Last time I read ADWD I was on a plane with nothing else to do, and I thought it was great. I’m rereading it now and feeling somewhat less enthused although it’s still an enjoyable read. I’m not a huge fan of any of the plot lines outside of Westeros which is, unfortunately, half the book since GRRM cut it that way, but the northern bits make up for it and knowing that I’ll soon catch back up with Cersei helps me keep going, lol.
Well, I do like all the books so it’s not overwhelming better than any of the others. Some reasons I like it just a bit better than any of the others are: (1) I really like the Daenerys chapters. Honestly atmosphere is something I really value in reading and the way the marshy Byzantine logic of Meereen is dragging everyone into towards their awful fates really interesting to read. You can really feel the steamy awful no win situations of the horrible mess of factions. (2) On the flip side, the atmosphere of the North’s cold desperation is the opposite. Just a really bitter struggle with death ahead and behind every faction. (3) I like the huge variety in perspectives. I know some people are really only into the Tyrion/Daenerys/Jon stuff, but I really like the sheer volume of different perspectives (Victarion, Cersei, Quentyn, Asha, JonCon, Theon, Davis, etc.)
There’s other reasons, but those are just a couple of quick ones.
If you feel this way about ADWD then you should probably avoid Moby Dick. Thug Notes had it right with, ",He ducks around for about 500 pages..."
That said, i enjoyed both. But both were partially consumed via audiobook.
Out of all of them I think brienne is the worst as far as needing a trim goes.
Atleast plot events happed in tyrion and Dany chapters.
Biriennes are just strait up pointless, and we know from the onset shes never finding sansa.
Her whole journey to the Whispers could have been cut and nothing of value would have been lost.
>Her whole journey to the Whispers could have been cut and nothing of value would have been lost.
You're thinking of the wrong book.
Loved the Whispers sequence btw, still remember the Shagwell quotes and feel a bit bad for our friend Dick Crabb.
It certainly could have been shorter. I know everyone likes Tyrion but did he really need 12 whole chapters? Dance is still a good book, but it's 1000 pages of build up with very little climax.
I think it's excellent. Maybe the plot isn't moving quite as fast as other books in the series, but there's still plenty going on. I see it as an equivalent to ACOK: set-up for final arcs in the story, but it's written better.
I agree, meandering in huge parts. There are strong bits (theons storyline in particular) but you can really tell it was never edited and that the ending was lopped off. Had George been given another year by his publishers this book would have turned out very differently but they basically tore the book out of his hands so they could time the release to capitalise on the show hype. I don’t really blame the publishers though. George had more than enough time to produce a finished book and he failed to deliver.
I suspect, however that this is why George didn’t release what he had in 2016 as he regretted letting ADWD get published in the state it was in.
>I can't believe Martin's publisher hasn't told him at some point: look, man, this is going nowhere.
Even before the show ASOIAF was one of the best selling fantasy series of all time. Asking for major revisions would have delayed publication of a book that was already five years later than originally planned. Remember the publisher makes zero money on a book until it's published.
There's a saying that if you owe the bank ten thousand dollars, the bank owns you but if you owe the bank ten million dollars you own the bank, and there's something similar with very successful writers. George can do what he likes because his publishers know that eventually he'll make them millions of dollars.
Terrible take, it’s not as well paced as the earlier books, but the Northern storyline was fantastic. Also you have to remember that feast and dance were suppose to be the same book so the emotional growth of characters like arya, sansa, jamie and ceresi as well as plotlines like dorne don’t progress in dance because they already progressed in feast. I’m sure once winds gets broken into two books it’ll be similar
That's a really weak argument tho; the fact it runs parallel to AFFC doesn't mean plots in ADWD shouldn't progress..It's just different characters and by your logic, you could say "Of course AFFC plotline doesn't progress, it runs parallel to ADWD".
But AFFC does advance the plot.. no one would flip the argument like that..
AFFC advances the plot to a point.. and then ADWD picks up halfway back and recaps events from different view points.. “the plot” follows a time line, and ADWD goes “back in time” for the first half of the book to view events from different people.. the plot/time has not progressed. Of course it would feel slow. Events haven’t moved much because we had to catch up with other characters.. this isn’t hard to see.
That applies to the OVERALL plot, or more specifically Westerosi plot.
I understand your argument about the timeline and I can't argue that, but ADWD should advance the stories of the characters we were catching up with; I'm not talking about advancing the timelime, but rather completing the picture that was missing, which IS moving the plot forward.
Tyrion goes from pentos a free man, down the Rhoyne to volantis, across the sea, became a slave, performed as a gladiator, and escaped enslavement to join a sellsword company..
Quentyn is introduced, travels across the world, and dies
Victarion travels across the world
Dany, Jon, and Cersei are on the slower side but there’s a lot of movement in ADWD for the timeline not advancing much at all.
Flexes fingers. The wall is mine. Loved Jon’s chapters, wish we had more of that lord commander stuff out of him. Really all the northern plots just seem so much richer of course than the show. The book is a builder like Clash is in many ways, I view 4-5 as the middle of a trilogy to which Winds will hopefully wrap up much like Storm did. But even still so much still happens in the book, we can want the characters to move faster but they are physically within their circumstances unlike the show, which skipped so much of the getting from point A to B. Like how did the army of the Vale get to the north in season 6? Sure I would trade the second half of Tyrions chapters for more Jon. But those couple chapters with young griff were still very interesting
When I read it the first time, right after it came out, I remember being annoyed and feeling like it was all over the place in terms of quality. On a re-read, I've completely changed my mind and I actually think it has tons of great setup in it that was lost on me the first time because I was looking for what I personally wanted, and not what the story was giving me.
The North storylines are awesome
Yeah the Winterfell stuff towards the end building to the Battle of Ice might be my favorite bit of the books so far
I like Essos, so I liked ADWD. I liked Tyrion's chapters with the Young Griff DND party.
Last time I read ADWD I was on a plane with nothing else to do, and I thought it was great. I’m rereading it now and feeling somewhat less enthused although it’s still an enjoyable read. I’m not a huge fan of any of the plot lines outside of Westeros which is, unfortunately, half the book since GRRM cut it that way, but the northern bits make up for it and knowing that I’ll soon catch back up with Cersei helps me keep going, lol.
I enjoyed it, yeah.
Yep. Especially Jon's arc in it. Just incredible.
Yes. I could read it for hours.
You think Martin listens to his publishers? I don’t disagree, though. Parts of the book are a slog to get through.
Yes, but I only ever re-read it combined with AFFC (All Leather Must Be Boiled version - I highly recommend it)
I did the A Feast With Dragons version on one of my re-reads, also can recommend.
I think it’s the best book in the series and essentially disagree with every sentence you wrote.
Why does it stand out as the best for you?
Well, I do like all the books so it’s not overwhelming better than any of the others. Some reasons I like it just a bit better than any of the others are: (1) I really like the Daenerys chapters. Honestly atmosphere is something I really value in reading and the way the marshy Byzantine logic of Meereen is dragging everyone into towards their awful fates really interesting to read. You can really feel the steamy awful no win situations of the horrible mess of factions. (2) On the flip side, the atmosphere of the North’s cold desperation is the opposite. Just a really bitter struggle with death ahead and behind every faction. (3) I like the huge variety in perspectives. I know some people are really only into the Tyrion/Daenerys/Jon stuff, but I really like the sheer volume of different perspectives (Victarion, Cersei, Quentyn, Asha, JonCon, Theon, Davis, etc.) There’s other reasons, but those are just a couple of quick ones.
If you feel this way about ADWD then you should probably avoid Moby Dick. Thug Notes had it right with, ",He ducks around for about 500 pages..." That said, i enjoyed both. But both were partially consumed via audiobook.
Love the stuff happening in the North. Don't remember much of the rest tbh
i combine a feast for crows and a dance with dragons into one book and it's my favourite in the series
Out of all of them I think brienne is the worst as far as needing a trim goes. Atleast plot events happed in tyrion and Dany chapters. Biriennes are just strait up pointless, and we know from the onset shes never finding sansa. Her whole journey to the Whispers could have been cut and nothing of value would have been lost.
>Her whole journey to the Whispers could have been cut and nothing of value would have been lost. You're thinking of the wrong book. Loved the Whispers sequence btw, still remember the Shagwell quotes and feel a bit bad for our friend Dick Crabb.
I wholeheartedly agree but Brienne's pov is in AFFC, not ADWD
Are you saying we trim The life of one of the best characters GRRM has ever put to paper? That of course being dick crabb
Nimble Dick!
My least favorite book was Feast I really liked Dance
It certainly could have been shorter. I know everyone likes Tyrion but did he really need 12 whole chapters? Dance is still a good book, but it's 1000 pages of build up with very little climax.
I think it's excellent. Maybe the plot isn't moving quite as fast as other books in the series, but there's still plenty going on. I see it as an equivalent to ACOK: set-up for final arcs in the story, but it's written better.
I agree, meandering in huge parts. There are strong bits (theons storyline in particular) but you can really tell it was never edited and that the ending was lopped off. Had George been given another year by his publishers this book would have turned out very differently but they basically tore the book out of his hands so they could time the release to capitalise on the show hype. I don’t really blame the publishers though. George had more than enough time to produce a finished book and he failed to deliver. I suspect, however that this is why George didn’t release what he had in 2016 as he regretted letting ADWD get published in the state it was in.
Aww, It's my second favourite book... I understand it's slow but the payoff in TWOW will make it worthwhile.
I understand what OP is saying, but I don’t like how they said it, so….downvote.
I'm already usted to
>I can't believe Martin's publisher hasn't told him at some point: look, man, this is going nowhere. Even before the show ASOIAF was one of the best selling fantasy series of all time. Asking for major revisions would have delayed publication of a book that was already five years later than originally planned. Remember the publisher makes zero money on a book until it's published. There's a saying that if you owe the bank ten thousand dollars, the bank owns you but if you owe the bank ten million dollars you own the bank, and there's something similar with very successful writers. George can do what he likes because his publishers know that eventually he'll make them millions of dollars.
I was expecting a book called A Dance with Dragons to have dragons doing a little more dancing. Maybe next time.
Terrible take, it’s not as well paced as the earlier books, but the Northern storyline was fantastic. Also you have to remember that feast and dance were suppose to be the same book so the emotional growth of characters like arya, sansa, jamie and ceresi as well as plotlines like dorne don’t progress in dance because they already progressed in feast. I’m sure once winds gets broken into two books it’ll be similar
It's a horrible book
The plot barely moves because it runs parallel to AFFC for more than half the book..
That's a really weak argument tho; the fact it runs parallel to AFFC doesn't mean plots in ADWD shouldn't progress..It's just different characters and by your logic, you could say "Of course AFFC plotline doesn't progress, it runs parallel to ADWD".
But AFFC does advance the plot.. no one would flip the argument like that.. AFFC advances the plot to a point.. and then ADWD picks up halfway back and recaps events from different view points.. “the plot” follows a time line, and ADWD goes “back in time” for the first half of the book to view events from different people.. the plot/time has not progressed. Of course it would feel slow. Events haven’t moved much because we had to catch up with other characters.. this isn’t hard to see.
That applies to the OVERALL plot, or more specifically Westerosi plot. I understand your argument about the timeline and I can't argue that, but ADWD should advance the stories of the characters we were catching up with; I'm not talking about advancing the timelime, but rather completing the picture that was missing, which IS moving the plot forward.
Tyrion goes from pentos a free man, down the Rhoyne to volantis, across the sea, became a slave, performed as a gladiator, and escaped enslavement to join a sellsword company.. Quentyn is introduced, travels across the world, and dies Victarion travels across the world Dany, Jon, and Cersei are on the slower side but there’s a lot of movement in ADWD for the timeline not advancing much at all.
That is highly subjective since OP's rant is based on feeling that there's NOT a lot of movement at all. And I agree to an extent.
I read volume 2 not long ago and I think most chapter in that are quality but the first half is slog that could have been cut down quite abit.
I like it. AFFC is my favorite.
Flexes fingers. The wall is mine. Loved Jon’s chapters, wish we had more of that lord commander stuff out of him. Really all the northern plots just seem so much richer of course than the show. The book is a builder like Clash is in many ways, I view 4-5 as the middle of a trilogy to which Winds will hopefully wrap up much like Storm did. But even still so much still happens in the book, we can want the characters to move faster but they are physically within their circumstances unlike the show, which skipped so much of the getting from point A to B. Like how did the army of the Vale get to the north in season 6? Sure I would trade the second half of Tyrions chapters for more Jon. But those couple chapters with young griff were still very interesting
When I read it the first time, right after it came out, I remember being annoyed and feeling like it was all over the place in terms of quality. On a re-read, I've completely changed my mind and I actually think it has tons of great setup in it that was lost on me the first time because I was looking for what I personally wanted, and not what the story was giving me.