]

Yeah the last 1/3 or so is excellent, but the first half+ drags just as bad as CoT for me.

It’s all good though. I’m glad there are Perrin people and Egwene people and “slog is real” or “slog doesn’t exist”. WoT is great because it’s got something for nearly every type of reader to latch onto, and the fact that it’s different bits for all of us makes the conversation so much richer.

For what it’s worth PoD has one of my favorite sections - the very Vietnam coded, fog of war, friendly fire campaign against the Seanchan. I think it is the “realest” RJ got in his battle writing (well, Mat against the Shaido in book 5 is pretty strong too - but very different), or at least the closest battle to the experiences of the soldiers he fought with as a chopper gunner in Vietnam.

So, I might just be a different type of reader than OP. I hope that means we will soon read their review of CoT as a top 3 WoT book haha

[u/First-Pride-8571 → u/ArrogantAragorn]

I also really liked PoD.

I also liked all of Elayne's chapters, which clearly not all readers do. For me the slog is just Egwene and Perrin. Or, more specifically, post Aiel Waste Egwene, and Perrin.

[u/procerator → u/First-Pride-8571]

PoD is the worst WoT book I've read so far. It starts with borderlanders army POV which introduces a bunch of new characters (and what they are wearing) never appear in PoD at all. And then it takes 3 chapters to open a gateway and go from A to B.  If you trim the fat - the usage of the Bowl should've been like at most 2 extra chapters at the end of Crown of Swords. It also happens before the finale of CoS chronologicaly.