Let's see, where should I start?

My girlfriend loves this series, and suggested I read it (should I be concerned by that? lol), so I picked up the first book. I'm pretty much exactly halfway through, and I have mixed feelings, so far.

My first issue, while minor, is a big pet peeve of mine: that is, Carey doesn't use the Oxford comma. Killin' me over here.

Now that that's out of the way, though, I can get to the meat. I find it hard to get over how much Carey has taken from both Jordan and Martin—in the case of Jordan, it is in her writing style: her level of detail is, I find, all too reminiscent of WoT...and she has straight up used patently Jordanesque terms (I mean seriously, who else uses the phrase "well-turned calves"?); as far as Martin goes, she's got way too much of the game of thrones thing going on. Hell, she even has a line where one character says to another "you would teach me the game of thrones?"

Maybe I'm being over-critical here, because WoT and ASoIaF are two of my all-time favorites, but there it is.

However, that's not to say that Carey hasn't intrigued me. I'm particularly fond of Jescelin's character. He's a great foil for Phedre, though I'm sure he's gonnna break at some point and become her lover. While that seems to be something to root for, I think I'll find it a bit lamentable, because in this world of free loving and (let's be honest, here) debuachery, it's rather refreshing to have a celibate character.

If anyone cares to refute or agree with any of my above assertions, I welcome it. Just remember not to throw in too many spoilers, since I'm not done with the first book yet.