"When you play a game of thrones you win or you die."
"Winter is coming."
Thanks to HBO’s two series, A Game of Thrones is big news at the moment, so I thought I
should see what all the fuss is about. I wasn’t expecting to like this book, at
least not as much as I did, not being much of a fantasy aficionado. For those
of you who haven’t been sucked in by this series yet, A Game of Thrones is the first book in Martin’s ‘A Song of Ice
and Fire’ series, and there are currently 6 sequels, all of which are erring on
the mammoth side of the book length scale. ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ is often
lumped into the fantasy genre, but don’t be fooled - you won’t find wizards in
pointy hats, orcs and elves in the fashion of The Lord of the Rings here - as it falls much more neatly into
the classification of ‘medieval fantasy’, with knights and kings and elements
that would be right at home in a novel about King Arthur and the Knights of the
Round Table.
The plot is fairly involved and a lot happens. Lord
Eddard Stark is required to move away from his home in Northern Winterfell to
the South when King Robert Baratheon of the seven kingdoms appoints him as Hand
of the King, after the previous Hand died. There is treachery within Robert’s
court, and a vengeance driven Viserys Targaryen seeks to overthrow Robert and
take the crown he believes is rightfully his following the previous usurpation
of his father by Robert. When I read the blurb on the back of the book, which
is similar to what I have written above, I must admit that I wasn’t enthused to
read the book, but it really is a brilliant story.
This book has one of the largest character lists I have
ever encountered in a novel; there are helpful appendices detailing the members
of each house which I used quite frequently when I first started reading. Having
innumerable characters might put a lot of people off, but they are all painted
very vividly which makes for an enjoyable read. Furthermore, with so many
characters, each reader is bound to find a character they can identify with. I
came to love some characters and completely loathe others - Tyrion ‘the imp’ is
my favourite, he is very funny and lends some humour to an otherwise mostly
serious book, and Eddard’s daughter Arya is entertaining as the tomboyish
counterpart to her prim and proper sister Sansa. I really came to care for some
of the characters as they felt very real, and I was close to tears more than
once when learning what becomes of some of them.
The narrative is unusual, rotating between eight different
perspectives in contained chapters which, when the characters begin to move
away from each other, leave minor cliff hangers at the end of each chapter,
making the reader eager to reach another chapter from the perspective of that
particular character.
Upon embarking on A
Game of Thrones, I partially expected it to display more qualities of
young adult fiction than adult, or that it might at least parallel Terry
Pratchett’s light-hearted style of fantasy. However, A Game of Thrones is very much an adult book - Martin does not
shy away from rape, murder, thievery and deceit, which I am thankful for as it
makes the story more realistic with regards to its medieval setting.
On a side note, having read A Game of Thrones and having now also watched the first series of
HBO’s adaptation, I would strongly recommend people to read the book instead of
or as well as watching the series, as the novel is far superior (although Peter Dinklage does an amazing job of portraying Tyrion Lannister). Furthermore
the last episode of the first series covers a lot of material from the second
book, so if you don’t want any spoilers I would advise you to read A Clash of Kings before watching the
finale.
Despite being 780 pages long, A Game of Thrones is completely absorbing and does not lag at any
point. Since it is the first book in a long series, A Game of Thrones leaves a lot of unanswered questions, and made
me very excited to start reading the sequel - A Clash of Kings - immediately. I immensely enjoyed this book and
I only hope the rest of the series is as strong as this first novel. The
wonderful characters, the medieval setting and the multiple captivating stories
included in the larger plot gripped me from the first page. This is definitely
a new favourite of mine, and goes to show what gems you can discover if you
crawl out of your comfort zone from time to time.
Rating: 10/10
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