Read the first chapter of The Gathering Storm

The Gathering Storm is the 12th novel in the much acclaimed Wheel of Time series by the Late author of fantasy, Robert Jordan. The series is being completed by Brandon Sanderson and will include 3 novels, The Gathering Storm, Shifting Winds and Tarmon' Gaidon (TBC).

The whole first chapter of The Gathering Storm, now set for release on the 27th October 2009 is being made available exclusively at Tor.com by the Kind permission of Tor Books. This excerpt will remain on the site till the end of October. An audio version of the first chapter is also available at the same place.

In other Wheel of Time news, the Prologue to the Gathering Storm will be made available as an e-book purchase from the 17th September and Tor Books have also announced that the entire wheel of Time series will be made available as e-books. The Eye of the World will be launched as an e-book on the 27th October 2009 in the US and then each subsequent novel released at monthly intervals. At this stage it is unclear if this release date includes the UK market.

Brand new cover art has been commissioned by different artists for the e-books, with a different artist for each novel.

It has been four years since the release of Knife of Dreams, book 11 of the wheel of time and Robert Jordan believed this would be his penultimate novel in the series. It has also been nearly 2 years since he passed away. There is much hype and breathless anticipation over the release of The Gathering Storm and this will only increase as the Launch date grows ever closer.

The first ever review of the The Gathering Storm is available over at Dragonmount, written by one of Robert Jordans biggest fans Jason Denzel. Jason gives a very fair review but be warned there is a spoiler section (clearly marked though).