ORBzine Book Reviews August 2000

Song of Ice and Fire Written by George RR Martin Synopsis Beyond bringing back a few lost for dead characters, and totally ignoring certain major characters from previous books, there is little to be said for it. We get a lot of Jaime the Kingslayer, who it seems is not the evil sod he was made out to be. Self-interested, perhaps, but not evil. Note - this is NOT a spoiler. We've learned a lot about King Aegon, but he probably won't pop up in the next book! :) The problem with the book is this: by the end all the major plot threads are tied up - the 4 Kings, and so on. But the minor conflicts are unresolved - there is no climax or "end" as such. It all kind of peters out, that's all. Review Martin is the best writer of modern Fantasy fiction - his works are vastly superior to those of Eddings and Feist. However, he sometimes glosses over things the same way they do. Let us examine the world that Martin shows us. The wall is apparently 700 feet high. A single storey of a building is 10 feet; most apartment blocks are less than 20 storeys [200 feet]. Yet Wildlings on the ground can shoot up at [and hit!] people on top of the wall, 700 feet above!!! A lot of things in this book seem slotted into the Universe. For example, a song called The Rains of Castamere plays an important part in the third book. Because it was never mentioned in the earlier books, it gets many, many references in this one. The book is very open-ended. At least 3 of those presumed dead in Book #2 are alive in Book #3 - which means that those presumed dead in Book #3 may be back for book #4! How long should we wait to do spoilers? Until the book comes out in the US? It's not out in the US? Jeez! I consider ASOS his best novel to date. I preferred ACOK, actually. ASOS is too .. unfinished. OTOH, I only just found out that there is a 4th volume in the writing - which explains quite a bit! :) I thought the series was meant to be a trilogy: now it's a never-ending mountain of books like the heel of time! :) Game of Thrones was written as Book 1 of a Trilogy. Clash of Kings was written as Book 2 of a 4-part series. Storm of Swords was written as Book 3 of a 6-part series. Dance of Dragons will be written as Book 4 of the series. It will be set 5-6 years after the end of Storm of Swords. MTFBWY, Speculator The Song of Ice and Fire. is available from the ORB bookstore [www.orb-store.com] via our suppliers. Help keep ORBzine free by visiting our sponsors: ORBzine is copyright Speculator. All Rights Reserved. Return to the Main Page of the Speculative Fiction Website Community.