I hate to say this, because it feels incredibly disrespectful to Robert Jordan (who died after the previous book in the series, Knife of Dreams, was published) but I feel like Brandon Sanderson is the breath of fresh air that the series needed. This is the twelfth book in the series, and by the eleventh instalment I had gotten so bored of the plot seeming to meander endlessly and all the ridiculous excuses he could come up with to have the women being naked or spanked – and Brandon Sanderson avoids all of Jordan’s pitfalls while actually moving things on meaningfully.
As soon as I started the first chapter (which deals with ordinary people in the series’ world responding to the enormous changes they’re encountering) I knew something was different. I felt more invested. Everything seemed to have more value and significance, and consequently, I ended up enjoying the entire book a great deal more. I think it’s really lucky that it was a writer of Brandon Sanderson’s calibre who ended up picking up the torch and carrying it over the finish line.
He also does a fantastic job of helping to make the portrayals of certain characters make sense. For instance, Rand. Before now he’d just seemed arrogant, petulant and annoying. I liked him in the first few books, but once he embraces being the Dragon Reborn, he was really boring – but in this book, it became clear to me that we the audience are not supposed to side with Rand and, in fact, a scene that he shares with Tam towards the end of this book is, in my opinion one of the most meaningful moments in the entire series. After this, I finally get why anyone would be invested in the character.
Meanwhile, the continued story of Egwene (still under captivity with the White Tower Aes Sedai) puts her ascension to Amyrlin into a new context – you really get a look at how that would make her feel (especially considering that it was so unusual) and this novel has her prove herself to the rebels she’s leading in a way that makes it make sense that anyone would following her. I think in the older books, characters just accepted new developments without much thought, but here we really get a look into their heads and see what they think and feel about things, which makes everything feel more believable.
Plot threads that have dangling for a long time (e.g. Aes Sedai politics) are finally resolved, some characters are killed, and every chapter of the book feels like it brings the story forward in a way that I really couldn’t say about the earlier books – especially some of the later ones, so The Gathering Storm made me excited for the rest of the series in a way I hadn’t done for a while.
Rating: 9.2/10









