Reviews

The Path of Daggers by Robert Jordan

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mattgetsliterary's review against another edition

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adventurous dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

matttruss's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I have heard some people refer to this book as the start of "the slog" but I found nothing sloggy here. The book start with a bang (quite literally) and ends with a bang. It doesn't follow a traditional story arch for a book, but we're in the midst of a 14 book series, each books can't have conflict leading to a climax followed by a resolution. If you know that going in, I think the book reads pretty quickly and moves along nicely. I enjoyed the pacing and the happenings in this one but could have used more Mat.

isabellarobinson7's review against another edition

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5.0

Second read: 19/09/20 - 20/09/20

Rating: (still) 5 stars

I finished The Path of Daggers a few days ago, but didn't write a rereview straight away because I don't have too much to say. When I was starting The Path of Daggers for the second time, I couldn't remember much about what happened in it. I guess this is because The Path of Daggers is offical Slog Book 1 and also, as it is known to me, Pointy Book 2 (I see this needs a bit of explanation. See, there are three books in the Wheel of Time series that have pointy objects mentioned in their titles: A Crown of Swords, The Path of Daggers and Knife of Dreams. When I first started the series, me being my usual over-prepared self, I knew all the titles of the books as well as a lot of other perhaps useless information. I kept getting the titles of books 7, 8, and 11 mixed up because they all had sharp items in their names, thus the Pointy Books were born.)

Anyway, I think the slog is already more evident to me this time, which is probably because the excitement of first experiencing Wheel of Time overshadowed for me the tedium of the slog everyone complains about.

First read: 27/04/20 - 01/05/20

Rating: 5 stars

I feel like I'm not allowed to give The Path of Daggers five stars because it is the start of the slog. But it was amazing, so I'm going to give it as many stars as I want.

I am not blind to the fact that the pacing did slow down. It wasn't as fast moving as previous books. I went into The Wheel of Time thinking the slog was going to be these pointless books where nothing happened, like it would be page after pages of people eating food or whatever. But the reason the slog is the slog is because the stuff that does happen isn't necessarily as impactful as past events, and perhaps not as entertaining to the reader.

All that happened in The Path of Daggers was necessary to the whole arc of the series. There is no way that Robert Jordan could have just changed the focus of this book to something completely different, because the stuff that happened was important for the story and needed to happen. The White Tower conflict needed to happen. Elayne coming to claim her throne needed to happen. All the stuff with Rand needed to happen, but it's just not as appealing to people the things that have happened before.

Like, you think about doing a jigsaw puzzle. The best part of doing a puzzle as when you find two pieces that fit together and you start making the bigger picture. But you can't just put your hand into a box of 1000 or so pieces, pull out one and try it against another, if it doesn't work, put it back and try again. You need to sort them you then out into groups like the edge pieces, the pieces of this colour here and the pieces of that colour there. That may not be the most interesting part of the activity, and it can get pretty monotonous while you're doing it, but it is a necessary step in order to complete the picture as a whole. So while it may not be overly exciting, what happened in The Path of Daggers was also very necessary. You can't just slice the slog out of The Wheel of Time and say that Robert Jordan just did a bad job at that point in the series. The reality is that what Jordan ultimately wanted to accomplish in The Wheel of Time warranted a little slowing down of pace in the middle, which I guess some people might have an issue with, and rightly so. You should be enjoying what you read, and if that isn't The Wheel of Time, then there is no shame in putting the series down.

The Path of Daggers was the Mat-less book. It was the book where Mat's name was mentioned only 15 times in this 600+ page book, in a series where he is one of the main characters. There is a bit of a habit that Robert Jordan has where if he doesn't need a certain character for a certain book, they're just not in it. It happened with Perrin in The Fires of Heaven and it kind of happened with Rand in The Dragon Reborn. This is what Jordan does and to some people it would be very annoying because they might really love the absent character. You just have to get used to liking more than one character. Sometimes characters are just not going to be there, so you can't dislike all the characters bar one, and then that one becomes the sole reason you continue the series, because they are going to be points where that character is not there, and you might just feel boring reading. For me, I don't hate any character (except Elayne at times) so it isn't a problem.

I really liked that realistic issues were addressed in regards to dealing with troops and armies, specifically ones with large numbers. Egwene had issues with accommodating for the army that gathered for the rebel Aes Sedai. It's a legitimate issue and one often brushed over and fantasy books. Armies frequently act so robotic it becomes unrealistic: they don't expend any resources, they just move from place to place and then fight when needed. But in The Path of Daggers, the tents were wearing down and the money was getting low and the food was running out; all genuine obstacles that come with having a large infantry, ones Jordan was right to include.

I was promised over 5% of Min POV, but it took awhile to come to fruition. It wasn't until chapter 27, only four chapters from the end, when she simultaneously appeared and had a POV for the first time. But the wait was worth it! (Who am I kidding, it always is.)

And finally, some spoilery stuff:

Spoiler

Callandor is back! I did a little surprised gasp when Rand pulled it out. And it basically turned into a non-sentient Nightblood with the affect its usage had on Rand. Because Rand went on a full on killing spree, not just limited to his opponents as well. He slaughtered his own swordsman on top of taking out a whole bunch of enemies. It was such a good scene, and I look forward to seeing more character-shaping moments like it in the future.

So yes. Official slog book one = five stars. I hope this continues, because the slog was one of my biggest fears going into The Wheel of Time, and if it is only this bad, I'm going to be absolutely fine.