One of the most rewarding aspects of being a software engineer is the ability to take curiosity and ideas from completely different worlds, technology, literature, and design, and weave them together into something new. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been experimenting with OpenAI’s Custom GPTs and built something that feels especially personal: the Wheel of Time Explorer, a dedicated reading assistant for Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time fantasy series.

Why the Wheel of Time?

For those unfamiliar, The Wheel of Time spans 14 volumes (+1 prequel), 1,000+ named characters, multiple cultures and histories, and an intricate web of prophecies. It’s a masterpiece of world-building and the largest known fantasy series ever written by a single author. It is ~4.4 million words long, which is about x8 times the length of the well-known Harry Potter series.

When I first started reading the series, I found myself juggling wikis just to keep track of characters and plotlines. I wanted a way to stay immersed in the story without constantly breaking the flow to look things up. That’s when the idea struck: why not build a custom GPT model that could serve as a guide through the series by answering questions, offering reminders, and surfacing lore only when needed?

Building the Wheel of Time Explorer

Creating the Wheel of Time Explorer wasn’t simply about throwing text at a model. The challenge was to design a reading companion that respects the reader’s pace. That meant building in:

• Spoiler awareness – the assistant will avoid spoilers by default unless explicitly asked.
• Contextual depth – you can request light clarifications or dive deeper into cultural and historical lore.
• Character tracking – explanations are tied to when and where characters appear, so readers can orient themselves without overwhelming detail.
• Conversational tone – instead of being a database, it aims to feel like a knowledgeable friend who’s read the series before.

I spent nearly 2 weeks experimenting with trying different prompts, constraints, and conversational guidelines, and preparing data-source for the model to strike the right balance between being informative and staying reader-friendly. And I tried the model by myself while I was reading the 4th book, The Shadow Rising.

If you’re a fan of the series, or simply curious about how AI can reshape the way we experience stories, I invite you to try the Wheel of Time Explorer 👉

Reflections

What I enjoyed most about this project wasn’t just the technical part of tuning GPTs, it was imagining a new way of interacting with stories. Reading epic fantasy has always been an immersive but sometimes overwhelming experience when it is longer or too complex. With tools like Custom GPTs, we now have the ability to design companions that enhance how we consume fiction, without replacing the joy of discovery.

For me, the Wheel of Time Explorer is just the start. I see potential for similar assistants across literature, history, and even academic research, where context and layered knowledge matter deeply.