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A Dance with Dragons |OT| - Read the rules or Melisandre casts magic missile

I

ItAintEasyBeinCheesy

it's 4th of July in my asshole
How many ships did Manderly say he had?, I can see him going to Stannis.

Push comes to shove......... Stannis, if he alive, might go and crush the Iron Born and put Asha/Theon in charge is exchange for loyalty. He'd kill Euron most like and Aeron as well, though would prefer not since the religious crazies make it so much funner. He can wouldn't really head South and leave the Iron Born at his back like Robb di.

All that depends on the situation at the wall as well i guess.
 
i_am_ben

i_am_ben

running_here_and_there
not that this has anything to do with adwd per se but "Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken" is the best motto in the series.
 
I

Irish

Member
My goodness... ASoIaF GAF is insane.

I like all the books equally for the most part. How can AFFC, ACoK, & ADWD have haters? Oh well. Of the two halves, I think I may prefer AFFC.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
Irish said:
My goodness... ASoIaF GAF is insane.

I like all the books equally for the most part. How can AFFC, ACoK, & ADWD have haters? Oh well. Of the two halves, I think I may prefer AFFC.
Click to expand...
Don't even step foot on the SomethingAwful thread for ADWD. There are people running around called GRRM a bad writer, that he has completely lost track of the story, and that he's an obese pedophile rapist.

Of course the last part may be true but whatev
 
T

thefro

Member
About 290 pages in, so spoilers for everything up to that point and then my speculation

Very interesting to learn more about the extent of what the wargs can do and that they can even possess humans. Will we see Bran in the body of one of the dragons or will Jon have to do it (assuming R + L is true and the dragons won't resist Jon as much since he has Targaryen blood). I never thought of that until the the first section of the book and it's a neat idea and really changes how I think the ending will play out. Obviously, since all the Stark kids seem to be wargs it raises the question about whether Ned is one too and if his spirit is possessing someone/thing.

I thought that we might see Aegon appear when I was reading the previous books, but it was a nice surprise to see Tyrion out him.

I can already see why Martin struggled with the "Mereenese knot" so much. Interested in seeing what he does from here. At the pace the book is going it's hard to see how this wraps up in 2 more books, but we'll see how the rest of ADWD is.
 
B

Brera

Banned
Brian Fellows said:
Almost 400 pages in and Dany's chapters are still a chore to get through.
Click to expand...

Am I wrong to skip them?

She's a pretty shit character and her story is going nowhere fast.
 
B

Big-E

Member
With Dany chapters I always hope something is going to happen and hope for some shit to go down but it never does. You think things are going to happen and shit will get real but it hasn't come. I am over halfway through the novel now.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
Big-E said:
With Dany chapters I always hope something is going to happen and hope for some shit to go down but it never does. You think things are going to happen and shit will get real but it hasn't come. I am over halfway through the novel now.
Click to expand...
The real meat of Dany's chapters is the interesting political parallels the people around her have with the forces-that-be in Westeros. You have to kind of look at her chapters like that, rather than 'focusing on something happening'.
 
S

Sleepy

Member
Huh, there must be something wrong with me because I think the Dany chapters are good and the Tyrion chapters are shit. Still, loving the book, so far.
 
S

Sleepy

Member
What is the difference when Martin writes of the "queen's men" and the "king's men"? Probably something easy, but I don't know if I am missing something important.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
Help Me! said:
What is the difference when Martin writes of the "queen's men" and the "king's men"? Probably something easy, but I don't know if I am missing something important.
Click to expand...

Queen's men are those who followed Queen Selyse in adopting R'hllor as their god. While they are called "queen's men" for being followers of Selyse, it is usually said that they are truly Melisandre's men.

King's men are those loyal to Stannis.
 
F

Famassu

Member
Help Me! said:
What is the difference when Martin writes of the "queen's men" and the "king's men"? Probably something easy, but I don't know if I am missing something important.
Click to expand...
The Queen's men are loyal to the queen/Melisandre & the god of light, King's men don't necessarily give a shit about the god of light crap and are loyal only to Stannis.
 
S

Sleepy

Member
Famassu said:
The Queen's men are loyal to the queen/Melisandre & the god of light, King's men don't necessarily give a shit about the god of light crap and are loyal only to Stannis.
Click to expand...


So it only has meaning in that context? An interesting division. Thanks.
 
T

Tacitus_

Member
Duki said:
dwd
euron and his bros would kick the shit out of theon, whereas the guy in the story who was replaced was weak and unloved by the other vikings.

besides victarion is where its at, biggest badass in the books right now
Click to expand...

Victarion will die the moment he'll have to fight someone capable with valyrian steel. He puts way too much faith in his plate.
 
J

John Harker

Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
~500 pages in. Not much has happened, true, but I'm enjoying the ride well enough. Still 3.5X better than Feast.

Though it's almost insulting that this timeline ended up becoming two books anyway.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
elrechazao said:
but words are wind
Click to expand...
no that's the title of the next book

aidan: I read your blog and I disagree. I really believe it's the worldbuilding and setup that necessitated two books. His prose, however, has become absolutely brilliant and so evocative I can't help but feel like I'm right there, alongside these characters, in a fully realized world. Never before have we been able to FEEL the world of A Song of Ice and Fire before AFFC/ADWD.

And that's just the kind of feeling I want going into the next novel.
 
B

bionic77

Member
aidan said:
I wrote a piece on my blog about what I think the big difference is between A Game of Thrones and A Dance with Dragons and how it's not so much Martin's plotting that's getting in the way of the story as it is his prose.
Click to expand...
The prose is fine (and in fact I love his writing in all of the books and wish I could write half as well).

The problem is that he has killed off too many of the good characters (and the new ones are not as good, i.e. Brienne) and I honestly don't think he knows exactly where the story is going, leading to a lot of treading water.

If everyone is correct and the action picks up in the next book and it is released in the next 3 years all will be forgiven.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
bionic77 said:
The prose is fine (and in fact I love his writing in all of the books and wish I could write half as well).

The problem is that he has killed off too many of the good characters (and the new ones are not as good, i.e. Brienne) and I honestly don't think he knows exactly where the story is going, leading to a lot of treading water.

If everyone is correct and the action picks up in the next book and it is released in the next 3 years all will be forgiven.
Click to expand...
I wouldn't mind if it took more than 3 years again, honestly. Writer's gotta do what a writer's gotta do.

I have a multitude of other novels and well, my life, to occupy the time.
 
A

aidan

Hugo Award Winning Author and Editor
bionic77 said:
The prose is fine (and in fact I love his writing in all of the books and wish I could write half as well).

The problem is that he has killed off too many of the good characters (and the new ones are not as good, i.e. Brienne) and I honestly don't think he knows exactly where the story is going, leading to a lot of treading water.

If everyone is correct and the action picks up in the next book and it is released in the next 3 years all will be forgiven.
Click to expand...


How is that a criticism of A Dance with Dragons? Dany, Tyrion and Jon, who are far-and-away the most popular characters in the series, comprise 75% of the novel's narrative.
 
B

bionic77

Member
aidan said:
How is that a criticism of A Dance with Dragons? Dany, Tyrion and Jon, who are far-and-away the most popular characters in the series, comprise 75% of the novel's narrative.
Click to expand...
I was talking about the series as a whole and why aDwD to me lags compared to earlier books. Martin is such a great freaking writer though that I still have faith in him to make me forget about of all my complaints in the next book assuming he ever gets around to writing it.

And is Dany really one of the most popular characters in the series? I said it before, but Dany and the Starks are pretty damn boring without their animals. Give me the Lannisters any day of the week over them. Even Cersei!
 
E

elrechazado

Banned
aidan said:
How is that a criticism of A Dance with Dragons? Dany, Tyrion and Jon, who are far-and-away the most popular characters in the series, comprise 75% of the novel's narrative.
Click to expand...
and nothing interesting happens to 2/3 of those, in a progression sense.
 
S

scosher

Member
I think Martin's prose is fine. His exposition has always been heavy and overly detailed, but that's also part of the reason why people miss so many subtleties in the text such as Renly/Loras' relationship, R+L=J theory, or (ADWD)
fake Aegon
.

His narrative structure took a real nose dive with AFFC and ADWD though. His previous novels were like music compositions in structure -- a slow ballad at the start, a crescendo to an epic climax, followed by a denouement.

In ADWD,
we got most of that for the first 750 pages, but then the last 200 just fizzled out with no climax. We were thrown with 10+ different PoV's, largely unconnected, and mostly to keep us up to date with characters not seen since AFFC. And then we're left with a bunch of cliffhangers and no resolution to the Battle of Winterfell or Meereen.

AFFC was even worse imo, as that book was mostly plodding throughout with no crescendo or rising tension. I thoroughly enjoyed ADWD's first 2/3rds though, and thought Martin was in top form. I blame all faults of ADWD's unsatisfying conclusion on GRRM's editor.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
Guys... please remember that this is the spoiler everything!!!! thread when speaking broadly about the book.
 
B

Basileus777

Member
scosher said:
His narrative structure took a real nose dive with AFFC and ADWD though. His previous novels were like music compositions in structure -- a slow ballad at the start, a crescendo to an epic climax, followed by a denouement.

In ADWD, we got most of that for the first 750 pages, but then the last 200 just fizzled out with no climax. We were thrown with 10+ different PoV's, largely unconnected, and mostly to keep us up to date with characters not seen since AFFC. And then we're left with a bunch of cliffhangers and no resolution to the Battle of Winterfell or Meereen.

AFFC was even worse imo, as that book was mostly plodding throughout with no crescendo or rising tension. I thoroughly enjoyed ADWD's first 2/3rds though, and thought Martin was in top form. I blame all faults of ADWD's unsatisfying conclusion on GRRM's editor.
Click to expand...
I think that Martin's real problems with this series are structural. But I suppose that's the risk with a "gardener" writer penning an epic fantasy series. Martin has always talked about how he started the series with the direwolf scene, and the series has expanded from a trilogy, to six books, to seven, and now probably even more. He didn't have the books planned out or outlined in detail, and it has resulted in severe structural problems when the 5 year gap didn't work and he expanded the scope of the story starting in ASOS. Hell, even the 5 year gap was an idea he thought up while writing ACOK. He spent 11 years dealing with these structural problems.
 
F

Famassu

Member
scosher said:
AFFC was even worse imo, as that book was mostly plodding throughout with no crescendo or rising tension. I thoroughly enjoyed ADWD's first 2/3rds though, and thought Martin was in top form. I blame all faults of ADWD's unsatisfying conclusion on GRRM's editor.
Click to expand...
I dunno, there was plenty of rising tension at King's Landing with Cersei's failures piling up & the rise of the religious army, ending with her getting imprisoned by the High Septon. And this plotline got a perfect continuation in ADWD with
the walk of shame
, after leaving it in an interesting point in AFFC. Plus Jaime not giving a shit about Cersei's cry for help after him growing apart of her throughout the book was *thumbs up*

Then there was the Iron Isles stuff that, yes, was probably the weakest part, but even it had a somewhat clear beginning, middle & end with the call to kingsmoot and "surprising" conclusion of who "won" it (and the whole dragon controlling horn thing), with a clear new plotline starting with Victarion being sent to Dany to try & take control of the dragons.

Not to forget Dorne. It was seemingly slow & somewhat uneventful, but even there were their slow build-up (with a lot of introduction to their culture & whatnot), more action/event filled middle (Doran capturing the Viper's daughters to make it seem like he's friends to King's Landing, Arianne trying to do what she did) and SHOCKING REVELATIONS about the real intentions of Doran in the end, leaving them with a clear kind of storyline for the future.

And while Brienne's story perhaps didn't follow the normal "slow beginning, a bit more eventful middle/build-up to a climax" formula (it was more about fleshing out (the post-war) Westeros), the ending with the fight & her being left at the mercy of Lady Stoneheart & Co was a good way to end her part in the book. Some may not like the cliffhanger ending, but for her I think it worked (especially since there weren't any other similar ones in the book).

Only Arya's & Sansa's POVs didn't really advance too much, even though there were some tasty tidbits with Arya being left blind due to what she did and Sansa learning more of Littlefinger's ambitious plans for her and for everything.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
scosher said:
I think Martin's prose is fine. His exposition has always been heavy and overly detailed, but that's also part of the reason why people miss so many subtleties in the text such as Renly/Loras' relationship, R+L=J theory, or (ADWD)
fake Aegon
.

His narrative structure took a real nose dive with AFFC and ADWD though. His previous novels were like music compositions in structure -- a slow ballad at the start, a crescendo to an epic climax, followed by a denouement.

In ADWD,
we got most of that for the first 750 pages, but then the last 200 just fizzled out with no climax. We were thrown with 10+ different PoV's, largely unconnected, and mostly to keep us up to date with characters not seen since AFFC. And then we're left with a bunch of cliffhangers and no resolution to the Battle of Winterfell or Meereen.

AFFC was even worse imo, as that book was mostly plodding throughout with no crescendo or rising tension. I thoroughly enjoyed ADWD's first 2/3rds though, and thought Martin was in top form. I blame all faults of ADWD's unsatisfying conclusion on GRRM's editor.
Click to expand...
AFFC was about building bricks, as is ADWD. And that's good enough for me.
 
D

devilhawk

Member
So the three heads of the dragon implies three Targs, right? End of DwD
With Dany being the obvious one, it is between Little Griff, Tyrion, and Jon Snow for the other two.
 
B

Big-E

Member
ZephyrFate said:
The real meat of Dany's chapters is the interesting political parallels the people around her have with the forces-that-be in Westeros. You have to kind of look at her chapters like that, rather than 'focusing on something happening'.
Click to expand...

I do enjoy the political stuff somewhat but a real problem I have that I don't know if other people have is that the names of the people outside of Westeros all sort of blend together and I forget who is who as they are all weird names.
 
L

legend166

Member
I'm about half way through now. Enjoying it so far, although not much has really happened. But the build up is pretty interesting at the moment. Seems like a lot of stuff is going to happen in the second half of the book.
 
Z

ZephyrFate

Banned
Big-E said:
I do enjoy the political stuff somewhat but a real problem I have that I don't know if other people have is that the names of the people outside of Westeros all sort of blend together and I forget who is who as they are all weird names.
Click to expand...
There's a pretty good naming system, but to explain it is a bit spoiler-y.
 
S

Sotha Sil

Member
ZephyrFate said:
AFFC was about building bricks, as is ADWD. And that's good enough for me.
Click to expand...


AFFC was about building bricks, but I'd argue ADWD was mainly about setting the pieces on the chess board. I think knowing about the knot really robbed me of some enjoyment. I'll reread it in a few months to see how I appreciate it as a novel, rather than as a part of the series.
 
B

Branduil

Member
The Asha chapter had the worst sex scene ever. It was awful even by Martin standards. Actually the whole chapter sucked, so I'm glad she died.
 
R

Rubashov

Member
I didn't realize until this book that Robett Glover is not actually named Robert Glover. Mind blown. Throughout multiple rereads and even a run through the audiobooks, I mentally inserted an R every time.
 
L

levious

That throwing stick stunt of yours has boomeranged on us.
scosher said:
I think Martin's prose is fine. His exposition has always been heavy and overly detailed, but that's also part of the reason why people miss so many subtleties in the text such as Renly/Loras' relationship,
Click to expand...


still don't get how this can be missed, I lost count of all the references to it.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
That link doesn't seem to work for me. Just brings me to the generic Google Talks page.
 
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