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Fantasy. Fiction. Science Fiction. Thriller. HTML:THE BOOK BEHIND THE SECOND SEASON OF GAME OF THRONES, AN ORIGINAL SERIES NOW ON HBO. In this eagerly awaited sequel to A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin has created a work of unsurpassed vision, power, and imagination. A Clash of Kings transports us to a world of revelry and revenge, wizardry and warfare unlike any you have ever experienced. A CLASH OF KINGS A comet the color of blood and flame cuts across the sky. And from the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns. Six factions struggle for control of a divided land and the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms, preparing to stake their claims through tempest, turmoil, and war. It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles.… (more)
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Now that King Robert Baratheon is dead and that his alleged son Joffrey, a vicious and sadistic young teen, has taken over the Iron Throne, the people of King's Landing are starving nearly to death and the
Once again told through the different points of view of various characters, we follow the story as the narration alternates between Tyrion Lannister, now the king's hand in his father's stead, who must plot against sister Cercei and nephew Joffrey to keep his place and his head; Catelyn Stark, on a mission to broker peace and convince the Baratheon brothers to unite with Robb against Joffrey and his people; Sansa Stark, still held captive in King's Landing, who keeps hoping her knight in shining armour will rescue her from Joffrey's cruelty and bring her home; Arya Stark, presumed dead by the rest of her family and forced into servitude at Harrenhal after having been made prisoner by Lannister's people, which doesn't stop her from continually plotting to overthrow the enemy; Bran Stark, a mere boy coming into his own powers with the huge responsibility of holding down Winterfell while older brother Robb wages war against the Lannisters; Jon Snow, on a dangerous mission north of the Wall, with the Night's Watch; Theon Greyjoy, Lord Ned Stark's former ward, now returned to his family, who fancies himself a great warrior; Daenerys Targaryen, accompanied by her three baby dragons, attempting to amass the small fortune she needs to acquire ships so she can reclaim the throne, and finally Davos Seaworth, a former smuggler who has been knighted by Stannis Baratheon, who brings us into the heart of the battle.
With the story fragmented is so many different parts, one might think much confusion would ensue, but part of Martin's genius is he manages to hold it all together and keep the narration firmly moving along. I had plenty of opportunity to put his skills to the test too, as it took me several months to get through the first half of the novel, simply because I was trying to read too many other things at the same time. But somehow, both his characters and the events they take us through were so memorable that even I, with my poor faculties of recall, still followed the thread of the story without trouble, and by the time I got to the halfway mark, found I simply had to put everything else aside and rush through till the end. If in the first book, we loved to hate snot-faced, evil bastard prince Joffrey, the real villain in this novel is Theon Greyjoy, who's delusions of grandeur and sense of entitlement lead him to acts so despicable, he manages to make us forget Joffrey with his barbaric schemes. The ending comes as a very pleasant surprise and has me impatiently looking forward to the next in series.
While A Game of Thrones was more about politics and introducing the "game", the end prize being a crown, A Clash of Kings is it's bloody younger brother. Gone are the pages upon pages of talk and introduction, these characters have now been solidly introduced and are biting at the bit for action - with the slight exception of one.
Tyrion Lannister, the "Imp", shines in this book. Honestly, I cannot decide whether to love or hate the dwarf. His cunning makes me admire him, his wit makes me want him to win (he's the only REALLY likeable character in the series aside from Renly - It's impossible not to like Renly) and he's the underdog, and I always cheer for the underdog.
But that means I'd have to forsake the noble Starks and how it kills me that the Starks and the Lannisters have done to each other the actions in this book. There is no going back there, no forgiveness.
And then, most of all, there is betrayal of the most magnificent sort. There is deaths, deaths that taught me, once again because I'd forgotten it from the first time I read these books, that you cannot become attached to any character because Martin does not hesitate to sacrifice them for the good of the story.
The only thing that really disturbs me about A Clash of Kings is the stories of Jon Snow and have Queen Daenerys. Dany's story is disturbing to the point of making me severely uncomfortable in reading it, and Jon's story seemed one gigantic setup to something even bigger and more amazing - but the set up was so long and drawn out I really struggled to keep my interest in it.
There's no doubt about it - Martin knows how to tell a story and how to make a person really get caught up in the lives of these fantasy characters.
Unfortunately, I enjoyed this installment less than the first. It seems to
So instead of any real review, I'm going to transcribe a couple of the notes I made while I was reading the book.
"Ways to make the book shorter:
-cut ridiculously unnecessary descriptions. Example - someone saw a rabbit, "brown and fat. It had long ears and a twitching nose." Yes, I know what a rabbit is. I don't need details unless it's 8 feet tall, purple, or has 7 legs.
-cut endless paragraphs of food, especially if two banquets within twenty pages of each other have a lot of the same food. Don't write when you're hungry!"
If I never read the words "boiled leather" again, it will be too soon.
Overall, it was kind of boring. People have been moved around to possibly interesting positions, but I'm not sure it required these 700 pages to get them there.
Recommended for: completists, people who like to read descriptions of battles, insomniacs.
Quote: "Littlefinger gestured languidly. "A trade envoy from Lys once observed to me that Lord Stannis must love his daughter very well, since he'd erected hundreds of statues of her all along the walls of Dragonstone. 'My lord,' I had to tell him, 'those are gargoyles.'"
That being said, many of the characters personality's were expanded, for better or worse, and I even began to find Bran's storyline interesting by the end!
What really shines, though, are the characters. Love them or hate them, it is impossible
Martin is truly excellent, and these middle two books - Clash of Kings and Storm of Swords - are close to perfect.
Martin absolutely knocked the ball out of the park with "Clash". I don't know if it's better than "Thrones", but it's easily its equal. He takes the core set of surviving characters (Arya, Sansa, Bran, Catelyn, Jon, Cersei and the wonderfully rich Tyrion), and picks up almost immediately where "Thrones" left off. And I don't just mean in terms of plot, but also in building out his fantastic world of intrigue, adventure and politics.
"Clash" is complicated, intense and absolutely epic. It sprawls majestically over a widely varied physical and literary landscape. The politics within the plot, focused on four Kings battling over a land that's used to having only one, are intricate, but not difficult to follow. Martin's writing is clear, his dialogue is smooth and the interplay between characters is enjoyable and completely in sync with the overall tone and 'place' of the story. The book is very serious and heavy - at about 1,000 pages, the book is actually heavy, but I love the weightiness, with corresponding depth, of the story.
Like "Thrones", there's not a ton of fantasy in "Clash". It's very middle-ages-historical-fiction with a tinge of supernatural. There's more fantasy in this book than in the first, though, and it feels like it'll build into much more for the third book. There are dragons, but they set up a certain tone and act more as a plot device than anything else. There's no fire-breathing and attacking and destroying. There's further development around Bran's supernatural connection with his direwolf Summer, and we see that the bastard Stark, Jon, has a bit of the gift as well. There are a few more fantastical devices scattered throughout the book, which Martin develops slowly through his world's mythology rather than hammering in a slew of de facto dungeons & dragons.
The characters are Martin's true accomplishment. He feeds off a character's strengths and deficiencies, and each one is perfectly human and in some way relate-able. Individuals-as-'outsiders', is the base upon which the best characters are built. And he uses that foundation frequently. Tyrion, the dwarf prince, has become one of my favorite and most memorable characters in the series, and perhaps one of the most well-developed characters in any popular fiction. He's witty and smart, and sometimes obnoxiously flip. But his deep-seated insecurities which evolve slowly over the course of both of the first books make his chapters the most anticipated. Arya develops into a wonderfully three dimensional character as the tomboy princess cut off from her family, trying to survive and find a way back home. Sansa's princess-ly arrogance dissipates under the strain of trying to survive as a hostage, and finds friends in very un-princess-ly places.
There's no reason to read this book before the first. There's a wealth of back story upon which "Clash" is built. Some of which Martin explains, most of which he doesn't, which I found enjoyably and surprisingly subtle. I would've been more lost if I'd not read the books back-to-back. And yes, they're that good that I was willing to invest over a month of precious reading time in two 1,000-page books.
I'm looking forward to seeing HBO's creation of Martin's world of Ice and Fire coming this spring. Until then, I'll start digging into book 3 - "A Storm of Swords". I expect that the overwhelming wealth of positive reviews mean there's more of Martin's great stuff ahead.
The "grit" of the tale can be cashed out in two ways. One is that Martin does not shy away from the details of political, economic and militaristic conflict. He revels in pulling the reader into the complexities of the conflict for the throne and showing that the situation requires far more than a noble leader with an army at the ready. This is one of the book's greatest strengths, Martin immerses you by throwing you into these situations and letting them wash over you. This is one bit of common ground with Tolkien. Neither felt that every aspect of the world needed to be explained, and present it to the reader in a way which enriches the narrative without requiring the reader to understand every reference.
The second aspect of the "grit" is the violence, and the fact that main characters are not safe from death. Martin seems to have a rather bleak view of human nature, at least, human nature when power is up for grabs. There are few heroes here who struggle against violent evil. Martin inverts this trope in A Game of Thrones when the noble hero archetype is executed, largely due to his adherence to nobility. Instead, most of the characters here are capable of inflicting terrible acts of violence, and the lower classes (living with these scheming nobles) are routinely tortured and slaughtered.
While this kind of violence can be immersive, and while it can enrich a narrative (violence is, after all, one of the things we must deal with about ourselves), it is far from clear that it does so here. The world Martin is creating is an awful place, and he has no interest in making it cleaner. Yet, this puts us, as readers, in a position of being consistently berated by the brutality. Between that and the sexual violence rife throughout, it comes across as brutality that does not get us anywhere. What's more, it is not clear that it actually adds to the realism, as opposed to providing the voyeuristic moments of violence. Perhaps if people are indeed as brutal as Martin's narrative suggests (at least in the circumstances of Westeros) it would seem realistic, but I am not in agreement with him on this point. As such, it is simply wearying, bordering on revelery in the horrors.
That said, it is an engaging read. Martin ably uses a diverse range of point of view characters to move the story along at a quick clip with a political conflict that really sweeps the reader along. One is never far from a cliff-hanger (usually the end of the present chapter), and he does a nice job filling in the gaps between the narratives without resorting too much to conversations with no purpose but to fill in the reader.
This style does, however, have some drawbacks. One is that we never get an extended period of time with any single character. For all the "realism" of the characters, it is difficult for them to be well-rounded when we are constantly switching away from them. Take, for example, the absolutely insufferable Theon Greyjoy. Theon's rage and violence (though not his misogyny or self-centeredness) might be nicely explored in reference to his time spent as a captive in the Stark court. Yet, Martin only has the space to tell us (largely through Theon's angry comments) that this is an influence on him, without rounding out the subtleties of how it might have led him to become the person he is. Instead, we simply have to suffer listening to his internal monologue in a series of chapters from his point of view - his awfulness would be far easier to swallow if he were in the slightest bit interesting!
The scope of the tale also means that some of the more interesting characters and plotlines are shortchanged here, particularly Danyerys and Jon Snow. Dany moves around a bit, and engages with some politicians and mystics, but does not develop much as a character or in terms of her plot. Her chapters seem designed to move her from one stage of her story to another. The same holds for Jon, whose chapters are mildly more interesting (as we learn more about the "wildings" beyond the wall), but also does not develop him very far. This is a standard problem, however, for fantasy fiction of this scope. One cannot expect every storyline to develop at an equal pace, when events do not.
With its able writing, Martin's saga is worth following for readers who have an interest in medieval conflict and history, and who are open to a story about a deeply brutal, classist and misogynistic society with none of those ugly traits blunted in the least. The land of Westeros is an awful place, and Martin is not asking us to escape there. Instead, he is simply laying it bare; a historical approach to fantasy.
Robert Baratheon is dead, his sadistic 12 year old son is on the iron Throne while his ambitious mother schemes for power, and five other kings claim the right to the throne.
Lots of fun.
The sequel is every bit a good as the first in the series. The same book
While most of the same narrators return, new ones appear, in a brilliant stroke to keep the uncertainty high.
Arrogance, greed, lust, sadism, betrayal—you name it, it’s there. Even decency from time to time, though not often.
There are any number of threads to the story, some of which seem only distantly related to the main plot. Yet this is a predicted 6-book series, so Martin is taking his time and developing his subplots with a very certain hand. His characters also develop, since he has the luxury of a lengthy series, each installment of which is about 800 pages. Lots of time to do an excellent job, and he does.
Even better than the first book, although I wouldn’t have thought that possible.
Highly recommended.
There’s a comet in the sky. It’s blood red, and it means different things for different people. But whether it is a good or bad omen, it doesn’t matter. After the deaths of Robert Baratheon and Eddard Stark, the Seven Kingdoms of
Up in the North, Robb Stark is the new king after the slaughter of Ned. He wants to make peace with Joffery, but that may never happen. His mother Catelyn is by his side, and her will is almost crushed. Her husband is dead, her son Bran is hopelessly crippled, and her two daughters are held captive. But she bears on hoping for a better outcome.
Bran has been having strange dreams called Green Dreams, dreams that can tell the future. Also dreams about his direwolf Summer, which makes people believe he’s a shapeshifter. And lastly, he’s having dreams about falling. The same fall that crippled him. What he’ll have to face will be complete terror.
Sansa is the betrothed of Joffrey, a boy of thirteen who reigns after Robert Baratheon. The only reason why she’s alive is because if she dies, Joff’s Uncle Jaime Lannister will be murdered in the prison in Winterfell. Sansa used to love Joff, but ever since he ordered Ned to be executed, things have changed and now she wants out of the marriage and to escape. Arya actually has escaped the Iron Islands and now is disguised as an orphan boy in the Night’s Watch. There she’ll have many hardships that will put her swordsmanship to the test. And every day, her hatred grows until she gets her revenge.
And finally there is Jon Snow, Ned Stark’s illegitimate son. He’s still on the Night’s Watch exploring more of the world beyond the Wall and all of the dangers. This is what’s left of the Stark family.
Down South, the three Baratheon kings rule. The first king is Joffery on the Iron Throne. He’s much too young to rule by himself, but everything he “does” goes through either his mother, Cersei, or his Uncle Tyrion. Cersei may be the mastermind of Joff’s power, and she has a secret so big, it’ll affect the course of Westeros. Tryrion is a dwarf, and through his wits he survived, and through his wits he’s thriving. He’s constantly battling Cersei to see who can outdo each other.
The second and third Baratheon kings are Stannis and Renly. Both of them are Robert’s brothers, both want power, both will stop at nothing to get it, and both want each other dead.
Then there is Daenerys Targaryen in the East. She has the Blood of the Dragons, and the past year in [A Game of Thrones] has unnaturally aged her way past her years. She was left with her sun-and-stars husband, Drogo, dead, and her stillborn son. She was helpless and powerless, but now she has a new weapon. Dany has three newly-hatched dragons: Drogon, Viserion, and Rhaegal. The dragons are back with much excitement to Dany and the East, but to horror in Westeros. She just found out that her number one enemy Robert Baratheon has died, and now she wants to go back and be the Queen of Westeros, but her future is uncertain, but she is determined to win.
The Kings play a dangerous game. They fight, they clash, and will inevitably die. And that will either be apocalyptic, or a new beginning.
What can I say? All my comments made on [A Game of Thrones] will more or less be the exact same. Now that I read it, the only that I want to read next is [A Storm of Swords].
Rating: Five Stars *****
If anything, I believe this book was even more enjoyable than Book 1. Any time an author creates a new world with numerous characters, it takes 200-300 pages just to become familiar with it and them. At least when starting Clash of Kings, the reader is well familiar with the landscape, and what a landscape!
What I enjoy most about Martin is the realism in his work. People die, and it's not always the bad guys. There is brutality, murder and rape, just as there certainly was in the medieval style culture on which this series is modeled. There is also honor, loyalty and heroism, and conversely, not always displayed just by the good guys. It's not as simple as good vs. evil, there is some of each in most of the characters.
While there is magic, it is not the kind of "over the top" magic that requires a reader to suspend belief. If the "good guy" has his back against the wall, he is more likely to die than be rescued by a magician's spell.
Again, this is a more than worthy successor to the original book in the series and a great springboard into Book 3. If you liked Book 1, you might as well fill out your dancecard for all the remaining installments.
Tyrion
Obviously I loved this book and can’t wait to start the next one.
I'm eager to get started with the next book in the series just to see what happens the the Stark children. That and the dwarf of Lannister is becoming a favorite too. Plenty of books left in the series, so who knows where it'll all end up.
Various lords and kings get sent around the remnents of the empire, trying to establish their own fieifdoms. Lots of pesants die and noby cares about any of them. George probably cheats abit with the timelines, positions and information that readers know but characters shouldn't,
Each individiaul chapter is good, but best read in snippits of one chapter of a time, as trying to keep all the correlations straights is ridiculous. It is not praise for a book to say that it's easily put downable after a chapter. But you're unlikely to want to put it down between chapters. I remain in mixed feelings about the series, and still don't care for any of the characters. Even the new ones he's added to confuse things whilst not mentioning some of the old ones. I do wna tot know what the drgaon girl is going to do when she finally stops wasting time somewhere else (who knows or cares where) and eventually gets to westeros.
"The battle fever. He had never thought to experience it himself, though Jaime had told him of it often enough. How time seemed to blur and slow and even stop, how the past and the future vanished until there was nothing but the instant, how fear fled, and thought fled, and even your body. "You don't feel your wounds then, or the ache in your back from the weight of the armor, or the sweat running down into your eyes. You stop feeling, you stop thinking, you stop being you, there is only the fight, the foe, this man and then the next and the next and the next, and you know they are afraid and tired but you're not, you're alive, and death is all around you but their swords move so slowly, you can dance through them laughing." Battle fever. I am half a man and drunk with slaughter, let them kill me if they can!"
Thus reads an excerpt from A CLASH OF KINGS, the mind-blowing sequel to A GAME OF THRONES. George RR Martin's seducing darkness of the bleak and torn Seven Kingdoms continues as we are presented with old and new characters in this startling but sinister tale of A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE. Queen Cersei's son Joffrey ascends to the Iron Throne and continues with his sadistic reign of the King's Landing in the south following the death of King Robert. The grim Stannis and Renly Baratheon (brothers to Robert) believe themselves to be the legitimate heirs to the throne. This is the prequel and culminates to the final epic battle against Joffrey and the Lannisters. Stannis relies on the powers of his new faith in the God of Light and Lady Melissandre, yet not everything is what it seems, and darker powers seem to be at work in Stannis. Renly, in turn, relies solely on his charisma to draw and lead a vast army.
Rob Stark still battles to avenge his father's execution. Daenerys, the exiled heir of the former ruling family, continues the nurture of her three dragons. Jon, now part of the Nightwatch, travels further north to destroy the Wildlings and its leader, and hopes to destroy the evil threatens the Kingdom, now that the dead seem to walk.
My favourite character is Tyrion Lannister, an evil but likeable character, who tries to tame his nephew, King Joffrey, and protect himself from the evil schemes of his sister, Queen Cersei.
Martin captures the horror of medieval battles, where survival was not only based on skill, but also on luck. There is nothing sweet, nothing heroic, but Martin leaves you tasting the blood and witnessing the gore of the battle between steel and flesh. The reader is not untouched by this, but is seduced by the pain and terror of these characters. The story is definitely graphic and aimed at the adult reader. Martin is a superb storyteller (the best I have come across) and he infuses his characters with life, purpose and a sense of chaotic morality. The characters move between shades of grey, and are not strictly saints or sinners, but each is fallible in his or her beliefs. This is what makes the story so gripping and interesting. Be prepared for a roller coaster ride gone out of control. You never know what happens next, and it is hard to guess where Martin is going with this tale.
In A CLASH OF KINGS evil outwits good, if goodness can be found. Martin succeeds in disguising darkness as light, as it slays those who are deceived by it. The introduction of magic in this book is very subtle, but utterly believable.
The only complaint I have about this book, is that Martin is slow to reveal the grandness of the story, and I guess we will have to wait for A STORM OF SWORDS.
At 1009 pages this book supplies a depth and breadth of world that is so involving that though I race toward the end in eagerness, it's still enough to carry me through a couple weeks of real time reading. Enough time for it to live in me. To stew in my
With the focus on so much bloodletting, this volume can't live up to the promise of the first, substituing blood and anger for the characterizations of A Game of Thrones. Of all the characters in this volume, only Tyrion Lannister, the Imp, experiences any true development and the reader is unsure to which faction he will eventually align himself.
As with most multivolume epic fantasies, the spell of the initial book can't be maintained throughout as, at some point, the plot must be advanced for the sake of advancing the plot. That said, Martin has a doozy of a plot going on, with more scheming and political machination occurring than in any other fantasy novel I've come across. Don't be put off by my comments, just understand that there's slightly less magic going on here.