In this blogpost you have a compilation of my off-the-cuff, stream-of-consciousness posts to the Tor.com rereaders on Facebook during my read of A Memory of Light, by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson.
After waiting 16+ years to read the end of this story, I was hugely excited to read A Memory of Light. I was also very conflicted. This story has been part of my life for a long time now; the characters are like old familiar friends; friends who were about to a) die, in the story, or b) if they didn't die, they might as well, since I wouldn't get to read about them anymore.
I don't know how to explain the mix of emotions I felt; driven to devour the book as soon as possible, on the one hand; driven to draw it out and linger over the last new Wheel of Time book I'd ever read.
Thus the reread community has been a godsend. They are in the same boat, know just how it feels, and could share the excitement and the ambivalence.
So, during my read, when excitement or trepidation or dread threatened to overwhelm me, I would siphon off a bit of that and share it with the reread community. What follows are those posts, from January 8 through 12, beginning just before I got the book and continuing for a day or so after I finished reading.
Note that these posts were all, by design, spoiler-free (and are certainly influenced by Leigh Butler's brilliantly funny and profane Spoiler-Free Review, which you can find on Tor.com). As such they don't actually SAY anything. They just record my emotions, mostly for my benefit, and perhaps for other Wheel of Time fans.
Tomorrow I'll go back and identify what I was reading when these reactions took place.
And now, the post!
9:26 a.m. “Oddly, I seem to have waked (from a dream of
sitting in a crowded stadium of folks awaiting our books) in a non-twitchy
state. Now I know it's really here, I'm sort of...stretching my morning
routine, since I took the day off. Still, I'll be setting off for the store in
the next half hour!!”
5:40 p.m. “ Hey, Linda...I just realized that I'm
reading about you in AMOL!”
9:56 p.m. “My ‘break’ lasted ten minutes; after five I
was twitching again. I'm going back in! Hang in there, bleary-eyed friends;
tai'shar tor-rereaders!”
10:27 p.m. “Wow. The scene I just read...wow. I never
expected *that* to go like *that*. Just...wow.”
11:23 p.m. “And now, I do a snoopy dance of joy. What a
CMOA!”
January 9
1:08 a.m. “Oh good grief, I thought the rest of you
were crazy, I can't believe you were right about this! Ah hah hah, it was all a
trick! Bloody marvelous! Oh, well done.
11:38 a.m. “I told myself not to read before going to
work this morning, but I couldn't help it. And...i got to a section where
things began to suck. Not the story, but what's happening to Our Heroes! Just
the beginning, I'm sure, and then it was time to leave. Now I'm going through
the whole day filled with dread. Argh!”
I really shouldn't
have allowed myself to read a chapter at lunch...”
Yeah, right.
*sarcasm*”
11:10 p.m. "Well...the next paragraph made me
laugh. And the next page did again."
12:05 a.m.
"Yeah, it...gets worse"
7:35 a.m. “ YES!!
Awesome! (please don't turn this into sucking when I turn the page)”
I...don't know. It
was great. I...don't know.”
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Memories of Light, part 2
January 8
11:15 a.m. “The weird non-twitchy phase has passed with
a vengeance. Heading out now to claim my copy! The nearest Walmart parking lot
is like a deathtrap at the best of times, and I have this horrible feeling that
as soon as I put my gleeful hands on a preciousss copy the earth will crack and
swallow me whole, but there's no help for it. Time to dance with Jak o' the
shadows....”
9:43 p.m. “I've never read this slowly. P. 246. I keep
stopping to squee. I agree...wonderful. Squeeing, occasional getting choked
up...but a mounting sense of dread, too.”
10:32 p.m. “And two pages later, I'm stunned all over
again. Why did I never realize this? Completely logical, completely unexpected.
Wow. Brain explodey.”
And then, That
happened, closely followed by THAT. No, I don't like this at all.
Ugh, so good."
1:31 a.m. “Ok, bed. For now.”
12:54 p.m. “Oh no. OH NO. This is a disaster. How is
that even possible? And if he is, they *both* could be! Light!
1:34 p.m. "Turns
out it's not as bad as I thought. Or it's worse. I haven't decided yet."
10:54 p.m. “Home from my twelve hour work day.
Exhausted, headache. Logically, considering the next chapter is 180 pages long,
I should just go to bed, right? RIGHT?
11:07 p.m. "Pg 624. Lol. But i think there's not
much more laughter in the near future...."
11:19 p.m. "Crap. Didn't see that coming, he's
totally insane."
11:57 p.m. "Bwah hah hah, that is hilarious! In
general, though, everything is so tense and dire I can hardly stand it."
January 10
12:38 a.m. "Oh. Oh, god, no."
12:54 a.m. “Aw, man, that SUCKS. Makes sense, though.”
12:56 a.m. “Oh...tears now.”
1:13 a.m. “No. No, i
think I'm going to give...what happened...the weight it deserves. I will rest
here. See you all in the morning.”
7:10 a.m. “And we wake, and within 5 pages, we have
more sucking. I have to admit, despite
everything, I always had a soft spot for him.
Man. This is gonna get brutal, isn't it?”
7:24 a.m. “ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!!? Bloody Seanchan.
7:43 a.m. “Well, that
was a good bit of fan service, but this next bit....aw, *expletive*. This book
keeps making me want to curse, something I usually avoid. (How can something so
horrible be so good?!)”
7:50 a.m.
“Awesome! (oh nos)”
7:51 a.m. “Hah! Pg
726 'if any of those...' "
7:56 a.m. “I have never hearted Mat Cauthon quite like
the rest of you, until this book.”
8:02 a.m. “Aww.
Together again.”
8:08 a.m. “OH! OH
NOS! And now I have go to work.”
8:14 a.m. “Hahaha
that is hilarious that man is a tool and you are awesome! Ok...NOW I can go to
work.”
9:26 a.m. “Pg 780.”
9:32 a.m. “Ohnononononononono”
9:45 a.m. “oh
i don't want to read
this anymore”
10:25 a.m. “Tai'shar Manetheren. Tai'shar Malkier.”
10:44 a.m. “Where is she? Where are they?”
10:51 a.m. “Hahaha haha hahaha bloody genius.”
12:17 p.m. “sads”
12:32 p.m. “I finished reading the last book of the
Wheel of Time on Thursday, January 10, at 12:26 p.m. EST.
2:07 p.m. “Yeah, it's a little odd, after thinking of
"Dragonsworn" as people like Masema's bunch, but once I decided to see
us as Dragonsworn, it made things even more engrossing.”
5:00 p.m. “ Any good
post-apocalyptic snacks in the bunker? What do you fix for supper on the day
the world/pattern/series ends?”
7: 59 p.m. “It's a good thing I live alone, is all I'm
saying. As it is, the walls of the apartment aren't *that* thick. And I may
have lost it a time or twelve at 2 a.m...two nights in a row....”
11:16 p.m. “The White Tower's got, like, 1500+ novices
now? Including the likes of Sharina Melloy? And Egwene made great use of them
in the Seanchan attack on the Tower, and then we're told they're...just off
Healing? MAYBE that's a good enough use, or maybe every Aes Sedai ought to have
been in a circle of 13 the whole time, with 12 novices hidden in the camps...”
January 11
9:43 p.m. “A friend who likes to post 'Question(s) of
the Day' just asked "What is the last book you read that made you
cry?" Hmm, let me think....”
Posted by Chris Cottingham at 8:50 PM
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