A Song of Ice and Fire: Sprawling Suspenseful Storytelling

I've already discussed the HBO series Game of Thrones, but this post is about A Song of Ice and Fire, the series of books that form the basis for the show. George R.R. Martin's sprawling epic is meant to be a heptalogy, with five books released so far. Each book is a mammoth tome, which is why it has taken me a few months to get through them, but it's time well spent.

The series begins with A Game of Thrones and sets up a fantasy world with a bewildering array of characters and locations. Each chapter is told from the point of view of a particular character, and by the end of the fifth book, Martin has established 31 separate point-of-view characters. Besides these main characters, there are over a thousand named characters in the book, which presents quite the challenge for easily distracted readers. Many people find it difficult to read the books because they are overwhelmed by the number of names and locations to remember. To those people I can only recommend watching the excellent HBO series first. That way you can put a face to each name, get yourself better situated in the fictional worlds of Westeros and Esteros and begin your reading on a more informed footing. This might make it sound like reading A Song of Ice and Fire is a chore, but once you've become sufficiently immersed in the tale, you'll be breezing through these books and reveling in every bit of political intrigue and battle strategy.

The books describe a very medieval world, populated by Kings and Knights, where ancient families forge alliances through battles and marriages and everyone is using everyone else for political gain. However, as the series progresses, fantasy elements come to the forefront, with the advent of dragons, skinchangers, whitewalkers, and sorcerers. The plots are completely character-driven and unlike a lot of the fantasy genre, female characters are hugely influential. There are manipulative queens, swashbuckling tomboys, a woman who yearns to be a knight, and a teenager who discovers that her rosy visions of becoming a princess bear no semblance to the treacherous reality.

The series is violent, clever, and addictive. The structure of each novel means that every chapter ends with a cliffhanger, leaving you with no idea what's happened to that character until a few chapters have passed. (Or if it was the last chapter for that character, you'll have to wait until the next book). No character seems to be safe, with Kings and commoners coming to violent ends without a word of warning and throwing the entire story into disarray. Magic is used sparingly, but when it does come into play, it completely changes the rules of the game and messes with your mind in that special way reserved for fantasy novels.

A Song of Ice and Fire is a classic piece of fantasy storytelling and its breadth and scope means that there's just more material to sink your teeth into. The fifth novel, A Dance with Dragons, was released in 2011 after a five-year wait and there's no telling when the sixth novel might be released. But until then, you have the HBO series and thousands of pages of material to keep you entertained. I highly recommend getting the books in Kindle or other e-book format because lugging the books around poses a danger to your spine, but regardless of format, this is a must-read series for anyone who simply loves to read.