WOT questions: Will all three A Memory of Light books feature Rand, Mat, and Perrin?
Short answer: Yes.
Longer answer: They will all three appear in all three books, but it will not be equally balanced. Some characters will be more of a focus in some of the books, and other will be more of a focus in others. This is particularly true of the first two volumes, where I had to juggle which characters would be a focus in one, and which will be a focus in the other.
I ask because you said the prologue Robert Jordan wrote would probably be split over two books.
Yes, it will be. I don’t know yet if the third volume will have a prologue or not. The material Mr. Jordan wrote for the prologue is split, half in the prologue of The Gathering Storm , half in the prologue of the second volume.
Does this mean story arcs are getting split as well?
I tried to keep story arcs contained in a single book. We’ll get glimpses from some of the characters in the first book, with a more complete story arc in the second book. And we’ll get story arcs in the first book from some characters, followed by glimpses in the second.
The split actually turned out really well. I think I managed to get a balance working where characters don’t vanish for entire volumes, but we still get to have complete character arcs.
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