>>24611934
Listen here my son, I will elucidate. The Wheel of Time takes place in a world where women - the Aes Sedai - possess all magic and thereby hold great power. They want to KEEP that power, and try to control the population to make sure their power remains.
It will not remain.
Robert Jordan's depiction of women is so good it borders on pure misoginy. Women in Wheel of Time are catty, short-sighted, petty, vindictive, overly emotional, unreasonable, stubborn, arrogant, haughty, proud, vain, utterly hipocritical and perfectly willing to argue over protocol and who gets to wear which hat while LITERALLY EVERYONE is DYING around them because women can't fucking get their shit together. The rule of the Aes Sedai is the rule of women: capricious, overreliant on rigid rules, rife with gossip and jealousies. The further you read the Wheel of Time, the more you will realize how utterly incompetent every single woman in that series is (except Min, I like Min) and that they really, really, REALLY need men to make decision and run things to prevent the whole world from being destroyed. And even then, even with The Dragon Reborn standing in their presence, the only hope for the salvation OF ALL LIFE from the Dark One, the Aes Sedai will go "hmph, you have to what I say because I wear this hat!" because women are retarded and Robert Jordan will not let you forget that. (again, except Min, she's cool)
Jordan piles one humiliation after another on his women. There will be spankings, open palm and with paddles.
>>24612326
The Devil in a Forest is a completely straight-forward well almost not really but you know and easy to follow Gene Wolfe novel, pretty short too.
For someone trying to get more into Wolfe I would also highly recommend reading his short stories, for example pic related