New Spring/Robert Jordan/378 pp.

I have a confession to make - I didn't read this in the correct order. New Spring is part of Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series; it's a prequel that takes place about 20 years before the events of the first book in the series. New Spring was written originally as a novella, published in an anthology of new works written by several masters of the fantasy genre. The anthology came out between books 8 and 9 of the "Wheel of Time" series; Jordan later expanded the novella into a full novel, which came out between books 10 and 11 of the series.

As I said, the events in New Spring take place about 20 years before the events of the first book in the main series. Moiraine and Siuan, both apprentices to the Aes Sedai, a group of sorceresses, overhear a prophecy of the rebirth of the "Dragon", a hero who will save the world from the "Dark One". Once they become full members of the Aes Sedai, Moiraine and Siuan begin searching for the Dragon, to protect him from the followers of the Dark One. Moiraine also meets up with Lan Mandragoran, a soldier who will become her Warder, a warrior who is bonded to serve her.

It's difficult to talk about the "Wheel of Time" series without explaining such terms as Aes Sedai, Warder, and Dragon. It also made reading this book a little slow going at first. While the book is a prequel to the events of the series, it assumes a familiarity with the world of the series, since it was published after 8 of the series' volumes. But there is a small glossary at the back of the book, and once I began to remember what the new words meant, the book became a lot more enjoyable. I'm a big fan of multi-volume works like the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the Harry Potter books, and Christopher Paolini's "Eragon" series. My only concern is when a writer drags things on without ever resolving anything, seemingly just to make a few more bucks off the fans. I've had several friends say they stopped reading the "Wheel of Time" series for just that reason - that it seemed like some volumes in the series weren't really moving the story forward. But I enjoyed this book so much that I think at the least I'll read one or two more volumes in the series to see how things go, before giving up on this story.

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