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

Emerson

May contain jokes =>
Man, I didn't think I could hate Ramsay Snow more but I surely do.

40% Kindle question
Where is Davos being sent?
 

bengraven

Member
Emerson said:
Man, I didn't think I could hate Ramsay Snow more but I surely do.

40% Kindle question
Where is Davos being sent?

I'm guessing
Skagos. Osha would be taking him to be with wildlings and there is a mention in that chapter of him having to go where men eat men.
 
I was smiling like a kid when I saw the package by my mailbox today.

I also love how relatively silent this thread is so far. Keep reading everyone!
 

LM4sure

Banned
John Harker said:
I kind of wish I was capable of skipping it. It left a bad taste in my mouth all these years. What a chore to churn through!

I'm pretty stoked about Dance though (mainly because the show rekindled my affection for the series) so will be heading to B&N at lunch to grab it.


I knew I didn't just make that up. The reviews on amazon.com for A Feast of Crows are awful. But maybe it won't be so bad since I can immediately move on to A Dance with Dragons. I imagine reading a book that didn't live up to expectations and knowing the next book in the series wasn't coming out for many years later would leave a bad taste in your mouth.

But okay. Fine. I will read all the books. Thanks everyone for your input.
 

KingGondo

Banned
LM4sure said:
I knew I didn't just make that up. The reviews on amazon.com for A Feast of Crows are awful. But maybe it won't be so bad since I can immediately move on to A Dance with Dragons. I imagine reading a book that didn't live up to expectations and knowing the next book in the series wasn't coming out for many years later would leave a bad taste in your mouth.

But okay. Fine. I will read all the books. Thanks everyone for your input.
It's honestly a really good book IMO.

Not jaw-droppingly stupendous like ASOS, not as tightly-wound as AGOT, but definitely better than ACOK IMO.

Just have an open mind and enjoy the ride. :)
 
LM4sure said:
I knew I didn't just make that up. The reviews on amazon.com for A Feast of Crows are awful. But maybe it won't be so bad since I can immediately move on to A Dance with Dragons. I imagine reading a book that didn't live up to expectations and knowing the next book in the series wasn't coming out for many years later would leave a bad taste in your mouth.

But okay. Fine. I will read all the books. Thanks everyone for your input.

AFFC isn't bad, it's just overly verbose and padded and ends with no resolution with a bunch of bad cliffhangers.
 

yacobod

Banned
A lot of revisionist history going on in here. AFFC is by far the worst book in the series. The book is basically all set up like ACOK, but without any of the characters you give 2 shits about.

My rankings
ASOS > AGoT > ACOK >>>>>>>>>>>AFFC, i'm not sure where ADWD will go, but I suspect it will be between AGoT and ACOK.
 

KingGondo

Banned
yacobod said:
A lot of revisionist history going on in here. AFFC is by far the worst book in the series. The book is basically all set up like ACOK, but without any of the characters you give 2 shits about.
How can it be revisionist history if I just read the series all the way through? I enjoyed the hell out of AFFC.

I'll admit I love the Tyrion and Dany chapters and missed those the most, but I enjoyed the Dorne, Braavos, and Iron Islands sections immensely and really appreciate the world-building GRRM pulled off. Jaime's development is also very moving.

And that leaves out the fast-moving (and maddening) Cersei chapters plus the new developments at the Eyrie. And Brienne's storyline was quite engaging and exciting.

Tons of important stuff happened, and for the most part it was well-written and absorbing. I'm really stumped as to the hate it gets. AFFC and ACOK are about equal in quality in my eyes.
 
KingGondo said:
AFFC and ACOK are about equal in quality in my eyes.

No one's opinion matters except your own. Leave yacobod to bitching about GRRM being a pedophile who is going to die before he finishes the series.
 

KingGondo

Banned
cubicle47b said:
No one's opinion matters except your own. Leave yacobod to bitching about GRRM being a pedophile who is going to die before he finishes the series.
I agree, I just wanted to get my opinion out there and defend AFFC since the original guy was asking about it. I feel that it gets an unnecessarily bad rap.
 
Jon II/2591 in Kindle (but whole chapter):

Kill the boy indeed. That was some man shit in this chapter. Hope the show gets here; I'd like to watch Jon start to come into his own.
 

gdt

Member
Oh god, Amazon needs to hurry the fuck up with my delivery!

And I need to hurry up rereading Storm of Swords :(.
 
yacobod said:
A lot of revisionist history going on in here. AFFC is by far the worst book in the series. The book is basically all set up like ACOK, but without any of the characters you give 2 shits about.

My rankings
ASOS > AGoT > ACOK >>>>>>>>>>>AFFC, i'm not sure where ADWD will go, but I suspect it will be between AGoT and ACOK.
Revisionist history? Fuck that noise. AFFC was a fantastic novel with superb prose and a perspective on the Westerosi world we have never gotten.

It's FAR better than ACOK. Snore.

as for ADWD, I'm nearing 200 pages in and enjoying it so far. Six years without re-reading the books and I enjoy all the catching up the book is doing for me, with tons of references back to ASOS, AFFC, and even as far back as AGOT.
 
ZephyrFate said:
Revisionist history? Fuck that noise. AFFC was a fantastic novel with superb prose and a perspective on the Westerosi world we have never gotten.

It's FAR better than ACOK. Snore.

After my recent reread, I would say I rank Feast second behind Storm overall (that might change depending on Dance, which I've only just started on). The quality of prose is amazing, and we get to see so much more of the world than in the past. Brienne's chapters get criticized a lot, but I don't get the hate. We get Merribald's amazing broken men speech, which might just be the most well-written segment in the entire series, and the Quiet Isle, not to mention a great look at the common people. I also really find the Ironborn lifestyle fascinating, and Aeron and Victarion's chapters are really strong. Plus, we get inside Cersei's head, which I think makes her a much stronger character than in the first three books.
 

thefro

Member
Barnes and Noble still hasn't even shipped mine out :(

I got it for basically free from there after the mispriced 360 deal they had, so I guess I can't complain too much.
 
bluemax said:
George's experience in writing soap operas really shows up. This series could go on indefinitely at this rate.
So in other words you're unimpressed or something? I really don't want to sour my experience with this book.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
yacobod said:
A lot of revisionist history going on in here. AFFC is by far the worst book in the series. The book is basically all set up like ACOK, but without any of the characters you give 2 shits about.

My rankings
ASOS > AGoT > ACOK >>>>>>>>>>>AFFC, i'm not sure where ADWD will go, but I suspect it will be between AGoT and ACOK.

In case you somehow didn't know, your opinion is not objective fact, nor is it guaranteed to be shared by anyone else.

AFFC was a great book. I enjoyed it just about as much as A Clash of Kings, which I only enjoyed slightly less than A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords.
 
Wow, Borders can jump in a lake. Their website has it for $19 (same as Amazon), I check the stock of the local store, they have it, I drive to the store, get to the cashier, "that'll be $26," and I get the whole "we don't price match our website [which is obviously set up to bait you into a store with the promise of Amazon prices]" talk. Ragh.

I have Amazon Prime, so it looks like I'll be digging into this Thursday afternoon.
 

Emerson

May contain jokes =>
chaoticprout said:
Done with the book

high level thoughts:

Needed 200 more pages. EVERYTHING ended on shitty cliffhangers.

Been kind of preparing myself for this anyway. As we know he's got 100 pages of TWOW already and he said if it was up to him he'd have put that plus another hundred or something in this book.
 
Emerson said:
Been kind of preparing myself for this anyway. As we know he's got 100 pages of TWOW already and he said if it was up to him he'd have put that plus another hundred or something in this book.

It's come out in interviews that he cut out a bunch of stuff at the prompting of his editor. Apparently two major events were shifted to the next book.
 
A book of that size takes me a good month or two to read. I like to read and absorb every bit I can. I also have a problem of stopping and starting to think on what I've read.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
CF_Fighter said:
A book of that size takes me a good month or two to read. I like to read and absorb every bit I can. I also have a problem of stopping and starting to think on what I've read.

Same. I just can't read at the rate that some people here seem to be able to, which is like 2 pages or more per minute. It takes me easily longer than a minute to finish a page, and sometimes I'll go back and reread stuff.
 
Started reading, had to stop after a couple chapters. I'm tired as hell; stayed up too late finishing AFFC, then had a long day at work. I'm gonna try to wake myself up a bit before continuing reading; I've read the prologue and the first two chapters. God Tyrion's chapter was amazing. I've missed him.
 

speedpop

Has problems recognising girls
Amir0x said:
man you guys are reading fast
No shit. I'm barely hitting 20% here on the Kindle and I thought I was going through it like a train.


I couldn't resist reading the thread, especially after Jon's chapter (3rd POV?)
where he beheaded Janos Slynt. The entire last 1/2 of that chapter was balls to the wall awesome.

Tyrion's chapters are a hugely welcome change. I almost forgot how to laugh during A Feast for Crows.
 
D

Deleted member 1235

Unconfirmed Member
ultron87 said:
Just go to read the Prologue before going to work this morning. I liked it.

Also read the first line of Chapter 1. I loved it.

Chapter 1 First Line Spoiler:
"Tyrion drank his way across the Narrow Sea." He's back bitches!
haha, this was exactly my experience.

Lm4sure said:
I knew I didn't just make that up. The reviews on amazon.com for A Feast of Crows are awful. But maybe it won't be so bad since I can immediately move on to A Dance with Dragons. I imagine reading a book that didn't live up to expectations and knowing the next book in the series wasn't coming out for many years later would leave a bad taste in your mouth.

But okay. Fine. I will read all the books. Thanks everyone for your input.

you've made a wise decision. AFFC isn't even bad, it's just that people hyped on SoS which was amazing got all butt hurt over the world building and important but less exciting stuff that happens in AFFC, there are some annoying bits about it (Brienne in general) but it's a solid book and it has Cerseis POV. Which is interesting to say the least. Not reading it would be silly, would be a better idea to give up on the books and just watch the show on telly. (which would also be silly, but less silly)
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
It would be cool if someone put out a chapter-based timeline so people could read AFFC and ADWD together and get a fuller picture of what's going on. I'd definitely be interested in doing that on a second read through.
 
It started off a bit slow, but I can't believe it's midnight by me now, I've been absolutely absorbed for the past four hours. I have about 130 pages left, and work bright and early, but there's no way to not finish, I'm emotionally exhausted but can't bear to have the thought of what could happen in those pages over my head all day. What a great fucking sense of dread and despair this book builds up, tempered by just enough hope to keep me moving. I think the largely wintery settings and his descriptions of them has really set the tone perfectly...I've shivered a fair share though its hot as shit here.
 
Zefah said:
It would be cool if someone put out a chapter-based timeline so people could read AFFC and ADWD together and get a fuller picture of what's going on. I'd definitely be interested in doing that on a second read through.

The timeline is so messed up, that would be a pain to figure out. (vague timeline spoiler)
Arya is like a full year ahead of everyone else.
 

speedpop

Has problems recognising girls
Zefah said:
It would be cool if someone put out a chapter-based timeline so people could read AFFC and ADWD together and get a fuller picture of what's going on. I'd definitely be interested in doing that on a second read through.
Reading through A Dance with Dragons, this was my major thought when season 2 rolls around of the HBO series and I go through another yearly process of rereading. It'd be great for a guide to be out there and switch between the two latter novels just for completionists/fanatics sake.

MaritalWheat said:
I think the largely wintery settings and his descriptions of them has really set the tone perfectly...I've shivered a fair share though its hot as shit here.
One joy about being in the southern hemisphere as the book was released, specifically when I could read it instantly when Amazon put it up unlike the past where I had to wait months. It's been frighteningly cold in my city this past week and the location is so close to the equator where I seriously thought that the Stark's had it right.
 

dyls

Member
KuwabaraTheMan said:
After my recent reread, I would say I rank Feast second behind Storm overall (that might change depending on Dance, which I've only just started on). The quality of prose is amazing, and we get to see so much more of the world than in the past. Brienne's chapters get criticized a lot, but I don't get the hate. We get Merribald's amazing broken men speech, which might just be the most well-written segment in the entire series, and the Quiet Isle, not to mention a great look at the common people. I also really find the Ironborn lifestyle fascinating, and Aeron and Victarion's chapters are really strong. Plus, we get inside Cersei's head, which I think makes her a much stronger character than in the first three books.
And find out that she thinks everyone in Westeros is a stupid craven. Hooray. HBO rounded out her character more in two episodes of GOT than AFFC did in five hundred pages.

I just don't see how anyone can say AFFC is anything but the weak link of the series. Brienne and Cersei are two dimensional characters. They have ZERO depth. Which is fine, unless you give them hundreds of pages of POV each to remind us just how boring they are. I could tell you what either one of them will do in any given situation, and so could you. Doesn't make for exciting reading, despite any nebulous claims of "best prose in the series".
 
dyls said:
And find out that she thinks everyone in Westeros is a stupid craven. Hooray. HBO rounded out her character more in two episodes of GOT than AFFC did in five hundred pages.

I just don't see how anyone can say AFFC is anything but the weak link of the series. Brienne and Cersei are two dimensional characters. They have ZERO depth. Which is fine, unless you give them hundreds of pages of POV each to remind us just how boring they are. I could tell you what either one of them will do in any given situation, and so could you. Doesn't make for exciting reading, despite any nebulous claims of "best prose in the series".
Oh whatever. Cersei's complete meltdown is not only exciting to read but has implications for her rule to come, and Brienne's chapters had Meribald's speech and world building on a level none of the other books had (i.e. from the common man's POV), so yeah. Best prose in the series is definitely given to AFFC.
 

Rocwell

Member
Woohoo, so excited for this, I'll be getting my copy in the next few days but I still need to plow through rereading the last 200 pages of Feast for Crows. Can't wait to find out what all the characters missing from Feast have been up to.

My enthusiasm for the HBO series kinda cooled after the first 3 or so episodes. I quit watching because all the T&A felt excessive and I really hated what they did to Sam's character. I guess I should give it another shot after I finish ADWD though.

I just don't see how anyone can say AFFC is anything but the weak link of the series. Brienne and Cersei are two dimensional characters. They have ZERO depth. Which is fine, unless you give them hundreds of pages of POV each to remind us just how boring they are. I could tell you what either one of them will do in any given situation, and so could you. Doesn't make for exciting reading, despite any nebulous claims of "best prose in the series".
Well, it is the weak link but not for the reasons you suggested. Cutting the book in half and leaving out half the cast really leaves a lot to be desired. I think it will make following the timeline of events rather headache inducing as well.

I like Brienne though, she and Jaime have had an interesting effect on each other, although I grant Brienne has had a greater effect on Jaime than vice versa, but I think she may still surprise some people. The Cersei chapters were amusing because
you got to see how clever she thought she was being as she sows her own undoing.
 

RJT

Member
Man, I can't read more than 1/2 chapter per day... I'll take a lot of time to catch-up. Especially since I read the previous books in Portuguese and now I'm reading in English.

So far:
Prologue: great
Chapter I: predictable,
but it felt good to have Tyrion back.
 

-TRN-

Member
Woot woot just got my copy here in Brazil :D
There were only THREE copies where I live on this big bookstore. Who the hell orders only three copies of the newest release when all the others are on the 'top ten' lists oO
 

Jarmel

Banned
Coop said:
That was awesome. When he said it was wrong to hang him and to bring him his sword.. damn

Amazon 33%
Best chapter in the whole book so far. Honestly it's better than AFFC but good god the series seems to be coming to a halt. Also seems Martin is making the series more complicated than he needs be.
 
So far, I'm conflicted on this book.

On one hand:

The Aegon twist is a nice Fuck you to all the "Aegon is alive" conspiracy theorists.

On the other hand:

Tyrion is absolutely wasted as a travelogue POV.
 
petethepanda said:
Wow, Borders can jump in a lake. Their website has it for $19 (same as Amazon), I check the stock of the local store, they have it, I drive to the store, get to the cashier, "that'll be $26," and I get the whole "we don't price match our website [which is obviously set up to bait you into a store with the promise of Amazon prices]" talk. Ragh.

I have Amazon Prime, so it looks like I'll be digging into this Thursday afternoon.

You should have explained to them that this is why they are going out of business.
 

John Harker

Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
Only 40 pages in. I haven't read since Feast came out all those years ago. Anyone else having trouble bringing their own interpretations of the characters faces to mind? All I see are the HBO ones!

Not that I'm complaining, but in my head Tyrion is now much better looking than he probably is. And our Pentos merchant friend is too thin.
 

Azrael

Member
I am speechless after reading Bran's second chapter. I am 18% through the Kindle edition, and if Dance ended now, it would already be a better book than Feast.
 

yacobod

Banned
Well I had no idea some people enjoyed the pointless travelogue that was Brienne's chapters. She's just a fool on a fool's task, especially since you know Sansa is stowed away in the Eerie. And she's just as bloody stupid and honorable as Ned was.

And I have to disagree with Cersei being a positive of AFFC, she's a complete one note 2D character/villain in the series. The only villains more comical than her are the Bolton gang (Ramsey & Roose), but like I said before I'm pretty sure they are a GURM's pedo, rape, torture-porn fantasies being put directly on the page.

That being said, I'm like 33% done with ADWD so far proper and really enjoying it so far. I'm finding Dany's chapters to be a chore to get through. She's so stupid. I didn't have a problem with her chapters in the other books, but these are pretty bad. Book needs more Bran though, his first 2 chapters were pretty great.
Anyone else think that the Septa Lady Lemore is actually Ashara Dayne traveling with the Griffs and Tyrion?

another GURM gem:
The three men were erect. The sight of their arousal was arousing, though Daenerys Targaryen found it comical as well.
 
John Harker said:
Only 40 pages in. I haven't read since Feast came out all those years ago. Anyone else having trouble bringing their own interpretations of the characters faces to mind? All I see are the HBO ones!

Not that I'm complaining, but in my head Tyrion is now much better looking than he probably is. And our Pentos merchant friend is too thin.



thumb_google+1button.jpg


No, but I do hear Roy Dotrices' voices for most characters.
 

ultron87

Member
Seems like there are some definite pacing issues at the start.

I really didn't need (Tyrion II)
a whole chapter of Tyrion riding in a cart with Illyrio.

I'm glad I'm not rushing through this.
 
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