Book Review: The Dragon Reborn by Robert Jordan

This is the third book in The Wheel of Time and, with a title of The Dragon Reborn, you know this book is one of the big turning points in the series. Following several months after the events of The Great Hunt, we find our characters facing new threats and learning new secrets as the mysteries of the Prophecies of the Dragon unfold.

Read on for my review. As before, prior books in the series are considered fair game in terms of spoilers.

Overall Impression

Another great stepping stone in the saga of The Wheel of Time. A plot that starts slow but by the end has you breathless; characters that continue to evolve as they embrace, or try to run from, their destiny; and a setting that grows clearer and more complex, this book has it all. 

Plot

Like the prior few books, this one starts of a little slow but picks and ramps up the pace as it goes along. It also features multiple viewpoints, similar to the prior novels. However, while the others all had the characters start together and end together, here it is a little different and shows how quickly the scope of the books are growing. We follow Egwene, Mat, and Perrin for the most part, though with some brief instances of Nynaeve and Rand. And the finale of the book is quite epic and one of the culminating aspects of the story. After this book, there can be no question of who is the Dragon Reborn and what the threat is to the world.

One of the minor gripes I have is some apparent inconsistencies or oddities with some minor plot points. In the first novel, we saw two of the Forsaken, Aginor and Balthamel, free and walking about, yet all of the characters appear surprised to hear of more Forsaken on the loose in this book. Did they not remember what happened at the Eye of the World? I can justify it by saying that perhaps they thought it was only those two, but it still feels a little odd. Likewise we are introduced to balefire in this book and while we don't learn of all of its properties, I feel that later books invalidate a particular scene that takes place here, though I can again justify it by perhaps saying it was a rather weak instance of balefire. These are both very minor points, though, and I only mention them since I caught them with some extra knowledge of what is to come.

Characters

This books features more heavily on Perrin, Mat, and Egwene than Rand, which is curious given that Rand is the Dragon Reborn. Still, this works out quite well and we get to see these characters grow a lot more. This is also the first time we have Mat as a viewpoint character and we get to see his gambling/trickster nature a lot more. Egwene, Elayne, and Nynaeve all grow together, but a lot of it is the growing tension between Egwene and Nynaeve as they struggle with their new roles despite being having a master/apprentice relationship in the past. One interesting aspect is that Egwene starts to Dream a lot more and while she doesn't realize it, we as the audience can tell that she is having visions of the present and future.

Perrin has always been my least favorite of the Rand-Mat-Perrin trio, but he does have its moments and this book certainly advances his storyline satisfying some of Min's prophetic viewings. His arc also brings a new character, the young woman Hunter of the Horn Faile Bashere, which we are sure to hear of more in the later books.

Setting / World Building

While we've seen it before, this book is where we really start learning about the World of Dreams, Tel'aran'rhiod. This fascinating, dangerous place has been the setting of many events from the first two books and both Perrin and Egwene get more and more involved in it. We'll learn even more in subsequent books, but now we have a name for the mysterious dream that so many experience.

This book also introduces us to two new creatures of the Dark One- Darkhounds and Grey Men, though the later was hinted at in prior books. This ramps up the tension as these two in particular are not as straightforward to deal with as Trollocs and Myrddraal. But the biggest threat is the return of the Forsaken. We've only seen a few, and only a few are explicitly named, but we can make connections and see that they are out causing trouble in the world with all of the knowledge and power from the Age of Legends.

Final Thoughts

This was a great addition to the series and, in my mind, a sort of capstone book that wraps up the first arc of The Wheel of Time. With Rand fully declared as the Dragon Reborn, the series takes on a new direction as the enemies become clearer and the stakes higher. I had originally intended to just re-read the first three books, but I may have to go a bit farther in the series since I remember a lot of things that will be happening soon!