[Tarrek]

I agree that books 7 through 10 do drag on a bit (might be an understatement), but I think one of the things that made Jordan different from other authors is the amount of depth he puts into each character, and the ability to do so with so many characters. In my opinion, if these characters were real, a fan could probably predict what they would do in a given situation.

About Sanderson, he is doing a very good job with the series. In his first one he got a couple characters off, but that was corrected in ToM. His style seems faster paced than Jordan's, which is probably a good thing for many fans.

My favorite character right now is Mat due to his actions in ToM, but it changes often. I have to say, up until ToM, Perrin was starting to become my least favorite main character, but his story arc finally improved.