Temple of the Winds- how...annoying!

So, I'm only less than 300 pages into the 4th book of The Sword of Truth series, Temple of the Winds by Terry Goodkind. I am very annoyed at Mr. Goodkind. How many times does he have to use the characters thoughts to fill up a half a page thinking about things that have already happened and re-explain them to the reader? As if we haven't read the previous books... I don't think that anyone could properly read past book 1 as a stand alone book. Also, it seems that everytime the characters are conversing, that they nearly have to pull the others teeth out to get anything out of them. Come on!!! Did he really need to drag on through the pages like this? It's all bullshit just to fill in pages to make the freaking book longer! I hope to God that the rest of the series is not like this or I may not read past the 5th book! Plus... I seriously hope that after this series came out that any population of physciatrists that read any of these books offered free help to Mr. Goodkind. All these horrible rape/torture scenes are starting to become sickening. :(