"The Wheel of Time spins the Pattern of the Ages, threads being lives of men and women, cities and towns, nations and destinies. The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills. The patterns created can never be comprehended in full, but maybe we can see bits and pieces of it. And this is the only power we can wield to save ourselves from the Darkness within Shayol Ghul."

I took a long time buying Priya her birthday gift. Mostly because I couldn't make up my mind. I thought I would get a whole load of fluorescent stars to light up her room with, help her create galaxies and constellations on her ceiling: the idiot beat me to it, and bought the stars for herself. Thought I would make her into the heroine of a tiny comic book: sounded cliche, I've done it before for others. I surrendered to fate, in the end, and bought her Book 2 of the Wheel of Time: the only one she was missing to complete her collection.

Turned out to be a gift for myself as much for her: best sort of gifts really. Frankly, it's not all that great: not exactly an epic of great proportions, to wrap you in wonder and carry you far, far away from your room, like Tolkein does; but it aspires to be. It's not a fantastic legend, with creatures and characters far too fabulous to conceive of, with lands one longs to go to; but it aspires to be. However, it does have a compelling weapon that forces people to keep reading: a promise of a story. (Unlike that stupid book about some dumb dragon and an even dumber boy - Eragon - which was so obviously a Tolkein wannabe. The story was boring, the hero maddeningly hard headed and stupid, and worst of all - the pompousness of the author, Christopher Paolini, seeped through the words: 'Oh, yeah, this is a great story isn't it? I'm only 19, you can make out from the general immaturity in the story, but I made tons of money from this book. Fabumungo, isn't it?." Point being: it was a loser of a book.)

The Wheel of Time is the sort of book I would love to buy my nephews. It makes me wish I was in a different place, with a purpose. In love with a fierce warrior, who fights battles with all he has. A fierce, bloody, feared warrior, who is chivalrous and dreamy. A bunch of friends with weird quirks who take me off on adventures. Family who are respected and a bloodline to make one proud of one's inheritance. Life with everything super intense: love, romance, adventure, friendship and everything that comes with it.

I wish I was a book. Not the characters, but the book. Life would be so much easier if you were a book. Actually, maybe we are all in a book. A very complicated, intense story, maybe we're being read by someone.

Now that's a thought.