With the exception of Tolkien, I don’t read many fantasy books. The ones I have tried have not been able to hold my interest. sigh You read Tolkien first and everything else seems like crap! I think I may have found a series that will do the trick however: George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire”.
Yes, definitely buy it. The series is something that’s becoming increasingly rare; fantasy with something new to say. It’s dark, absorbing and challenging. The dialogue is crisp and intelligent and, despite the size of the books, the plot is always kept moving.
It’s the only fantasy series I bother with. Martin maintains a very high quality through all three (so far) books: A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, and A Storm of Swords. He enjoys playing with stereotypes, turning them on their ear and defying your expectations of what’s going to happen. His Westeros is a richly developed world, filled with intrigue and politics and warfare and desperation.
One of the best things in the ASOIAF novels is the way threads grow and develop through the books – a throway line in one book will be revealed to have deep importance two books later, and hints are dropped that allow you to piece together a fuller picture of the story than is just told on the page. Nothing happens in ASOIAF without a reason. You have to be on your toes to keep up with the characters, actions, and plot lines, and I found this a marvelous challenge.
One similarity between ASOIAF and LOTR you might like is the way that magic is still rare in both worlds. Unlike many fantasy series where everybody and their Great-Aunt Irma can cast +10 Omnipotence spells, only a few people in these series can wield such power, making it much more impressive and special. Martin said that he was inspired by LOTR on this, where really only Gandalf of the main characters could do any magic, and even then he never used it a great deal.
Whatever you do, don’t let anyone spoil the surprises for you! There’s lots set up in GoT that will surprise you, and the truth behind a lot of the occurences won’t be revealed until later. You may find that just when you thought you had everything figured out, that you were completely off-target – and yet Martin never pulls a Deux ex Machina, it’s all set-up carefully from day one, but he’s a master at manipulating appearances.
Get started on GoT now and then pick up CoK and SoS. Maybe by the time you’re finished he’ll have published the fourth book, A Feast for Crows.
Let me put in a fourth thumbs up for this series. It has wonderful characters, tremendous scope, unpredictable plotting, and high-quality writing. It’s the only fantasy series that’s actually inspired me to join an online fan club. The only problem, of course, is that it’s not finished yet, and the publication date for the fourth book keeps getting pushed back.
I keep checking www.georgerrmartin.com every few weeks, hoping for news. He promises to post there the instant the next book is finished. There should be five total, when it’s all done.
I’ll make that a fist of big thumbs up too. The next volume in the series must be even better… not even out in print yet, and already warranting 5 stars on the readers reviews sites such as Amazon or Barnes & Noble. (latest release date I found for A Feast For Crows is August 27th)
One of the reasons the series gripped me so strongly is that, unlike so many fantasy worlds out there, Martin’s is believably dirty and brutal, and none of the host of characters walk blithely unscathed and untouchable through it.
There are not many “sure things” in life. You have taxes, death, Hip Hop stars arrests, bipartisan political squabbling, the combination of a positive Slashdot’er review and a positive Doper review, and that’s about it.
The book will be on my nightstand tonight!
Yes! Yes! For the love of God! YES!!!
Thanks again guys. I’ll chime in with my review when I am done.
I’m not a big fantasy reader myself, but I blew through the first one in record time and I’m now in the middle of the second one. I think they’re great.
One warning, though: they will absorb every bit of free time you have!
There are some threads in this forum about the series - you might want to give them a miss until you’ve read the 3 books already out. A lot of the speculation we’ve gotten into will spoil major events, and believe me, this is one series you don’t want spoiled!
They’re a great series. I’ve read several reviews noting similarities between the events in the books and England’s War of the Roses. At times, it reads more like bloody medieval history (is there non-bloody medieval history?) than your typical sword-and-sorcery. And if you’re like me, that’s a good thing.
Are you sure he plans only five books, Smeghead? I thought it was six, and a bit of googling turned up this among many other interviews/links/articles/etc:
That was the original plan but GRRM scrapped it due to scripting problems. AFfC will take place immediately following ASoS but will cover several years. No more gap.
(latest release date I found for A Feast For Crows is August 27th)