What The Path of Daggers did to revitalize the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan, Crossroads of Twilight (CoT from here on out) does to derail the series again.  In no uncertain terms, this novel is simply padding for the sake of padding.  I will try to eschew any plot spoilers in this review for CoT, but trust me so little happens I think I can work my way around that!

The Wheel of Time seems to have no end in sight, which I think after ten novels is a detriment to the series.  We all know how it is going to end (Rand fighting the Dark One) and there are certainly hints at the ramifications (the breaking the wheel or ending the age).  The problem is rather than building off the energy from The Path of Daggers, Jordan decides to account for every character while Rand is doing his bit in that book for the majority of CoT.

The minute detail about characters or the plot lines is not astonishing but rather mind numbingly repetitive.   For example we know Perrin loves his wife, is very upset about her abduction and will do just about anything to get her back.  Now flesh out this concept over a hundred pages (not counting the last book) but then remove anything that suggests plot movement save the last few pages.  Another example is the issue of male and females users of the power bonding to each other (willingly or not) and whether this is good or bad.  The problem is that this idea has been well covered for a number of books and absolutely nothing new was presented to advance this subplot  Interspersed in the bloated plotlines are some good things, but it is mired in Jordan’s verbosity.

Virtually every character is described in detail, down to what they are thinking.  Honestly a computer could write this type of text, the descriptions are cookie cutter and interposed.  So you might think the characterizations are over dense, but they are not.  It is like Taco Bell, the same seven ingredients are just recombined to make new products.  There is also a significant page count dedicated to second tier and third tier characters that probably could have been edited out, the point of this was to show that the powers of darkness were not standing idly by, but given the few exciting moments in CoT, this could have been shown differently.

In this various descriptions and intrigues of lower echelon characters is the question; Can Robert Jordan write characters that have a mature relationship or outlook.  Sometimes the character interactions are very juvenile and petty.  Rand with three love interests who don’t mind this fact is very hard to believe, even given his ability to have improbably things happen around him.  Secondly almost every female character is so wrapped up about other character’s looks and social connections it makes me, mostly jokingly, wonder if the series is not geared towards soap opera fans and Sweet Valley High readers. 

Very little happens in CoT, but when the timing is bad which is frustrating.  The several things happen make the next installment look promising, particularly for Rand and Egwene. Perrin’s plotline might turn out interesting but given much of CoT was focused around doing nothing with this it is hard to tell.  Matt’s will need more time to develop but looks promising.  Given his absence in a number of previous books that is fine.  Of the 672 pages, perhaps 200 of them contain anything interesting, but even a fraction of those contain anything that advances the plot.  Had the CoT started with the Matt subplots at the beginning and literally skipped to about page 550 and then followed up with the plot hooks at the end of the book, you would have an exciting novel.  But that did not happen.

It is tough to say whether Jordan has writer’s block, stretching out the plot so as more books are published, or is simply indulgent.  From a publishing perspective it might be tough to get Jordan back on pace. Tor sells more books the more Jordan writes.  It could be that Jordan is simply too much of Tor’s Book’s profits for them to dare and reign him in.  All of this is conjecture, but it shows the level of frustration with the The Wheel of Time currently.  The fact that the average rating from customers on Amazon is at 1.5 out of 5 exemplifies the frustration Jordan has generated amongst his fans. 

Waiting two years for, basically, nothing is a bitter pill to swallow.  When I re-read the series I will probably be less bitter as I can put the book into a greater context.  The Wheel of Time is one of my favorite fantasy series, but CoT exemplifies all of Jordan’s foibles in the series to date.  If the cliff hangers in CoT hold true the next book or two seem to have promise, which I guess is the best thing to come out of this very mediocre novel.