Winter Is Coming . . . Or, Game of Thrones Read-Through

It's been a while since my last Game of Thrones update.  I took a break from the book right around the time that it started getting interesting.  Or at least, around the point that it seemed like something was finally happening.  People were dying, coups were being initiated, betrayal was in the air.  But I also had schoolwork with which to contend, and those papers aren't going to write themselves, and jobs won't work themselves.  So I put the book down.

But I picked it up again! 

The first hint that interesting things are afoot came in the very last chapters, as the events in the prologue finally came to have some meaning.  As far as the narrative is concerned, the prologue was unnecessary; events later on didn't require they be foreshadowed in the opening sequence, and I have the sense that the prologue was added for dramatic benefit.  That is, to hook readers for the intensely slow five hundred pages to follow. 

Now everything is coming to a head.  The dead are rising, a king's been killed, Westeros is in open revolt and the Dothraki are on the march.  So maybe the first five hundred pages were worth it to set the pieces on the board.  It's possible, but I have the sense it could have been done otherwise to greater effect.  Such is what it is, however and I'm drawing pretty close to the conclusion.

Which means I can start watching the show pretty soon.  I'm excited for that.  I received the Blu-ray boxed set of season one for Christmas, and I haven't been able to even open it yet.  But with the book finally out of the way I can tear off the plastic wrap and get to watching what seems like a pretty engaging television show.  Perhaps more engaging than the book.

Ultimately, that's what these updates have been about; getting an idea of the book before I watch the show so I can compare the two.  I'll let you know my thoughts as I have them.

When Houses Fall . . . A Game of Thrones Readthrough Update

I'm on the final leg of Game of Thrones!  What's that mean?  It means it's finally getting interesting.  Stuff went down.  I suppose, if you thought of it as a chess game, then the queen just took the knight.  What's most interesting so far is the way in which Martin has set up the rules of the world; I'm impressed by his world-building on the cheap, and I think I can see where he's going from here.  I'm interested to see what he's going to do with the dragons, and especially with magic, since this doesn't seem to be a world in which magic plays much of a part.  But on the whole, I gotta admit that it hooked me, and I'm really excited to finish the books now.

Be Careful What You Wish For . . . Or, Another Game of Thrones Read-Through Update

Cersei Lannister by Lee Moyer

By Steven McLain

I've been making my way through Game of Thrones rather glacially, I have to admit.  But bear in mind that it's the holiday season and this book hasn't really inspired me to keep reading.  But I made a commitment, dang it, and I'm going to finish the book. 

From sort of a philosophical perspective, I have to admit that I like the book.  I mean, I like idea of the book.  Political intrigue, dragons (sort of), impending doom, and the walking dead (Maybe.  They seem to have been forgotten).  I like the idea of the whole thing, but the book just doesn't seem to live up to the promise.  I'm well into the five hundredth page, and things are kind of getting rolling.  Eddard Stark is undeniably the protagonist, at this point.  So, at least I've identified a protagonist.  You might call Caetlyn a protagonist as well, but we don't get a lot from her point-of-view and she seems strangely passive, regardless.

The difficulty in finding the book's protagonist is one thing; without that emotional hook of a clearly defined character that the reader can sympathize with, the book stands entirely on plot.  And there's not a lot of that.  I really am surprised that this book did as well as it has.  Maybe the late 90s was just one of those periods were not a lot was going on, and Game of Thrones is at least a mediocre story with professional writing.  I don't know.

***Watch out!  SPOILERS ahead!!!***

Daenerys by John Picocio

Okay, let's see what's been going on.  The King threw a tournament; Caetlyn brought Eddard a knife implicating Tyrion in the botched assassination of Bran; Sansa doesn't cry (interestingly, the hinge on which the story turns); Arya discovers a plot against her father, but her father dismisses it; Daenerys gets pregnant, eats a horse heart, and watches her brother drown in boiling gold; Caetlyn captures Tyrion; Jaime Lannister attacks Eddard, kills his men, and flees; Eddard tries to keep the peace, discovers that Cersei and Jaime are lovers, and that the prince is their offspring.

Have I missed anything?  I'm sure I have.  Tyrion is getting on my nerves, but at least he's doing things.  I imagine that pretty soon civil war will erupt in the land, Eddard will be killed and the next book will be just as emotionally disengaged as this book.  

Emotional distance might be my biggest complaint about this book actually.  Without that clear protagonist, I'm not sure who to be rooting for, and I'm left to the caprice of the plot, which is little more than an intellectual exercise in this novel, a lot like watching chess.  I can sort of see why people like these books, but I'm just a little flummoxed at their overwhelming success.  Oh well.  It takes all types.  

I'm at least nearing the end, so I should have a review for you in the next few weeks (if I manage to power through in the next couple of days).   

The Bastards of Westeros . . . Or, A Game of Thrones Read

Illegitimacy is a major theme of George Martin's Game of Thrones.  From the outset, Martin has exaggerated the division between Eddard Stark's legitimate children and his bastard son; the dwarf Tyrion Lannister comments that "all dwarfs are bastards in their fathers' eyes."

Male issue has historically been a big deal, and the time period that Martin is aping emphasized primogeniture--that the first-born son inherited everything, including wealth and title.  In an era before birth-control and women's sexual liberation, men produced a lot of illegitimate heirs.  Ensuring legitimacy was a full time job.  I'm curious, at times, why Martin chose to emphasize it so heavily, though.

Certainly, verisimilitude necessitates the continual rehashing, but to modern readers it seems hollow and somewhat dull.  Primogeniture has finally been absolved in the English monarchy, and if you haven't encountered fifty bastards today then you haven't left your house.  Children born out of wedlock used to be a bigger deal; now it's commonplace.  Finding the energy to care about Westeros's bastards is both dull and tiresome.

With that out of the way, let's recap what's been going on.

***Beware, there be SPOILERS ahead***

Let's see, I left off with Jon and Tyrion on the wall.  Since then, Arya has gotten a swordmaster, Caetlyn and Eddard have contemplated war, Bran gets a new saddle, Robb is rude to Tyrion, Arya defies gender norms, Jon gets his own Samwise (I mean Samwell), Dany stands up for herself, and Eddard begins to suspect that the crown prince may be a bastard (or at least not the king's own son).  I guess that's about it.

I think that summary actually does more justice to the book than it deserves.  That makes it sound like things are happening, but in reality it feels like more plodding along waiting for something to happen.  I have the sense that Martin is organizing his pieces, setting up a board on which he will eventually play; and some of my friends have intimated that something will eventually happen.  I hope so, because despite my resolution, I've already begun reading other books and Game of Thrones has fallen to the wayside.

The Frakking Others . . . Or, Game of Thrones Reading Update

I've been reading through George R.R. Martin's fantasy epic Game of Thrones.  It's not the first time and once more I'm reaching the part where I just want to put it down.  You know that part, where nothing happens and people whine about how much they'd rather being doing something else, another kid starts crying, or the dwarf dispenses pithy words of wisdom?  Oh, wait.  That's all of it.

**MINOR SPOILERS**

I'm about 250 pages in and so far I have discovered that despite being reared in the far north by a father as cold as ice and hard as iron, the Stark children sure do cry a lot.  In fact, I counted.  In nearly every perspective in which they appear, they try (unsuccessfully) to stifle tears.  They've been teased, bullied and frightened.  One has been shoved from a tower, another has had her wolf executed (by her father, no less), and another had her friend ridden down and hacked apart.  So maybe they have a reason to cry.  But I'm beginning to suspect this is a book less about magic and intrigue and more about how many tears these children can spill.

So, running recap.  Eddard Stark doesn't want to go south, the king does; Caetlyn hates Jon; Jon wants to prove himself; the Others are this series' version of "frak" (the Other frakking take you); and Daenerys got diddled by a horselord.  Did I miss anything?  Oh yeah, assassins are inept, conspiracies are obvious and the Cersei Lannister is a conniving, incestuous bitch. 

Also, in two hundred pages not a lot actually happens.  Each chapter is a major jump in either time or space, with quick stretches of exposition to let the reader know where he is.  World-building on the cheap, as I've come to think of it, lends itself well to the style of jump-cutting we see in movies or television shows (a reason I think it has done so well on HBO). 

I've discovered, as well, that in these first two hundred pages there isn't really a protagonist.  I can see the underpinnings of a conflict, and there are a couple characters I suspect will become protagonists (Eddard Stark was just eliminated as protagonist-worthy, in my mind); but in the tens of thousands of words I've already read, no one stands out.  That lack of conflict is dangerous, because it leads me to suspect that not much is going to happen for another two hundred pages. 

Ultimately, I think this is why I put the book down so often.  It's just interminably boring.  And there are the random POV shifts throughout the book; I'd call them errors but it seems to be used purposefully.  If so, I can't imagine to what end.  Shifting from 3rd to 2nd person mid-narrative is just jarring.  And also unnecessary.  Whenever I note them I wonder if it could have been written differently, and I discover that easy solutions exist.  I suspect either his editor didn't notice, or both were too lazy to care.  Either way, it rips me out of the narrative.  It's distracting; and in a book already teeming with not-much-of-anything-going-on, these distractions make me want to put the book aside.

Magic Zombies . . . Or, First Impressions of Game of Thrones

As some of you are aware, I've tried to read G.R.R Martin's Game of Thrones more than a couple times.  This attempt marks my fifth go at it.  I've already resolved that I will finish the first book.  I've read Twilight to try to figure out just why it was so popular.  I read Fifty Shades of Grey.  I want to know why people enjoy some of these pieces of fiction.  With Game of Thrones, at least, the storytelling is compelling, the writing is top-notch (-ish, which I'll get to) and everything about it should lead me to love it.  All of my friends essentially swear by it.  They love it.  But something about it has never really grabbed hold of me.

I've read through the first hundred or so pages a couple times.  More often, I stop about the end of the first Daenerys perspective.  I suspect that what most people find innovative about Martin's work is exactly what puts me off.  The quick perspective changes and lack of concrete physical detail feels not only choppy, but fails to embed me in the world in a compelling way.  Sometimes, we talk about the learning curve of a book; how difficult the world, or magic-system, is learn.  In Martin's book, I suspect, the world is not that different from our own.  Based on the War of the Roses, Martin has lifted English history whole-cloth and dropped fantasy elements into it.  As such, I don't need a lot of time to learn this world.  Yes, some of the names are different, but not so different that I can't figure out what's going on.

**SPOILERS AHEAD**

More to the point, though, I think this book is too much like real life.  I want my fantasy to be escapist.  I don't want children to fall from roofs; I don't want to see a child sold by her brother as a sex slave in his machinations to reclaim power; I don't want to see a brother and sister get it on.  All these things are facets of the "real" world.  They aren't necessarily what I want to read in my fiction.

That being said, a lot of people really do love these books, so lets get into my impressions of the first couple chapters.

Prologue:  Kind of an interesting premise.  Wandering through the snow, jawing about how ominous it all feels.  Then zombies show up.  Yeah, I know that zombies weren't a big deal in 1996, when this was originally written and perhaps it isn't fair to judge Martin on current fads.  But I can't help wonder why we need zombies in the first go-round.  There are also a couple point-of-view slips where he slips from third to second person.  They're minor but telling.  Also, when one character withdraws his black gloved hand from his wound, we're told that it gleams red.  I'm not sure about anyone else's blood, but mine usually isn't so obvious against a black background.  Another minor thing, but it irritates me already. 

Bran: The first chapter of the narrative actually ties into the prologue, in which the man whose death we did not see in the prologue is executed.  We're left to assume that it's the same man, and maybe Martin will fill this in for me later, but with only minor physical details to draw that assumption, I'm left uncertain.  That uncertainty left me feeling ambivalent about the whole thing.  Oh, and look, wolf puppies, one (conveniently) for each of the children.  Except this isn't any wolf, it's a direwolf, which is bigger and badder and somehow direr than regular wolves.  Also, it's a bad omen.  Okay.  Interesting dynamic between the bastard kid and the "trueborn" children of Ned Stark (who I'm to assume is going to be our protagonist). 

Catelyn: The best writing so far.  The dichotomy between the (pardon the pun) starkness of the north and the vibrancy of the south is telling.  Moreover, it begins an interesting discussion about the moral certainty of the north (black and white) between the shifting morality of the south (rainbow hued) demonstrates a sectional clash that I hope will be explored later.  Regardless, it presents a picture of a world already rife with division.  It's also a monotone world; so far, everything has been either, black, white (or some variant of "icy") or red.  We know Martin can paint a picture--later he describes ivy in which "[moonlight] painted the leaves in shades of bone and silver . . . "--so his reliance upon primary colors is either intentional or just lazy. 

Daenerys: The (very) young sister of the last Prince of Westeros, whose sexuality is to be sold to secure money and a foreign army.  This isn't the first time in history that a woman has been used against her will: "A man should be able to do as he likes with his own chattel."  Martin isn't out to make a historical argument.  But I wonder why it's important that Daenerys be portrayed as a girl barely into adolescence.  Is this the gritty reality we have to confront in this fantasy epic? 

Musings of feminist theory aside, Martin lapses into primary color descriptions, using instance of red, yellow and green without hue.  Except for the color of the two young noble's eyes (and Daenerys's dress) everything is flat and without gradation.  

So far, I'm enjoying the book a little more than I have previously.  I think the dichotomy between the monotones of the world itself and the subtle shades of moral gray already present is a fascinating take on a fantasy epic.  I'll let you know how it's going as I read more.

Want to let me know what you think about Westeros and the Game of Thrones?  Put them in the comments.  But, please, no spoilers; this is my first go-round.