I started reading Robert Jordan in the 80's when I stumbled across his Conan stories. I remember enjoying them , and rapidly burned through each one as they were released. Up until that time my exposure to the character of Conan had been the Arnold Schwartzenager movies and some of the old L Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter adaptations that I borrowed from my friend Kurt.
I remember they sat on a dusty homemade bookshelf next to a collection of Tarzan and John Carter of Mars paperbacks. At the time I was just working my way through Edgar Rice Burroughs and I took a brief detour into Conan before finding and completely losing myself in Michael Moorcock's Elric (but that is a different story!). So I was at least primed for Jordan's take on Conan and I really did love the books. So when I saw the large trade paperback edition of They Eye of the World (it wasn't initially offered in hardcover) I was already a Jordan fan and I picked it up quickly and tore through the book in a matter of days. I was completely captivated. The landscape of epic fantasy was very different at that time. George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones was still 6 years away and I distinctly remember feeling that itchy need to find a great series to sink into and lose myself.
I get that same feeling when I'm looking for that next big game too. Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, The Elder Scrolls, the original Zelda games, Ultima Online and Everquest. You know that feeling.
I went on to eagerly read each new novel as it was released. I found a circle of friends who were into it too and we would discuss each book and speculate about the future of our favorite characters. I was an unabashed fan. But there is a twist.
I never finished the series.
10 years into the journey I dropped out. It was now the year 2000. Winter's heart, volume 9 in the series, had just been released and I recall feeling a need to start getting some closure. There were so many plot lines to bring together, a vast array of characters to follow and understand. I was about half way through Winter's Heart and I just put the book down. I felt nothing was happening. I had read hundreds of pages but the plot seemed to minimally advance. I put it down and left it for weeks. Then I came back and tried a second run at it. But I was just so frustrated. I began skipping forward, skimming the chapters. I finally set it down for good and I never went back to it. I sent a heartfelt but frustrated email to the editors at TOR and to my surprise I got a response. It turns out they weren't super happy either. And that was it for me. I eventually gave away all 9 hardcover 1st edition copies of the books to a friend of my nephew and let it go. It made me sad, but at the same time it was kind of liberating too. I felt like I had invested a lot of time and energy into the books and that relationship just kind of withered away.
Later, of course, I read that mister Jordan had been ill and that he was in fact dying. In hindsight, I could kind of put the puzzle together. When TOR announced that Brandon Sanderson would finish the series with the help of Mr Jordan's widow/editor I was happy it was going to get its conclusion, but still I didn't go back to it. I'm not sure why exactly, but it had lost its luster and I couldn't reignite that interest that drove me all those year ago.
Spring forward another 21 years.
On the heels of the massive success of Game of Thrones on HBO, the Wheel of Time is getting it's own production. The casting and teaser images were getting my attention. That nostalgic love was stirring and so one night I downloaded a new copy of The Eye of the World to my Kindle and started reading. My first thought was, "I don't even remember this book!" which is odd for me as I have a damn good memory for books. A few more pages in and I realized that this new edition had been enhanced. I continued to read through it and soon found the story as I remembered it. And soon enough, it had me again. Rand Al'Thor and his friends fleeing their homes with the enigmatic Aes Sadai and her Warder and I was there with them. And it wasn't just the enjoyment of that first story again, it was the enjoyment of the whole experience. I could almost feel the pages of that first trade paperback under my fingers, feel the texture of the paper and the wonderful scent of a new book. I wanted that first Darrel K. Sweet cover art to look at again (and of course Google supplied it for me). I quickly read the entire book and loved it again.
I haven't picked up book 2 yet. I'm pretty sure I will. And I'm sure I'll watch the adaptation on Amazon as well. It seems that those iconic opening lines ring true for me in a new way: “The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.” I hope I can like those final volumes better this time, and I hope I like Sanderson's final volumes to close it all out. Now, so many years later, I can finally find out how the story ends.