The Shadow Rising

Book Four of The Wheel of Time

By: Robert Jordan

Narrated by: Kate Reading, Michael Kramer

Length: 41 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's summary

The Wheel of Time is now an original series on Prime Video, starring Rosamund Pike as Moiraine!

In The Shadow Rising, the fourth novel in Robert Jordan’s number one New York Times best-selling epic fantasy series, The Wheel of Time®, Rand al’Thor now wields the sword Callandor. He is both the Champion of Light and the Dragon Reborn. Now, he seeks answers to another prophecy that lies with the warrior people known as the Aiel to put him on the path of learning how to wield the One Power.

Accompanied by Moiraine Damodred, Rand arrives at the Aiel Waste and is granted permission by the Wise Ones to enter the sacred city of Rhuidean. After passing through a doorframe ter'angreal, Moiraine gains foresight while the Aiel await Rand's return, either with both arms marked by dragon symbols, validating his identity as He Who Comes With the Dawn, the Chief of Chiefs of all the Aiel - or to never emerge at all.

Since its debut in 1990, The Wheel of Time® has captivated millions of readers around the globe with its scope, originality, and compelling characters. The last six books in series were all instant number one New York Times bestsellers, and The Eye of the World was named one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read.

The Wheel of Time®
New Spring: The Novel
#1 The Eye of the World
#2 The Great Hunt
#3 The Dragon Reborn
#4 The Shadow Rising
#5 The Fires of Heaven
#6 Lord of Chaos
#7 A Crown of Swords
#8 The Path of Daggers
#9 Winter's Heart
#10 Crossroads of Twilight
#11 Knife of Dreams

By Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
#12 The Gathering Storm
#13 Towers of Midnight
#14 A Memory of Light

By Robert Jordan and Teresa Patterson
The World of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time

By Robert Jordan, Harriet McDougal, Alan Romanczuk, and Maria Simons
The Wheel of Time Companion

By Robert Jordan and Amy Romanczuk
Patterns of the Wheel: Coloring Art Based on Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time

Listen to more books in The Wheel of Time series.

©1992 Robert Jordan (P)1997 Books on Tape

Critic reviews

"Jordan's multivolume epic continues to live up to its high ambitions. Complex plotting, an array of strong characters, lavish detail, and a panoramic scope make this series a feast for fantasy aficionados." (Library Journal)

"The fourth volume of the most ambitious American fantasy saga continues to suggest that The Wheel of Time will also be the finest." (Booklist)

fantastic reading

I read this series many moons ago myself. the narrator's get my head voices perfectly.

Great

I'm invested ro the characters, the places and the struggles. Bring on the next story!

One of the best fantasy series.

Series is developing quite well by this book. I love how everything works so well together. this my favorite series. if you are a fan check out the WOT spoilers podcast but only if you have finished this series.

The Dragon rides again

Great book.
The boys and girls are growing.
The Dark One stirs
they must prevail

Really Good!

I'm assuming that if you've made it this far in the audiobook version of the series you already knew that. Narration unbelievably well done as usual. There are some longer pauses than I was accustomed to, but if you speed up the reading, they are less noticeable.

Perrin comes into his own

It's so interesting going back through this series. There are so many little/small things that I forgot, but also random moments along the way that stuck with me. This book had a few of those, and it was interesting to read them and kind of "re-live" that moment that stuck with me through the years.

I enjoyed how this book did a bit of a dive into Perrin's character. Though the narrative spent a good amount of time focused on him, I enjoyed it. It was fascinating how Jordan conveyed the influence of being ta'veren, specifically with how Mat could not resist it, but Perrin manages to strike out one his own. Even so, Perrin's nature as ta'veren seems to set him up as a leader among the people of the Tow Rivers when he returns to try and save them from Trollocks and the White Cloaks. The character arc for Rand felt much more minor, but it is interesting paying attention to how he begins to embrace the reality of his destiny and even tries to seize it for his own. As for Mat, there's so much to enjoy with him, but he didn't get quite as much "time" in this volume.

Kate Reading and Michael Kramer continue to turn in phenomenal performances. As the story has continued, Reading has been given more and more to do, as the women's stories have amped up a decent amount. At this point it is almost comforting to hear their voices when I put my ear buds in and hit "play" in the audible app.

On to the next one!

The Best So Far

Of the first four books in the Wheel of Time series, this was easily my favorite. I won't go so far to say that the series gets better and better as it goes. I'm writing this after reading book 5 and personally believe that book 5 was a step down from this book. The best character in the series is the "world". It is so full of detail and has so many different cultures, customs, history, and so on, that it's easy to get lost in the details. That said those details are partially responsible for the most notorious and common criticism of the series, how slow it is.

In this novel we get to spend time in a number of different and varied locations across the map but the focus stays mostly on the Two Rivers and the Aiel Waste. I won't say more than that to avoid spoilers but the Aiel are one of if not the most fascinating groups we've been introduced to in the series and the time spent their is probably my favorite storyline of the series so far. A number of characters truly get a chance to shine in this book but it Perrin in particular gets his moment in the sun. It isn't the first book to make him a POV character but it's the first I've been happy to spend so much time with him. I have nothing against him in previous books, I just feel this one does it the best and other characters don't suffer as a result.

I still have the same complaints about this book that I do the first three books. The characters sometimes seem very dumb or intentionally obtuse. Villains have giant signs on their foreheads screaming evil, At least one character whose name I won't mention for fear of angering their fan base is unbearable to spend time with, and of course it can be an extremely slow read. It is still the Wheel of Time, and has earned its place as a must read series for Fantasy lovers, but it's not a series I would recommend to anyone who doesn't truly love the genre.

World-Building and Action In Equal Measure

The Shadow Rising picks up where The Dragon Reborn left off, with Rand al'Thor wielding his authority from the Stone of Tear after breaching the fortress with the assistance of a cadre of Aiel and taking Callandor in accordance with prophecy. For a brief interval, the companions who set out from the Two Rivers are together in one place again, before the machinations of the Forsaken and Rand's reluctant determination to embrace his fate forces them to head in separate directions yet again.
Mat and Moiraine follow Rand deep into the Aiel Waste, set for the sacred city of Rhuidean where Rand means to fulfill the next prophecy on his path to become The Dragon Reborn.
Perrin, Faile, and Loial depart for the Two Rivers, where Perrin hopes to save his family and friends from the Children of the Light, only to discover that things are far worse than his nightmares prepared him to expect.
Nynaeve, Elayne, and Thom Merrilin follow the trail of the Black Ajah to Tanchico, desperate to discover the secret weapon the dark sisters are hoping to use against Rand.
All of this takes place while Min attempts to sus out the meaning of her prophetic visions at the White Tower, as tumult and upheaval loom on the near horizon.
The Shadow Rising was one of my favorite books in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series when I originally began reading the series years ago. This was primarily because we begin to catch tantalizing glimpses of the world before the breaking as well as insights into the less previously well-explored cultures introduced in the first three books, in particular, the Aiel and Seanchan. Jordan also provided readers with a fascinating look at the dynamic between various Forsaken as well as the Dark Friends operating in the world, and how those various individuals and groups are frequently acting at odds with one another.
It isn't all world-building in this book, though. There's plenty of action and a whole lot of story along the way.
As with the previous three audiobooks, the narration provided by Kate Reading and Michael Kramer is spectacular, at no point taking the listener out of the experience or disrupting the flow of the narrative.

Not the tv version

Read all the books to the end. Wait a little. Then read again. Even better!

Another great entry

So far this series has just gotten better and better as we go. It was very solid entry , not my favorite but a contender so far.