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Last Monday, I bought A Game of Thrones. Last Wednesday, I started REALLY reading it, taking huge chunks at a time, staying up into the wee hours of the morning reading until my eyes BEGGED to be closed. I took a break Saturday and Sunday, when I was down to the last 100 pages and wanted to savor every line I read, and finished Monday.
SO.
My impressions.
I really really really like this book. I know somewhere there's probably a ton of articles written by more knowledgeable women with more critical eyes, but I think George RR Martin's women are as intriguing and as convincing as his men. Cersei Lannister is conniving, but there's another dimension to her as well that makes her character even a little sympathetic: she's a woman in love (with somebody she shouldn't be in love with - cos, seriously, ew) and her ills against her husband, the king, are, honestly, understandable (though overblown). Catelyn Stark is every bit the loving, loyal wife, but she has an arrogance towards Jon Snow (her husband's bastard) that makes her unlikable at times. Even Sansa becomes three dimensional as the story progresses, starting off shallow and naive, but slowly developing into a cautious young woman with conflicting loyalties, living in a dangerous situation.
In general, I think the characters have this awesome three dimensionality where they're obviously meant to fulfill certain roles in the story (the hero, the villain, etc) but their personalities are well-rounded to the point where they aren't JUST that role. The role does not define them. Jon Snow is by all rights meant to be a hero (he is Special Snowflake x 10), but he's a teenage boy with issues, so he's prone to being moody, doing incredibly stupid things every once in a while, while at the same time thinking he's HOT SHIT but a complete outcast because he's a bastard. Tyrion Lannister (one of my favorite characters) is deliciously ambiguous: he hates his family, but he's loyal to them; he genuinely likes some of the Starks and Jon Snow, but he - well, that would be giving away too much.
And Eddard Stark is just awesome, hands down.
(So's Daenerys, even if her subplot squicked me more than a bit)
Moving away from the characters, I am loving the structure George RR Martin uses - switching the story between character's PoV's by the chapter. It kept me on my toes, wondering what was going to happen to, say, Eddard, when the story shifted to Dany. I like to think of this structure as the Soap Opera method; soap operas do the same thing (sometimes with less success, because it makes the story laaaaaag) and keep the audience watching. The most recent incarnation of Bleak House (the BBC version with Gillian Anderson) did the exact same thing, and it made a very dry story compelling. Martin does it, and, well, the results are an AMAZING book with AMAZING characters, INTENSE plot, and political intrigue coming out the ears. It's a page-turner (and a fast read - 600 pages in three days fast), because the author knows how much to give the reader at a time before giving the reader something else.
Well, I bought A Clash of Kings yesterday and have started on that.
SO.
My impressions.
I really really really like this book. I know somewhere there's probably a ton of articles written by more knowledgeable women with more critical eyes, but I think George RR Martin's women are as intriguing and as convincing as his men. Cersei Lannister is conniving, but there's another dimension to her as well that makes her character even a little sympathetic: she's a woman in love (with somebody she shouldn't be in love with - cos, seriously, ew) and her ills against her husband, the king, are, honestly, understandable (though overblown). Catelyn Stark is every bit the loving, loyal wife, but she has an arrogance towards Jon Snow (her husband's bastard) that makes her unlikable at times. Even Sansa becomes three dimensional as the story progresses, starting off shallow and naive, but slowly developing into a cautious young woman with conflicting loyalties, living in a dangerous situation.
In general, I think the characters have this awesome three dimensionality where they're obviously meant to fulfill certain roles in the story (the hero, the villain, etc) but their personalities are well-rounded to the point where they aren't JUST that role. The role does not define them. Jon Snow is by all rights meant to be a hero (he is Special Snowflake x 10), but he's a teenage boy with issues, so he's prone to being moody, doing incredibly stupid things every once in a while, while at the same time thinking he's HOT SHIT but a complete outcast because he's a bastard. Tyrion Lannister (one of my favorite characters) is deliciously ambiguous: he hates his family, but he's loyal to them; he genuinely likes some of the Starks and Jon Snow, but he - well, that would be giving away too much.
And Eddard Stark is just awesome, hands down.
(So's Daenerys, even if her subplot squicked me more than a bit)
Moving away from the characters, I am loving the structure George RR Martin uses - switching the story between character's PoV's by the chapter. It kept me on my toes, wondering what was going to happen to, say, Eddard, when the story shifted to Dany. I like to think of this structure as the Soap Opera method; soap operas do the same thing (sometimes with less success, because it makes the story laaaaaag) and keep the audience watching. The most recent incarnation of Bleak House (the BBC version with Gillian Anderson) did the exact same thing, and it made a very dry story compelling. Martin does it, and, well, the results are an AMAZING book with AMAZING characters, INTENSE plot, and political intrigue coming out the ears. It's a page-turner (and a fast read - 600 pages in three days fast), because the author knows how much to give the reader at a time before giving the reader something else.
Well, I bought A Clash of Kings yesterday and have started on that.
