I really enjoyed reading this book! The beginning reminded me of a mix of Eragon and Lord of the Rings. I'm usually a person that prefers more dialogue, and less description, however this book won me over. The eloquent descriptions of the settings and events that happened throughout the book made it so much more enjoyable to read. I look forward to reading the rest of the series.

4.5 stars
Wow, this book was... well it was mostly great!
Yes, there was what was clearly a lot of set-up, because this is the first book in a series of ~14 books. But I didn't mind that, really, because it was a lot of cool world-building and character foundation. That being said, there are a lot of names--of characters both current and past, of places and titles--this isn't for the faint of heart. But I'm reading this series along with new friends and using Discord to have discussions that are carefully marked with spoilers! And those who've read the series many times before are helpfully pointing out important things that will come back later, so I feel like my reading is being guided, somewhat.

Here are my thoughts, only vague spoilers but I still hid them:
-Rand is a little all over for me. As the main guy (currently) we are in his POV frequently, so at the start it's good that he is confused because it allows him to ask many questions, and this functions to help the reader who is also still figuring things out.
-Idk if I'm just arrogant or have a big head (probably both true), but most of the times that people were saying 'this part was confusing!' I was not confused. And many many of my predictions have already been coming true. I don't feel I've read that much fantasy, and I've never read the 3 LotR books, just the Hobbit, so I don't know why the tropes are smashing me in the face? (that being said, the homage in this book to LotR is so strong sometimes... whew)
-Mat as a character better get so much more interesting, because for most of this book he was super annoying to me!

-I liked Perrin's POV when we got it re: the Traveling People and the Whitecloaks, but I wanted him to have another POV this book. When he catches up to everyone in Caemlyn, from Rand's POV he just seems to be much more gruff and not like 'his old self'. (I mean, all of them have changed, but he seems more changed than Mat, maybe...)
-Egwene and Nynaeve and Moiraine-- all seem like they could be super cool and powerful, yet each of them sort of has a 'thing' in this book, maybe because it's mostly from Rand's POV?? Moiraine is the most nuanced, but we really don't know much about her because we've never really had a conversation with her, she's all riddles and 'we better hurry and move forward!'. Egwene just seems so young and stubborn and mainly functions to be pretty. Nynaeve seems so ANGRY all the TIME, she's hardly ever described without the qualifiers 'muttered, angrily, growled, scowled, stared, sniffed' etc. I think she could have an awesome storyline but so far is just pissy and magically having romantic feelings that came out of nowhere.
-The Rand and Mat travel to Caemlyn chapters took forever... there was a bit of a slow patch during the 50-75% as everyone was separated and struggling to get back together.
-For now, the entire 'meeting royalty' part seems out of place, and I also felt like the writing was weak in that section
-The last ~50 pages are freaking JAM PACKED with action and crazy stuff going down--I think I will have to re-read that to get things more solidified.
SUPER SPOILERS:::
-I felt like Moiraine seemed super dismissive of Rand at the very end. He's freaking out, he's an anomaly and she's just like "well, good luck, I can't show you a damn thing because I assume it's 100% different even though logically I'm the best option you've got." so... we'll see how that goes.