March 19, 2009
The Great Hunt, Book Two of the Wheel of Time
Front Cover of The Great Hunt (UK Version)
- Author: Robert Jordan
- Front Cover Illustration: Lee Gibbons
- Back Cover Illustration: Daryl K. Sweet
- ISBN: 978-1-85723-027-7
- Publisher: Orbit Fantasy
The Forsaken are loose, the Horn of Valere has been found and the Dead are rising from their dreamless sleep. The Prophesies are being fulfilled – but Rand al’Thor, the shepherd the Aes Sedai have proclaimed as the Dragon Reborn, desperately seeks to escape his destiny.
But Rand cannot run forever. With every passing day the Dark One grows in strength and strives to shatter his ancient prison, to break the Wheel, to bring an end to Time and sunder the weave of the Pattern.
And the Pattern demands the Dragon.
Rand still denies that he is the Dragon Reborn, but the evidence keeps mounting up.
This book is a real taste of reading the pattern. Everyone is a thread, and this is where they really start getting knotted up. You’ve got one group travelling cross-country following another, one in the ways, and yet another in another world entirely! And they’reall crossing each others paths, helping and hindering each other as they go.
That’s what I like about this book, during the first book there were clues as to who the hero was going to be, but this book shows that there is no hero. Every individual person has their role in the ‘Pattern’ and each action has it’s own consequences, throughout the Wheel of Time.
I enjoyed the progress of the characters, they all show theour personalities even more, and the relationships are constantly growing and changing.
After the peek at the Dark One’s minions (AKA Prologue) the story story gets going, introducing more characters and locations, more plots and even another culture. All these help to build up to the climax of the book and as with all the other books in the series, don’t assume you know anything.
If you’ve read book one already, then you’ll be wanting to read this book anyway, but if this looks interesting, you need to find book one The Eye of the World
And just to add, I think that the ending of this book is possibly my favourite part of the entire series (I’ve read upto book 7).
Darcy said,
March 19, 2009 at 17:53
The character progression that took place in this book was probably the best and most controlled of the series. I waffle back and forth on my favorite book, but at the end of my most recent series re-read The Great Hunt came out on top.
Hope you’re enjoying your own re-read!
Charlie said,
March 20, 2009 at 11:42
Thank you. The re-read is taking longer than I planned, but I’m looking forward to getting onto books 8-11. My fiancee keeps telling me to just read them now, but I always have to reread the series when I get a new book. Just one of those things I guess.
Thanks for checking out my blog.