Recently finished The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan and currently 100 pages into The Great Hunt.
You know that series is never getting finished, due to the author's death, right?
Aside from that, the series falls apart after book 6, and I stopped reading after 8... What started as a tightly written epic, devolves into to stuttering mess by book 7, with pages and pages of the characters clothing descriptions, a slew of new and unimportant characters, and silly filler situations. A couple of the main fellowship that starts the adventure in
Eye of the World, just sort of evaporate for entire books, and the main cohesion of the story goes right in the toilet. A lot of speculation was flying around around the time we were all waiting for book 8 to hit, that Jordan and his publishing company were attempting to cash in on the wild success of the early books, and the company had him generating a ton of filler and useless subplots to extend the series well beyond 10 books. After hearing this, and observing a marked decrease in quality with each release, I gave up on the series. Friends that stuck with it tell me I made the right choice.
I have a few major issues with the series that I can't elaborate on for fear of spoiling the books for you, but, I recommend stopping after the fantastic book 6... Books 1-6 are definitely great, but read the series with the knowledge that it will remain incomplete, and that the quality dips to abysmal levels after a while...
George R.R> Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series is MUCH better, and if you haven't read that yet, I would grab a copy of the first book,
A Game of Thrones, ASAP.
I have a few friends that feel
The Wheel of Time series is just downright bad, first book to last, and I can't find anyone that dislikes Martin's stuff...
Meanwhile:
The Iliad -
Homer