Halfway through book 3 and SoIaF is losing me...

[TK-421]

Re: **Potential Spoilers**Halfway through book 3 and SoIaF is losing me...

Finished ASOS - which shock did you mean? There were a few. Tyrion killing his Father, Catelyn coming back, Jon becoming commander of the night watch...

Whilst not exactly cheerful, things are certainly moving on!

I've just seen ASOS was published in 2000, AFFC 2005!!?? Five years???

I was referring to the Red Wedding.

Don't worry yourself about the 5 year gap. Not everyone can shurn out junk every year like Jordan.

The only one I know that has been able to keep up with that kind of pace and release real quality stuff is Erikson.

 

[Boaz]

Re: **Potential Spoilers**Halfway through book 3 and SoIaF is losing me...

Not everyone can shurn out junk every year like Jordan.

TK, that's a fairly unfair thing to say... To be fair, you should make sure to include Danielle Steel and Nora Roberts.

Spoilers...

Finished ASOS - which shock did you mean? There were a few. Tyrion killing his Father, Catelyn coming back, Jon becoming commander of the night watch...

I meant Jon's promotion, Shae's appearance in Tywin's bed, Shae's murder, Tywin's murder, Lyssa's murder, and Stoneheart's appearance. Tywin and Lyssa seemed to get their just desserts.

 

[Pyan]

Re: **Potential Spoilers**Halfway through book 3 and SoIaF is losing me...

TK, that's a fairly unfair thing to say... To be fair, you should make sure to include Danielle Steel and Nora Roberts.

Not to mention Barbara Cartland, with 664 novels to her, umm, credit.
Amazingly,this works out to about 10 a year, every year, over her lifetime...

 

[Rolynd]

Re: **Potential Spoilers**Halfway through book 3 and SoIaF is losing me...

Spoilers...
I meant Jon's promotion, Shae's appearance in Tywin's bed, Shae's murder, Tywin's murder, Lyssa's murder, and Stoneheart's appearance. Tywin and Lyssa seemed to get their just desserts.

Yes I was chuffed with the end of ASOS. I will definitely carry on with the series. I was sad Tyrion told Jaime that he had killed Joffrey. I know he was angry but the real crime was Tywin's actions.

Thank god Lyssa's dead.

 

[Boaz]

Pyan, I'm speechless...

Edit: Okay, I've done the research... Philip M. Parker claims to have authored... wait for the drumroll... 200,000 titles. He has a computer program as a template and he plugs in formula... and out pops a book. You can read it in the New York Times.

Second Edit: I am thankful for you Brits allowing Yanks on the forums, but what does "chuffed" mean?

 

[Pyan]

Chuffed: To be proud, very pleased, or happy with yourself...

 

[Shacklock]

Pyan, I'm speechless...

Edit: Okay, I've done the research... Philip M. Parker claims to have authored... wait for the drumroll... 200,000 titles. He has a computer program as a template and he plugs in formula... and out pops a book. You can read it in the New York Times.

Second Edit: I am thankful for you Brits allowing Yanks on the forums, but what does "chuffed" mean?

We dont allow you! Begone commoner! *Shoo*

 

[Aegon the Unworthy]

Two comments for the peanut gallery

I guess you dont have to worry about Jordan churning out crud anymore do ya....

Everyone knows Sam is the true hero of LotR. Frodo had an agenda, a task to complete for Bilbo and the lure of the ring made him reluctant to part with it....Aragon had his agenda, Gandalf had one too....Sam was a hero because one was needed, no other reason.

 

[Rolynd]

Ok bit of an update for those who are interested. I have finished AFFC and have resolved to finish the series (provided I live long enough to do so ).

However after reading AFFC I was left disappointed.The book felt like a continuation, without a beginning or an end, rather than a book in its own right like the others managed to be. GRRM said in his note at the end that he wanted to complete some characters storylines, rather than have half of all of them, but if he completed any character arcs I don't know whose (apart from a few dead people maybe).

Jaime - Will he help his sister or not? I think he will go back, if only to kill her himself (the prophecy is about Jaime not Tyrion, you mark my words)By far the most engaging character in AFFC, and possibly the series. This guy wrote the book on inner conflict. Was one of a few highlights in AFFC.
Cersei - In custody awaiting judgement. Going fat and a bit bonkers.
Samwell - seems to be growing up, so some progression, but his PoV was woefully short of incident.
Aryan - I enjoy Aryan's PoV, simply because I like here. Where is she going though? What exactly does the kindly man have in mind for her? A whole book should have ample time to give us a clearer picture.
Victarion - Interesting. Too brief.
Brienne - wandered around doing nothing. Achieved nothing. Her character didn't progress, and her PoV did nothing to advance any plot lines.
Arianne - Spent half her PoV locked in a tower. I found it as tedious as she did.
Sansa - Did nothing. As ever.

I feel the series would have been better served by including all the characters. GRRM says he wanted to finish character arcs, but none were finished anyway. And what was the logic behind his choice of PoVs for AFFC? Regional? Where is the logic in that? These are genuine questions.

As I saw it there were three main storylines in this series: The war between the Northmen and the Lannisters and their allies, Danaerys and the rise of the dragons and lastly the invasion of the Others beyond the wall. The first must be over now, unless the blackfish can somehow gather the embers and fan them into new flames, and was dealt with in a few chapters of the seige of riverrun. The second and third were ignored due to the exclusion of Jon and Dany. I understand that the epic scale and a large amount of characters are part of what make SoIaF what it is, but when an author ignores his plot for an entire book it smacks of self-indulgence to me.

We do not want another Wheel of Time. I hope ADOD is a return to form - bleak and dark yes, but compelling once again as well please.

 

[The Imp]

Ok bit of an update for those who are interested. I have finished AFFC and have resolved to finish the series (provided I live long enough to do so ).

However after reading AFFC I was left disappointed.The book felt like a continuation, without a beginning or an end, rather than a book in its own right like the others managed to be. GRRM said in his note at the end that he wanted to complete some characters storylines, rather than have half of all of them, but if he completed any character arcs I don't know whose (apart from a few dead people maybe).

Jaime - Will he help his sister or not? I think he will go back, if only to kill her himself (the prophecy is about Jaime not Tyrion, you mark my words)By far the most engaging character in AFFC, and possibly the series. This guy wrote the book on inner conflict. Was one of a few highlights in AFFC.
Cersei - In custody awaiting judgement. Going fat and a bit bonkers.
Samwell - seems to be growing up, so some progression, but his PoV was woefully short of incident.
Aryan - I enjoy Aryan's PoV, simply because I like here. Where is she going though? What exactly does the kindly man have in mind for her? A whole book should have ample time to give us a clearer picture.
Victarion - Interesting. Too brief.
Brienne - wandered around doing nothing. Achieved nothing. Her character didn't progress, and her PoV did nothing to advance any plot lines.
Arianne - Spent half her PoV locked in a tower. I found it as tedious as she did.
Sansa - Did nothing. As ever.

I feel the series would have been better served by including all the characters. GRRM says he wanted to finish character arcs, but none were finished anyway. And what was the logic behind his choice of PoVs for AFFC? Regional? Where is the logic in that? These are genuine questions.

As I saw it there were three main storylines in this series: The war between the Northmen and the Lannisters and their allies, Danaerys and the rise of the dragons and lastly the invasion of the Others beyond the wall. The first must be over now, unless the blackfish can somehow gather the embers and fan them into new flames, and was dealt with in a few chapters of the seige of riverrun. The second and third were ignored due to the exclusion of Jon and Dany. I understand that the epic scale and a large amount of characters are part of what make SoIaF what it is, but when an author ignores his plot for an entire book it smacks of self-indulgence to me.

We do not want another Wheel of Time. I hope ADOD is a return to form - bleak and dark yes, but compelling once again as well please.

I think GRRM made a tragic mistake by splitting the original book the way that he did. The references to events occurring in other parts of "the world" are terrible, and having entire POVs missing didn't work for me. I also didn't like the added POVs- the departure from the previous 3 books, so to speak. AFFC felt like it was all over the place and lacked focus, which is odd given that the lower number of main characters should have made it MORE focused. I too look forward to ADWD as a return to the "formula" that made the first 3 books so special.

 

[TK-421]

Everyone knows Sam is the true hero of LotR. Frodo had an agenda, a task to complete for Bilbo and the lure of the ring made him reluctant to part with it....Aragon had his agenda, Gandalf had one too....Sam was a hero because one was needed, no other reason.

Egg, for once we agree 100%. Samwise is my hero and I think we will find that Samwell will be the true hero in the end of ASOIF as well. Either him or Tyrion as they are my favourites.

 

[Koopa]

Despite the fact that it must have been difficult carrying the ring, i never saw Frodo as much of a hero, if a hero at all. Especially since ultimately he failed at his job. Good thing Gollum and his greed was there as well.

 

[soulsinging]

I enjoyed the first volume,then half of the next one and by that time I wasn't enjoying it one little bit. I liked the medieval feel to it at least. GRRM writes well but the storyline seemed to go astray somehow. I wish I could explain exactly what I mean

I did return for a second read but that didn't help. So, I shall be donating the books to the library.

That's interesting, because I was not particularly impressed with the first volume and almost gave up after half of the second, but now I am hooked. I seem to have had the exact opposite response!

 

[soulsinging]

Two things:

1) MS&T is bad. Not really bad, but it's painful to read a second time. There's two other series that I love (Dragonlance and the Edding's books), that are also really bad, but at least they don't cloak their badness by using a mutlisyballic verb to cover up the ho-yay of the quality of the writing. Weiss, Hickman and Eddings are shallow right out of the gate and don't apologize. I'm not sure if any of the three could spell deus ex machina properly, but they know what one is.

That sounds about right to me. I too loved Dragonlance back in the day, my first foray into fantasy. They were as mindlessly fun as one could ever want, but they never pretended to be more.

Williams was killing me. I know it started slow, but there was a scene in the doctor's home where he's telling a history story while Simon cleaned up, and constantly interjecting cleaning instructions... it was just bad writing. It's an unecessary and intrusive device and I knew I couldn't handle his style for another 4 books and 3000 pages.

 

[C Of K]

Jaime - Will he help his sister or not? I think he will go back, if only to kill her himself (the prophecy is about Jaime not Tyrion, you mark my words)By far the most engaging character in AFFC, and possibly the series. This guy wrote the book on inner conflict. Was one of a few highlights in AFFC.

You're not suggesting Lord commander Jaime will forsake his vows and harm a member of the royal family, are you? He was beginning to regain a conscience, and trying to salvage some honor. Or, is Cercei royalty anymore? Her bastards certainly aren't, but at one time there was no doubt that she was Queenly.

Whatever happens between them is guaranteed to be explosive.

 

[Rolynd]

You're not suggesting Lord commander Jaime will forsake his vows and harm a member of the royal family, are you? He was beginning to regain a conscience, and trying to salvage some honor. Or, is Cercei royalty anymore? Her bastards certainly aren't, but at one time there was no doubt that she was Queenly.

Whatever happens between them is guaranteed to be explosive.

Yes he is. And what's great is that he knows he can never regain it in other people's eyes. He's trying to be honorable even though he will never be seen by the world as anything other than the kingslayer, so in other words when he will never be able to benefit from it in any way. Knowing GRRM people will only realise what kind of man he has become after he dies in some horrible way.

Although really he is already an honourable man. We know now why he killed the King. He did it to save people, knowing full well it was reputation suicide. What is more honourable? Killing the King you are sworn to protect or letting him burn a city?

He did push a seven year old boy out of a window, but I think a sort of madness comes upon Jaime regarding his sister. He's not completely stable at the best of times but Cersei pushes him over the edge, which is why I think he will be the one to kill her, in a fit of rage after she has antagonised him by flaunting her other lovers or something, and then he'll probably kill himself.

 

[Ursa major]

but Cersei pushes him over the edge....

Nicely put.



GRRM's fleshing out of characters that appeared, at first, to be stock villains (and getting the readers - despite themselves - to root for them on occasion) is one of the reasons that I, primarily an SF reader, got so involved in reading ASoIaF, which wouldn't otherwise be my cup of tea.

 

[C Of K]

Jaime, making the hard choices for the greater good. I detect a hint of Nathan Petrelli in the man. Unfortunately for Jaime, there is a lot of truth in it. He is reviled for his greatest deed. Whether he killed Aerys mainly for selfish reasons or honorable ones, though, I still have no idea. He is just so practiced at breaking oaths.

Even now he is not cured of that. He would not leave the kingsguard to claim Casterly Rock as Tywin wanted him to. But when it came to raising arms against Riverrun, he had no qualms over doing so.

I think Jaime maybe capable of getting Cercei out of her current predicament. If he is indeed the Volanquar, I'm betting he will kill her sometime a little farther down the line. It's awesome how GRRM maneuvered both little brothers into a position where it could be either of them, considering the other part of the prophecy. Tyrion will probably ally himself with Danny, although even that may not go as we expect.

 

[Rolynd]

Jaime, making the hard choices for the greater good. I detect a hint of Nathan Petrelli in the man. Unfortunately for Jaime, there is a lot of truth in it. He is reviled for his greatest deed. Whether he killed Aerys mainly for selfish reasons or honorable ones, though, I still have no idea. He is just so practiced at breaking oaths.

Even now he is not cured of that. He would not leave the kingsguard to claim Casterly Rock as Tywin wanted him to. But when it came to raising arms against Riverrun, he had no qualms over doing so.

No Qualms - are you sure? He didn't want to go to riverrun in the first place, and when he ended up there he didn't raise a sword against anyone of house Stark or Tully, so kept his oath. Edmure agreed to be taken captive and gave up the castle bloodlessly.

 

[C Of K]

I think his even showing up outside Riverrun is an indication of what Jaime was prepared to do. He did, after all, take command of the entire attacking force. I doubt he would have turned the men around had things not played out the way they did.

Jaime has changed some. I don't for the life of me believe that he has changed all that much. He supports Tommen's claim to the throne, knowing full well the boy has no right to it. Not much honor in that.