Mark's BFB Challenge 2015

I'm in the 100 Book group and I noticed that Bryan had posted about this group which seemed interesting and so I thought I'd give it a shot. I'm in the midst of the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan and books 5 through 14 all look to have more than 600 pages with most in the 800 page range. 35 sounds like an admirable and stretching goal to me. I think I got through 25 last year.

I finished The Shadow Rising yesterday which is listed as having 1007 pages in Kindle form on Amazon. I did, however, start reading it in 2014. As I think about it I probably read more than half of it in 2014 so I probably shouldn't count it for 2015. Based on opinions below I will count The Shadow Rising for 2015!

Currently reading:

Read:

1) The Shadow Rising by Robert Jordan 1032 pages in Kindle Form
2) The Fires of Heaven by Robert Jordan 913 pages in Kindle Form
3) Lord of Chaos by Robert Jordan 1036 pages in Kindle Form
4) A Crown of Swords by Robert Jordan 856 pages in Kindle Form
5) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling 734 pages in Kindle Form
6) The Path of Daggers by Robert Jordan 672 pages in Kindle Form
7) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling 870 pages in Kindle Form
8) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling 672 pages in Kindle Form
9) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling 791 pages in Kindle Form
10) Winter's Heart by Robert Jordan 678 pages in Kindle Form
11) Crossroads of Twilight by Robert Jordan 818 pages in Kindle Form
12) Knife of Dreams by Robert Jordan 814 pages in Kindle Form
13) The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan 825 pages in Kindle Form
14) Towers of Midnight by Robert Jordan 818 pages in Kindle Form
15) A Memory of Light by Robert Jordan 1025 pages in Kindle Form

Welcome Mark, I use the date I finish the book so I would count Shadow Rising but it is up to you.
Must get to The Wheel of Time series sometime.
Happy reading !

I would like to welcome you too, Mark. And I do the same thing that Bryan does; I use the date I complete the book so go ahead and count it. It will give the rest of us something to strive for.
I hope you enjoy it here. Feel free to comment as much or as little as you like.
belva

Welcome and happy reading!

Hi Mark, welcome to the group, sounds like you will read a fair amount of BFB's this year.

Thanks everybody! I'm looking forward to hanging out in this group this year!

Hi Mark, great reading so far, I've added a total thread so feel free to add your books and kick us off !

The Shadow Rising, The Fires of Heaven, and Lord of Chaos are books 4, 5, and 6 of The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan. This series is an epic fantasy and with 14 books with an average length of nearly 900 pages it is definitely an epic series. I read the first three books in Fall 2014 and am definitely enjoying this series. However, it is time for a break! It's starting to feel like work when I read this series so I'll take a pause from BFB's for a little while.

I definitely recommend this series if you like Fantasy but just be prepared to read for a long time.

Well, my break didn't last too long. I started the 7th book of the Wheel of Time series yesterday. A Crown of Swords is listed as 902 pages in Kindle form. I'm enjoying it so far and am at about the 20% mark.

I'm 13 books into my 2015 reading and 9 of the 13 have been BFB's. I'm averaging 702.54 pages per book based on Amazon's listed page numbers. Part of me wants to see if I can keep my average above 700 pages per book for the year but that would be enormous overkill, especially if I'm trying to read 100 books in total this year.

I knew this might happen when I found this group. My competitive side kicks in and soon I'm out of control. I still have 4.5 more Wheel of Time books to go and these books average 896 pages a piece. Yikes!

I've been working through the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan as y'all know and I'm on Book 12 out of 14. I'm enjoying the series but I'm also ready to be done with it. It bills itself as an Epic Fantasy series in the vein of Lord of the Rings and Epic is the right word for it. This series is so long. 14 books that I imagine will end up averaging somewhere between 800-900 pages per book. It also seems to have 10-15 different story lines that are happening at any given time. I would say that there are 6 major, major characters in this series and for a good portion of the series they have mostly been pretty separated from each other. Currently two of them are together and the rest are separate.

There are so many different characters that have important things going on that I've thought about buying a marker board to keep track of everybody. I'm enjoying the series but I'm glad it will be over soon.

Book 11 was the last full book that Robert Jordan wrote before he passed away. Brandon Sanderson was chosen to complete the series and from everything that I've read, fans have been pretty pleased with how he did. I'm excited because I found Sanderson first and I love his writing so I'm looking forward to reading the last three books of the series.

The first books was published in January of 1990 and the final book was published in January of 2013. As much as I hate starting a series that hasn't been completed I could see some advantages to having forced breaks from it. The big problem though would be trying to remember what was going on after being away from the series for 9 months to 2 years.

Anyway, I recommend the series but only to people who are very serious about reading and and fantasy in general. Put on your big boy (or girl) pants if you plan to read this series.

I am afraid that I am just beginning to appreciate fantasy story-lines and then those of a lighter nature. I don't do sci-fi at all (or at least very rarely) but I really enjoy reading about others reading it & I especially enjoy it here where so many of the group do read & talk about their otherworldly book exploits.
I am hoping to begin another BFB in a month or so.
Good job up above. I enjoyed it.
Cheers,

I finished the final book of the Wheel of Time series last night! I'm often sad when I finish a book but at least I know that I can read it again. The completion of the Wheel of Time series leaves me with a swirl of emotions and thoughts. I'm still processing a series that has taken me close to four months to read. It's also interesting because it is very unlikely that I will ever read it again. I'm just going to spill some thoughts about it below so we'll see how it goes.

I very much enjoyed the series.

It felt like work at times especially toward the end.

14 books and 11614 pages.

It definitely feels like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders.

I'm sad that the series is over and I'll miss the characters and the story.

The series did generally end well. I wish that we'd gotten more of a glimpse of what happens after the major conflict is resolved but at the same time all the characters and story lines were resolved as far as I can remember.

I would probably give the series 4 stars overall, maybe 4.5 stars. There were some slow books in the middle but it still didn't deter me from finishing the series. The series was very enjoyable but I would say that it wasn't a 100% page turner all the time. It did feel a bit like work to complete and I certainly wouldn't recommend the series to anyone who isn't a voracious reader.

I think that in many ways Jordan was ahead of his time with regards to his approach to female characters in the fantasy genre. The issue of gender stereotypes, biases, discrimination, etc is clearly big right now, as it should be, and it has opened my eyes to broaden my consideration of these issues in what I read. As a single, white male whose family is middle class-ish I've never had to deal with the slights, discrimination, biases, etc that women, minorities and other groups have to deal with so I don't always see them or understand them. But I'm learning and I want to do my part in helping to rid the world of these things.

As a guy I'm probably not super qualified to comment on the portrayal of the female characters in the book but I'll give some impressions. To me, it seemed that Jordan did a pretty good job of creating major, realistic female characters. These women had strength, importance, and choices to make. Some chose relationships, some didn't. Some chose to commit the countries they ruled to war. Some didn't. It seemed to me that in many ways they were allowed to be on equal footing with their male counterparts.

A woman might have a completely different opinion about the female characters in the book but it seemed to me that the author wrote them better than a lot of typical fantasy authors. There were certainly still some aspects that weren't perfect (I can't count how many times the word bosom was used--many times for every female character) and I think that there were some places where the author gave in a bit to some stereotypes but I think that overall he did a better job with the female characters than a lot of authors have done. He definitely raised some ideas that are coming into more prominence now than when he began writing the series in 1990. If you're looking for a perfectly progressive series you will likely still be disappointed but I think it's better than many in the fantasy world. Maybe one day a male author and a female author will be able to team up to create an incredible set of characters to live in the fantasy genre. I'm not totally convinced that a single author can perfectly create characters of both genders but who knows...

As a side note, for all the hints about sex throughout the book he never actually went into any details. Somebody told me that they thought the book was kind of like Game of Thrones with regards to sex and violence but it really wasn't particularly explicit for the most part. I've never read or watched Game of Thrones but it is my understanding that it is very explicit. This series is not.

Anyway, I very much enjoyed this series. It is super complex and part of me wishes that I had bought a couple of big marker boards at the beginning so that I could keep track of all of the characters and what they were up to as well as drawing a map so that I could have a better idea of where things were located. Ordinarily, I read with just a focus on the story and don't soak up all of the details because I plan to read the book again if I enjoyed it. It's very difficult to imagine reading this series again any time soon because it was so long.

Well done Mr. Jordan!

Well done Mr. Sanderson with your efforts to complete the last three books of the series!

Very interesting comments on a series I am sure that I will never read so thank you for giving us a glimpse into that world. Well done!

Hey folks, thanks for welcoming me to this group. I have decided that I need to bow out of the group due to putting too much pressure on myself to read big books. I've also bowed out of the 100 book group for the same reason. I get a little too competitive with myself and end up making reading into work. I'm just going to have fun reading what I want to read this year. Good luck getting to 100 this year!

Hi Mark, pressure and competitiveness are never good, thanks for your contribution ( and your great review of the Wheel of Time series that has prompted me into reading it ), feel free to post any big books you do read in our count, and happy relaxed reading !