Stephen Cagle

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March 3, 2026 By: Robert Jordan

The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time, #12)

The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time, #12) cover

Entirely enjoyable, though still a little bittersweet. It would have been wrong to ask Sanderson to continue the "Wheel of Time" in Jordan's style. I appreciate the quickening of the pace and the different renderings of the characters.

It does feel different though.

I think the best way I can state it is that Jordan feels "Third Person, over the shoulder" while Sanderson is more "First Person" (that was a (weak) video game metaphor). Jordan's books almost feel like a work of historical fiction, where the author is attempting to be as accurate as possible, but maybe some of the details are lost to time and so he does not fill them in. Sanderson's feel more like a ride along on real time events. Jordan is like hearing about someone else from a third party, Sanderson's feel like I am actually present.

You would think that this would mean that I would like Sanderson much more as an author, but it is more complex than that. Jordan, in his distant voice, left me to fill in the details about what I felt and thought about the characters. Sanderson, fills in the internal mindset and thoughts of his characters more richly, and a wonderful intimacy and immediacy is gained in Sanderson's approach. However, something is also lost in making me judge someones less by their actions and more by their own headspace. I miss that from Jordan.


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