Barristan the Bold as character: finally something gets DONE
Arya: Perfect! Her way to an Assassin is believable and enjoyable.
Cerseis second Chapter: Better than a Death I am satisfied
Griff: Take them all DOWN! I thoroughly enjoyed him and his companions
Daenerys: seeing her rule was nice Mereen: the setting is awesome!
Tyrion: some parts of the journey are awesome, breathtaking even and his wits and tongue are as sharp as ever.
Davos: Still alive and unbent. Uh and where is he going? whats going to happen? Excited!
Dorne: can not wait how that plot with the 3 "spearwives" will turn out.
Victarion: short but I enjoyed it!
Jon: in command!
Jaime's chapter!!! it is the Kingslayer! and Brienne ? whats going on? wanna know more!
meh parts:
Asha Greyjoy: Well not really anything going here. The character is literally reduced to a set of observing eyes.
Theon/Reek: the character is kinda redeemed now in my eyes although I dunno how I feel about the ... I lack words here that torture/craven aspect is... I dunno makes me sick/disgusted a little bit on the other hand it seems realistically and despite the distasteful stuff going on I kinda liked it.
Bran: I do not know how to think about this.... never was a big Bran fan. It is kinda cool but kinda irrelevant and goes nowhere as far as I can see.
Bad:
Daenerys/Mereen: GOD this takes so loooong and it almost goes nowhere! And that makes this SOO tedious. Damn was I glad Barristan took over and finally DID something. Can not wait for the continuation here.
Journeys:
Quentin: good riddance! another tedious journey. I think we could have done without it. Tyrion: oh my god journey much? this could have been cut down to 50% of the original volume. Victarion: another journey Griff: another Journey
And my biggest beef with the book. Jon Snows death. I don not mind him dying. Even if he is gone. But the how this happened was the most stupid thing I ever read in Martins novels. his reaction after the letter from Ramsay felt forced/naive/and plainly out of character. Why did he not go to the Queen first? Why did he read the letter with the mance part to Tormund? Why did he not go to Melisandre? Why did he read the Letter to EVERYONE? Again that with Mance should be his secret, should it not? And he can always blame it on Melisandre (who actually sent Mance) and can tell the world tha he saw Melisandre sent rattleshirt. Why does he act like a stupid child? It is plainly obvious: that Bolton does not have Arya and that means she escaped. You know that he expects Jon to have her with him!!!!!!! Either she escaped with one of the spearwives (Bolton knows that there are six but he can not prove that he got all 6 and he lost Arya so Jon can assume this as his best guess) or alone or she is with Stannis and Bolton told him a big FAT lie. The Shieldhall scene was awesome but complete none sense. The informations at hand would have never driven him to breaking his oath for all the world to see. And he did not even wait for confirmation from another source! Bolton could have told him anything he wanted and Jon would take it for real in that chapter! And the logical conclusion to this was the melodramatic "overacted" "for the watch" - stabbing scene. Really? was that necessary?
How about this: someone stabs him because he sacrificed brothers from the eastwatch for the lives of murderous beasts.... or something along those lines.
This scene chapter almost killed the entire wall setting for me. Imho bad and forced BS.
Well he deserves a chance for redemption! I will see how this develops.
overall: 7/10 Too long, too tedious, too few things get done and one BIG disappointment. But settings and characters are thoroughly enjoyable. The book makes you work for your fun but boy is there some cool stuff! And I love where this is going!
sCuMBaG United Kingdom. July 21 2011 06:56. Posts 616
There is a part where the kindly man at the Temple is telling her the story of the slaves in Old Valyria who would pray for an end to their suffering , and so a man heard their prayers and gave them the gift they desired. Then there was one slave who's prayers were not for his own death but for those of his masters. He would pray every night. Until the gift giver heard his prayers and answered them. Afterwards he told the slave that for the gift he was given he would in turn serve 'him who has many faces'.
That's probably not "exactly" how it went, but its pretty close from what I recall. Anyways after I read that I got goosebumps all over because here we have little arya....this girl who has been praying every night for the deaths of those who are responsible for the destruction around her. Every night she prays, reciting the names in order and ending with the valyrian words meaning "all men must die" even though at the time she has no idea what they mean.
Just so well written, I'm really into Arya's story arch and hopefully soon , after furthering her training, her prayers will be answered
Some see the glass half full, others half empty. I think the glass is just too big.
MamiyaOtaru United States. July 21 2011 07:24. Posts 1651
Bolton could have told him anything he wanted and Jon would take it for real in that chapter! And the logical conclusion to this was the melodramatic "overacted" "for the watch" - stabbing scene. Really? was that necessary?
How about this: someone stabs him because he sacrificed brothers from the eastwatch for the lives of murderous beasts.... or something along those lines.
This scene chapter almost killed the entire wall setting for me. Imho bad and forced BS.
maybe I misread that last scene at the wall, but I was under the impression that + Show Spoiler +
they did kill him for sacrificing brothers for murderous beasts. They'd been grumbly about the wildlings and giants the whole book through, and it seemed to me like they finally snapped. It didn't even occur to me that they stabbed him because of his announcement he was going to deal with Bolton until you mentioned it, and that still seems less likely to me
minus_human Romania. July 21 2011 07:24. Posts 4758
this fucking series. Every book gets more and more fantastical, more infested with magic and bullshit prophecies. I liked how book one's prophecy of the stallion who mounts the world was exposed as not real, but that seems to have been the exception. I am sick of characters being dead but oh not really. She's a zombie! He was a fake! She wasn't really hanged! Lord Manderly was just pretending!
I am tired of things going nowhere. This series is like nightmares I have, where there is a goal from which I keep getting sidetracked, and it fades away and recedes, farther and farther until I wake up. Arya still training to be a magical assassin! Victarion still sailing! Cersei still on trial! Dany still fucking about in Meereen!
Speaking of Dany, ffuuuuuuu. GRRM will kill off main characters, but she is immune, no matter how much stupid shit she does. She is the promised messiah or some shit. Ned got the axe for being to naive and honorable, but Dany and Barristan are naiving and honorabling it up all over the place. Sure everyone around them suffers for it, but she has those magical dragons that show up at just the right time so she will be fine forever until her bullshit magical role is played out, probably when the bullshit magical others and she finally meet, around book ten, as the resolution of all this continues to fade off into the distance. Next book in six years!
enjoy the wait, you'll have plenty of time to speculate. Is Stannis really dead? Jon? (Id sure think so, but we've had all sorts of people rising from the grave) Brienne and Jaime are doing what? Meereen and Tyrion and Jhoqo and Dany get resolved how? Then theres the consequences of splitting things up. Ten years between mentions of Littlefinger! Splendid!
I am sort of sick of hearing about Essos. Westeros and its fucked up politics got me into this but we just had a whole book that occasionally glances at the periphery of Westeros and its politics (I don't count an entire book of Crows and Free Folk deciding whether or not they hate each other).
It's the Game of Thrones that interested me. This book almost ignored it. Jon was involved peripherally due to Stannis hanging around but that's about it, but he spends most of his time dealing with (the threat of) magical blue eyed people. Bran is off becoming a tree. Arya is becoming a magical assassin in Braavos. Tyrion is stuck in Meereen, and Dany is even farther away than that (it will take her the better part of the next book to make it back to Meereen, to say nothing of ever moving on the Seven Kingdoms). There's no more Game of Thrones. It's been replaced by plodding cliche fantasy bullshit, but hey! now and then some main character dies! (maybe)
I jumped into this series a few months ago, knowing there'd be another book relatively soon. Now there wont be and I don't give a shit. GRRM is running in place and I'm tired of reading about food
Posted this 6 days ago on shacknews but there was hardly anyone who could safely click it yet
Am I the only one that wants to see a picture of the final scene in the epilogue with all the skinny creepy murderous kids coming out of the woodwork. I think it was a super badass scene and I cant wait for varys stuff in the next book
I could have predicted everything except Aegon's and Connington's survival after Affc. Varys's return was possibly the best way to end the book
but honestly I am telling people not to even start reading the series. It will be a miracle if he lives to complete it at the rate he is going. And the last two have been terrible books. Atleast this one didn't have the ridiculous "cuz" usage of Affc.
Cassel_Castle United States. July 21 2011 11:37. Posts 818
Mormont clearly warged into his raven, there's no other explanation for it's sudden burst of intelligence compared to the first 3 books. Ramsay Bolton might be more hate-able than Joffrey. It's becoming obvious that someone will warg into a dragon at some point, probably Bran since he can already warg into Hodor. Before ADWD was released, fan speculation from preview chapters was that Young Griff was Aegon, but then the speculation changed to Young Griff being a fake Aegon, with the real one being dead. I'm still in the second camp after finishing the book.
I found the first half of the book boring and the second half pretty exciting, it just seems like there should have been a "third act" to this book where:
Dany either gets killed or starts a journey west. Aegon reveals himself to Dorne. Sam does something at Oldtown. Stannis finally meets the Boltons. Undead-Gregor fights for Cersei's innocence, and off-screen Margaery is found guilty or innocent. Jaime meets Undead-Catelyn. Bran at least ASKS the greenseer about Coldhands. Victarion tests the horn. (maybe last scene?)
Overall it feels like Winds of Winter is going to be too cramped, I would rather have had this book be even longer and come to some sort of "conclusion" than just have everything set up nicely for book 6.
If book 6 starts out as slow as book 5 I'll be as mad as the rest of you guys. Books 2 and 3 got into the action right away after cliff-hangers (except for Dany in that boring ghost town).
Last edit: 2011-07-21 11:37:59
Gryffindor_us United States. July 21 2011 11:43. Posts 5522
Mormont clearly warged into his raven, there's no other explanation for it's sudden burst of intelligence compared to the first 3 books. Ramsay Bolton might be more hate-able than Joffrey. It's becoming obvious that someone will warg into a dragon at some point, probably Bran since he can already warg into Hodor..
Mormont clearly warged into his raven, there's no other explanation for it's sudden burst of intelligence compared to the first 3 books. Ramsay Bolton might be more hate-able than Joffrey. It's becoming obvious that someone will warg into a dragon at some point, probably Bran since he can already warg into Hodor..
Maybe, but I thought the prologue showing that you were stuck with an animal that was near you when you died hinted toward Mormont being in control of the raven, even though it ate his face right after he died.
floor exercise Canada. July 21 2011 12:19. Posts 5505
The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
1Eris1 United States. July 21 2011 13:23. Posts 5797
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
You don't seem to understand that he's trying to use an alternative spelling for a lot of the words
think Ser instead of Sir
Known Aliases: Tyragon, Valeric ~MSL Forever, SKT is truly the Superior KT!
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
You don't seem to understand that he's trying to use an alternative spelling for a lot of the words
think Ser instead of Sir
I think he's pointing out the inconsistency of the usage of said terms in aDwD compared to the previous books.
Rasun United States. July 21 2011 13:49. Posts 787
There has not been a series since Harry Potter I have enjoyed half as much, let alone fantasy. I'm 14% into book 2 (yes I read them on a kindle) and was wondering how many books there actually are? Is the series complete or are there still more to come out?
Overall, I love the immersiveness and detail in the world he has created, everything makes sense and is so well done and laid out.
"People need to just settle the fuck down!"- Djwheat <3
sung_moon United States. July 21 2011 14:11. Posts 7087
i feel with the long wait of s2 i should start up reading book #2 after my summer semester ends. reading book 1 while watching the events unfold on the tv series was a great
Forever Young
Abysus United States. July 21 2011 14:28. Posts 64
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
He's used words multiple times in previous books as well.
On the subject of cliffhangers, he wanted to go a bit farther in the story but ran out of room in the book. However thats fucking asinine in and of itself because the dany, tyrion, and jon storylines properly edited could of been like 200-300 less pages.
MamiyaOtaru United States. July 21 2011 22:37. Posts 1651
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
I mentioned it after reading the last book, but while reading through the series you can see the point where he learns / stumbles into a new (archaic) term, and how frequently it gets used after that. "Leal" being one of them. Some others were dugs, palfrey, much and more, etc. They don't appear for a couple books, then they happen all the time.
Stijx United States. July 21 2011 22:48. Posts 786
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
I don't think you realize what he's doing, and why this makes him such an incredible writer. It doesn't make him 'lazy', people from all over this world using similar phrases, or the same sentence to describe things shows an authentic culture. We use the same phrases in our daily lives all the time. For example we might use the phrase "when in rome..." regularly, in the same way that characters say "words are wind". All the chapters are written stylistically to resemble the personality and the mental state of the character. Tyrion thinks about almost nothing but Tysha and the killing of his father, which is why he mentions it constantly. "Where whores go" is one of his driving forces at this point, it's the first thing that comes to his mind all the time, which is why it's also the first thing on the paper every time. This kind of writing is of a much higher level than most fiction, and incredibly impressive, I would hope that other readers are able to see how much closer this world is to an authentic living one that most other 'worlds'.
winter017 United States. July 21 2011 23:50. Posts 103
On July 21 2011 12:19 floor exercise wrote: The writing/editing seemed really inconsistent/lazy. None of this spoils anything plotwise but I may as well keep with tradition + Show Spoiler +
He uses "words are wind" 13 times. Pretty much every single character says it at least once in this book. It's been said before, but it just seems so fucking lazy to use it over and over, on both continents, like it has just become an incredibly popular turn of phrase around the world. Other things like how Tyrion can't go one paragraph without talking about killing Tywin for half the book bothered me. Or the "where whores go" thing. I got tired of reading the same thing in every chapter
He uses the word suet 7 times. Suet. Did he just learn the word or something?
Leal is used 13 times. Every servant or subject is leal.
He uses nightsoil 5 times. Not that many but it's kind of strange, he has no issue with shit being shit, but decides to throw in nightsoil 5 times.
I can't recall in previous books but there's 40 references to serjeants in this book, has he ever used this rank before? I can't say he hasn't but he has never used it as many times as he did in this book. He loves him some serjeants on both sides of the sea.
Felt like the whole book was just stapled together from random chapters of varying quality he had written over the billion years since AFFC.
I mentioned it after reading the last book, but while reading through the series you can see the point where he learns / stumbles into a new (archaic) term, and how frequently it gets used after that. "Leal" being one of them. Some others were dugs, palfrey, much and more, etc. They don't appear for a couple books, then they happen all the time.
Same thing happens with all writers. If you start at the very beginning (real world chronology) of the Drizzit series then go all the way to the end you can see Salvatore's writing style and vocabulary change throughout. I don't necessarily believe its lazy writing.
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Lomak United States. July 21 2011 07:07. Posts 311
