Growing up, fantasy books full of wizards, knights and gods were my bread and butter. My favorite authors in the field — David Eddings, Raymond E. Feist and Terry Brooks — contributed book after book to my collection while I ignored many other such sorcerous authors. What these three did that I find lacking in many fantasy authors was refuse to let the genre define the work. The omnipotent artifacts and super-duper spells were background to their characters’ personalities and development. Thus, the standard plucky hero versus shadowy villain conflicts that played out in the background were rendered largely irrelevant. Like I didn’t know who was going to win the battle between good and evil. The fun was in meeting the people involved.

Unfortunately, fantasy writing has a huge problem with convention. A good fantasy story could happen anywhere, but the genre too often serves as the prime instigator of historical wishful thinking, trading in the reality for a rose-colored prance into the Middle Ages. The knight-errants, wizards and busty wenches get all Ren Faired, polish up their thees and thous, and wave a sword at the darkness. Substitute those pesky medieval drawbacks like religious extremism, serfdom and the Black Death with shiny spells, more obvious monsters and world-saving quests. And the result, more often than not, is that the genre dictates the story. A new wave of fantasy writers is taking the tired formula and injecting modernism into its structure to take it into a new direction, but many authors continue to pander to style over substance. So, not long after I became an adult I gave up on reading anything new from the swords and sorcery crowd.

One author who never crossed my path was Robert Jordan. I’m not sure why; I had always heard that he was a shining beacon in the field. It just never happened. Recently, I decided to plug that gap and read the first book in his Wheel of Time series, and I really enjoyed The Eye of the World. It was a great piece of storytelling that delivered believable characters and wasn’t afraid to turn both convention and plot on their ears for the good of the tale. Jordan’s most glaring nod to the usual is in his use of the old favorite Farmboy Hero (fantasy seems to abhor city slickers who save the day), but as for the rest, even his depiction of God versus the Devil shakes the paradigm.

In fact, the opening volume of The Wheel of Time was so good that it will be some time before I read another book in the series. Currently at 12 novels averaging 600 pages apiece, Jordan has created an epic that requires serious investment, even by fantasy writing standards. I just don’t have the time anymore. Sorry, Dungeon Master.