Hey, guys!
It’s Tuesday, which means it’s time for a bookish favorites post. Top 5 Tuesday is hosted by Meeghan over on Meeghan Reads and is quite simple: check out the topic and write a post with your picks.
Today we’re talking about my favorite books of 2022 so far. However, this year I started reading the Wheel of Time series (so many books, so many pages). That means, apart from one other novel, the WoT books are the only thing I have read this year. I’m currently on the sixth novel, so I decided to simply tell you precisely why I enjoyed each of the five installments I have finished so far!
#1 New Spring
It was actually an accident that I started with this one. New Spring is the prequel novel to the series but I had initially intended to begin with the first actual book. Why? Well, the Amazon adaptation was out and the first season is based on the first book! I wanted to be able to compare. Alas, I ended up starting with the sequel instead and I’m glad I did. New Spring does a lot in terms of world-building and gives you a lot of intel you never learn in the other books (or at least not in the ones I have read so far). I am rather curious by nature and always want answers to my questions, so it really was lucky that I started with New Spring!
#2 The Eye of the World
This is the first actual novel in the series and I was hooked right away. The story is fascinating and I was sucked into the tale from the first page onwards. The book is -well, it’s fantasy, duh – pretty long but I just couldn’t put it down. I think this one is the best indicator of whether you’ll like the series or not. While New Spring gives you a lot of information it feels a little different from the rest, so maybe don’t judge the whole series based on that book – even though I definitely recommend starting there.
#3 The Great Hunt
What fascinates me about Wheel of Time – and this became more and more evident with this book – is how much inspiration Robert Jordan obviously drew from Lord of the Rings. Nevertheless, he manages to make it very much his own. Wheel of Time has some clear parallels (and there is a moment/joke in this book where Jordan clearly acknowledges that) but still feels unique enough to be captivating. Moreover, there is so much going on in this novel, yet Jordan still seems to tie everything of quite nicely so far, so at this stage I had trouble imagining how there could be so many more books!
#4 The Dragon Reborn
The Dragon Reborn had me hooked for a very similar reason as the last book. While The Great Hunt has clear ties to LOTR, here we take a turn and go full-on Arthurian legends. Actually, there is only one thing in the book that kinda screams that in your face, but once you start thinking about it, you notice a million little things that are nods to these tales. You don’t want to know how much time I spent on Wikipedia reading up on Arthurian mythology after this…
#5 The Shadow Rising
In The Shadow Rising more separate plotlines seem to develop and now I understand why there are another 10 books. Each one of these separate yet connected stories is so fascinating, that I always keep forgetting about all the others when I’m reading one chapter focused on a specific one. Interestingly, this book has a moment that is very much inspired by Norse mythology and Odin. I wonder if there will be more of this. Those who have followed my blog for a while know that I love all things mythology, so I’m very excited about this. Also, there are some parallels to Dune – which didn’t even occur to me until I watched the new Dune adaptation the other day. Now it seems so blatantly obvious! I just can’t wrap my head around how Jordan managed to combine so many different things into one series and it actually works!
What’s your favorite book of 2022 so far? Let me know in the comments!
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Oh wow, you are far more dedicated than me to start this series!! Isn’t there like 20 books?!
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14 plus a prequel – I started reading in January and I am now on book #7 (did start with the prequel, so it’s the 8th book I’m reading)
however, all the books are so long, I’m not even halfway through the total page count yet 🙈
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Ooof. That hurts. I wish you much speed and happy reading!!
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thanks!
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