Moon River

Book; 2, The Great Hunt


Chapter; 30, Daes Dae'mar


Character Groups:
Cairhien                     Kinslayers Dagger     Tifan's Well       Tar Valon
Rand                           Mat                           Moiraine            Egwene
Loial                           Perrin                        Lan                   Nynaeve
Hurin                          Ingtar                                                  Min
Selene (sometimes)    Verin                                                   Elayne
                                  Various soilders


See what I mean about the characters? Bear in mind that I am only including characters in the list that are important to the overall plot arc, since chapter 16 that number has gone from 10 to 14, not counting the soldiers, and I have actually left out a few because they aren't that important just yet. I have decided to include locations for each group, just to stop me getting lost! To keep to rule 2, I will not be describing new characters any more unless I have something interesting to say about them.


For example, Verin. Verin (or Verin Sedai to give her her full title) is another channeler. She belongs to the ancient, female only, order of channelers called Aes Sedai, which I believe I have mentioned before but not explained. Aes Sedai are subject to three oaths. 1) To speak no word that is not true, 2) to make no weapon for one man to kill another and 3) not to use the One Power as a weapon except in last defence of you life, that of your Warder...yadda yadda, the list goes on. The point is that Aes Sedai are bound to these oaths in such a way that makes them as much a part of a woman as her own skin, once sworn they are unbreakable. 

Or are they? A few chapters ago, Verin uttered a harmless little sentence that, it seems, broke the first rule. This is one of the great mysteries in the series. 'Did Verin Lie?' has been discussed on forums and blogs as long as there have been forums and blogs and the answer was a long time coming. This is in fact the 'longest delay' between event and explanation that I mentioned in a previous post. When I finally read the resolution, I curled up in a ball and giggled manically, earning some very strange looks from my sister.


Now for Selene. When I first read tGH in...oh... 2001, I found Selene absolutely fascinating. she pops up seemingly out of nowhere spouting cryptic phrases and giving off an air of knowing so much more than everybody else. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then and on this read through I just found her a bit annoying. This could be because now I know what she is up to, (much as I would like to, I can't erase my knowledge of the future books and start again) but I think it is just that in ten years my tastes have changed.


I was wracking my brain trying to find a succinct way of explaining this and it came to me quite suddenly. Selene is River Song (I'll assume that you have seen the most recent series of Doctor Who). She turns up out of the blue being all enigmatic and twirls out hero around her middle finger. She refuses to tell us anything while hinting at everything and when the big reveal comes, its a bit of a let down (if not a bit nonsensical). At least Selene vanishes as easily as she appears whereas River seems to have become a fixture.