[The Curious Orange]

I must admit I still enjoy them, but they do vary in quality. I actually like some of the more recent ones. Although they are painfully slow to advance the plot, some of the actual writing is quite beautiful. While the earlier books were, by and large, better, it wasn't all plain sailing. I found some of them a little rushed, particularly Book 3, The Dragon Reborn. An awful lot seemed to happen in the last chapter - enough for a book in it's own right. While I accept that 300 pages of Elayne taking a bath pushes things too far the other way, when RJ hits a happy medium he really does it in style. The Shadow Rising remains the highpoint of the series for me. If only he'd written something like that since...

I found Crown of Swords weak. The Ebou Dar / Bowl of Winds plot was cheap and served no purpose other than to extend the series. The Shadar Logoth ending was rushed and tacked on. To me, this remains the most disappointing of the series to date.

I loved Path of Daggers - so much happens in that book - Rand suffers his first major setback, Elayne realises her responsibilities to Andor - it's one of the best in the series, and I've never been able to figure out the hate that it seems to attract. I guess it might be because it's all character stuff rather than big battles against Foresaken.

Winter's Heart was alright, but the rot had set in. Apart from the one "big event" precious little happens. I think this was also the point when I ceased to care if Perrin found Faile or not.

Crossroads of Twilight was awful at every level. Truly, truly dire. 800 pages in which not one single thing happens, not one character advances any further than they were at the end of the previous book. You have to read it to believe it possible.

I also agree that Knife of Dreams resolved too much, too quickly. Why drag some of these plotlines out for so many books just to end them in a few lines?

So what do we expect to see first? Book 12 or the next GRRM?