[Sir Thursday]

I guess I should go and read ACOK before I say anything more: either it will reaffirm my first impressions or overturn them.

Vox

[Tempo]

I also have to agree with the original poster. I got all the GRRM books on the advice of those on a fantasy forum, and while they are good, they certainly arent world-beaters. They have some good POV characters, but many others who just bored me. I find I couldnt care less about who rules Westros, and just wish everbody would quit with the posturing.

I also believe even the popular "anybody can die" device is actually overused within the series, and as such has lost much of its effect. Sure it was shocking when that first major character died, but if Jon or Jaime were to be knocked off now, my reaction wouldnt be shock, it would be "Mmmeh, not again".

I dont really want to knock ASoIaF, it IS good, but it is in no way the "tour de force" many people would like to believe it is.
It actually fails in a very important test. I have a very limited access to different fantasy, and reread my collection constantly. Yet I have four books of ASOIAF on my shelf, and I feel no desire to go through them again.

[Werthead]

A Storm of Swords was written as one novel and published as such in hardback and paperback. The US publishers were also able to publish the book in one volume in paperback. However, the UK publishers (Voyager), although they are attached to one of the biggest publishers in the world (HarperCollins), get a very small budget for SF&F, so when it came to publish the paperback they could only do it and make a profit by putting it out in two volumes. I know that pissed a lot of UK fans off (as 2 x £6.99 is obviously more than the single price of £9.99 for the one-volume trade paperback) but it was the only solution. You can still get the trade paperback from Amazon, but only through the second-hand lenders.

As for who or what the story is about, that's easy: Ice and Fire. So you could argue that the main characters are:

Spoiler

Ice = Jon on the Wall, Fire = Daenerys and her dragons. The civil war in Westeros which dominates the first three books is therefore a colossal distraction, or a way of weakening Westeros so it is susceptible to invasion by the Others, or alternatively more ready to accept the return of the Targaryens (and there are several later plot points revolving around that idea). There's also an alternative explanation that we get in A Clash of Kings and then spelt out in greater detail in A Storm of Swords.

As for GRRM being overrated: I came to the series in 1999 (after Clash of Kings was published) with no pre-expectations whatsoever and was blown away by it. I think others have come to it knowing it's generally regarded as the best epic fantasy series out there at the moment and not being that impressed (I note a similar reaction among those who read Lord of the Rings in fully pre-knowledge of its legendary status in the genre). Different strokes for different folks.

[Dolorous Menhir]

Werthead: I thought that

Spoiler

the titular Ice was the Others, and that R'hllor was the Fire

. It could easily be both though.

[Werthead]

That's the other interpretation, yes. I quite the like the idea of:

Spoiler

having to ally with the Dark Lord to resist a far Darker Lord

However, GRRM has discounted this by pointing out that:

Spoiler

we will never know for sure in the books if the gods are 'real' or not. That's a matter of faith for the characters in the books. Although some people have tried to get around this by theorising that R'hllor and the Other are powerful entities but are not literally gods, so therefore could play a role in the story

Furthermore, we get the seeming confirmation in A Clash of Kings that

Spoiler

The Song of Ice and Fire is the power or inheritance that will stop the Others, and that Song will be formed by a union of House Targaryen (Fire) and House Stark (Ice). Rhaegar seems to have assumed that his destiny was to be the father of the Prince(-ess?) That Was Promised, but obviously Elia Martell wasn't fulfilling that side of the prophecy, which is why he made off with Lyanna Stark. This is why the theory that Jon Snow is the son of Rhaegr and Lyanna is so popular, as that makes Jon literally the Song (Son?) of Ice and Fire.

[Arkmam]

vox said:

@All: You've convinced me to continue reading, hopefully I will have changed my mind about the magic by the end. By the way, I noticed in the bookshop the other day that there was a Book 3 Parts 1 and 2. What's the deal with that? Surely for simplicities sake he could just have called them 3 and 4?

Vox

One of the publishers (I'm almost sure that it was the American, but it might have been the British) thought that the book was to big to release, so they split it. I have the unsplit one, in paperback.

[Werthead]

Yes, the American version is in one volume. The UK version is in two. Other countries publish it in even more volumes.

[Dinivan]

hmm...like in germany, there are already 6 or 7 volumes...like MBotF, there are 9 volumes, the german publishers are pure evil - a reason why i changed to the english versions. I have the one-book-version of SoS btw.

I've just read the first three books and i'm going to order book 4 tomorrow. I liked the series. It's much about who will die and who will survive, and it's enough magic in it to make me happy.
(I'm more the magic&god type, but some magic systems (e.g. 'true name') are simply painful, so I like this reminiscent, latent paint of magic. Its very fascinating.)

In my opinion aSoIaF is a nice read for the meantime but its not so stunning that it blew me away. And i didn't wanted to reread it at once (as I did with the MBotF). But i can imagine that i will in half a year or so.

It's way better than average but its not the best.

[Dagger]

I agree with what Werthead has been saying about GRRM's qualities. Erikson and Martin are my two favorite fantasy authors right now, but I love them for different reasons. It's like say Beatles and Rolling Stones, both are at the top of the class but for totally different reasons.

The use of magic in Martin's world is slowly increasing as the story unfolds, and I think he planned it that way. Martin sets us up in Game of Thrones, only to bash us over the head with our wrong assumptions as the books go on. Erikson has done a similar thing, I don't think anyone here finished MoI and did not look back at GotM and think, "everything I thought I knew is wrong and the clues were right in front of me".

[Red_orbiT]

While I like the series and will probably buy and read the whole lot of it, and I was almost shocked at the end of the first book, I think they get more and more predictable book after book. With a few exceptions(wich seems to be bound to certain characters), you can usually get a good picture of what will happen by imagining the worst scenario possible. While this is refreshing compared to Eddings, who works the opposite way, it doesn't get him anywhere near Erikson or Mieville in my opinion.

[MecnunK]

You could actually take any fantasy series and rip it to shreds one way or another. I guess it is a matter of perception/expectations as to how a series unfolds that gets you hooked.

Martin is good , excellent in infact and I would not say martin or Erikson is better of the two. As someone said already they are both brilliant in their own subfields. Martin has great 'characterisation' a flowing story line although in instances predictable is an interesting and entertaining one and the twists really hit home. As for the characters being unoriginal in context of the genere, I hardly think so, ASOIAF has a set of varied characters with developed personalities and a fairly compex set of motivations, besides almost all good fantasy has a set of predefined rules/characters that could be termed typical of the genere. 1st three books are brilliant IMO but that last one was lame. One strength I have noticed is that the characters fit the times/environement/world like a glove which is snot always the case with fantasy authors.

[Werthead]

Red_orbiT said:

While I like the series and will probably buy and read the whole lot of it, and I was almost shocked at the end of the first book, I think they get more and more predictable book after book. With a few exceptions(wich seems to be bound to certain characters), you can usually get a good picture of what will happen by imagining the worst scenario possible. While this is refreshing compared to Eddings, who works the opposite way, it doesn't get him anywhere near Erikson or Mieville in my opinion.

The problem I had with The Bonehunters was that you could see, more or less, where it was going. The only twist was that so much stuff was left over for Reaper's Gale.

'Predictable' is the last word I would use to describe ASoIF. Every time you think you've got a handle on a plot or a character, something will happen to change everything you thought you knew. This certainly becomes more prevalent in the later books.

[namo]

I would certainly like to know if someone predicted (AFfC spoiler) :

Spoiler

the demise of Cersei at the hand of the septons

I love both Erikson and Martin. Erikson paints from the start nuanced characters.
Martin starts with seeming stereotypes and then, like somebody else said, flips our perception of the characters : every time we think we have them figured...

The "wow, every character can die !" was also a revelation for me - I didn't know anything about the series when I started it.

[Dolorous Menhir]

Once Cersei (aFfC spoiler)

Spoiler

agreed to reinstate the Holy Militias, it was pretty obvious the new Septon - a grade A fanatic if I ever saw one - would be the source of her troubles. That was such a bad decision, it practically leapt off the page. Then again, pretty much every single thing Cersei did was a disaster. I hate her.

[Dagger]

I would like to see Cersei the Fat trapped in a room with Un-Catelyn. I'm sure they'd have much to discuss.

[Lister of Smeg]

UnCat has to be alive so she can send Brienne to kill Jaime! Otherwise what would have been the point in bringing her back? I foresee a reunion between her and either Sansa or Arya.