If you’ve read and liked J.R.R Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, you’ll love The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan. It’s a high-fantasy novel that was written is such a way that you can vividly picture what’s taking place. The book begins in a small, rural town by the name of Emond’s Field. This is where many of the main characters are first introduced. Each and every one of them have their own personality that you can actually see evolve as the story progresses. Throughout this book, as well as all the other books in the series, almost every character, no matter how small of a part that character partakes, has a personality that makes the book come to life and become much more dynamic. What makes this truly an absolute accomplishment few have or will achieve is the fact that throughout the entire series there are 2,782 major characters and each one has their very own personality. The magic of this world is something similar, yet also a refreshing new way of how an author uses magic within a fantasy book.

Jordan has been criticized by many about how much of his writing was heavily influenced by Tolkien. Others go as far as saying that he has taken ideas from authors before him and used the ideas to create his story. Yet even those who say this still think that the story was really good. For example, Jordan intentionally made Emond’s Field feel like the Shire from The Lord of the Rings, yet one must still consider this: almost every author has been influenced by something in the world around them or previous authors before them.

Those who had criticized Jordan for what they said as “lack of creativity,” are right if you look at it one way. If you look at it another way, it was a great way of showing how he was able to take a very cliche story type and make it into something absolutely wonderful. Taking something familiar then changing it into something new with the original familiarity makes it more enjoyable to read because it still retains the previous vibes. Coincidentally, on review sites a few of those that criticized Jordan of stealing ideas still gave the book five stars. While you could see Eye of the World as just another quest by an unlikely hero to destroy the villain, the road that gets the hero to his victory is more important than the clique storyline. With all of the book’s twists and turns, they make it a masterpiece