Tag Archives: song of ice and fire

Books

A Dance with Dragons – nearly finished

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The-Wall-game-of-thrones-20412535-1920-1080I’ll keep this spoiler free, don’t worry. Just a quick not to say: I’m absolutely loving the latest book. Totally worth the wait (admittedly I only read the other Song of Ice and Fire books last year, but still…) Mr R R Martin’s story has such incredible scope, action, intrigue, convolutions and resolutions – it’s an amazingly satisfying read. Creating the tableau of the Seven Kingdoms was complicated enough, but delivering such a wide range of characters which the readers can find themselves invested in (who thought anyone would care what would happen to Theon Greyjoy after the events of the previous books?) is a truly remarkable feat.

I tip my proverbial hat to you sir.

As I get to within the last couple of hundred pages (yes, it’s a long book) my only worry is what to read next to take away the pain of the wait until volume six comes out…

Books, Television

Post modern post-modernism

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I’m experiencing two different timelines for Game of Thrones at the moment – the TV’s first season / first book, in the early days of the War of Kings – and the latest book, A Dance with Dragons, as I read through it on Kindle. It’s a bit surreal; as ever, I am enjoying both, although a point Amanda made to me rings through – the number of characters Martin creates in depth in the books is very hard to keep track of, and I’m struggling to remember who all the random Mereen are around Danaerys at the moment. Will need to find a quick-ref summary.

Scalzi has a fun analysis on why this book has taken so long for George R R Martin to write – at over 400,000 words, in essence, it is the length of four or five lesser books, which a man might have churned out at a rate of one a year. So he’s basically written 4 regular sized books, or two jumbo sized fantasy epics, in one. Sterling effort, my good man, sterling effort.

Books

Song of Ice and FIre 5: A Dance with Dragons iPhone app

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adancewithdragonsNo spoilers herein, don’t worry, on the publication of the latest book in the epic George R R Martin series, A Song of Ice and Fire. I’ve managed to avoid spoilers so far despite the fact that the publisher’s screwed up and shipped copies into the UK a few weeks ahead of the official launch.

There’s a lot of hype around this book, not least because it’s been four years in the writing, the critically acclaimed HBO series has launched in the meantime, and, well, the fact that its a great story. I’m going to resist buying it until I’m through the excellent Mistborn saga (down to the last half book of that), and will probably then get the eBook to help me get through the 1000 odd pages of the new novel without lugging a massive tome around with me.

The iPhone app that accompanies the book launch comes complete with a summary of the previous books (invaluable for a quick recap, especially if you’re not sure how much ground the TV series has covered and want a reminder) as well as a few other goodies, so I will refresh my memory ahead of getting the book in.

Books, Television

HBO’s Game of Thrones–first impressions

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We watched the opening episode of HBO’s new fantasy drama series last night – Game of Thrones. It’s been showing for some weeks on Sky Atlantic / in the US after months of filming in Ireland and lots of hype on both sides of the pond.

It’s based on George R R Martin’s epic Song of Ice and Fire epic fantasy series, the first four books of which I blitzed through last year. Rich, immersive, politically complex, multi-faceted plotlines with an enormous cast of players. I wondered how it could make the transition to the screen and, having seen the first episode, I’m totally sold.

Atmospherically lush (that is the right word) you’re immediately sucked into the world and the politics of the Seven Kingdoms. The casting seems fairly spot-on at the moment – especially Tyrion Lannister – and Sean Bean is appropriately gloomy as Lord Eddard of Winterfell.

As you’d expect given the format, it whips its way through epic fantasy at quite a pace. Given that Mr Martin has taken some years to pen the fifth novel in the series, I do wonder how the pressures of commercial television will come to play in driving the completion of the series. In fact, Mr Martin has taken such a long time to get the next novel out that there has been some furore from the fans – evoking this perspective from fellow fantasist Neil Gaiman (in short, George R R Martin is not your bitch). He is, however, in some sense, probably at the beck and call of the nice people at HBO, which has picked up the show for a second season…

Trailer here for the epically curious: