How did you get into ASOIF

[Whatever]

It's a general consensus amongst WOT fans that the middle books are downright horrible.

Actually, it's not... the general consensus is that the 10th books is the worst, and we are talking about WoT, that means it's still above the average. i don't think any wot fan would ever say that 7 books out of 13 are "downright horrible", and )there are some of "the middle books" (like the 6th, the 9th or the 11th) that are something really, really good.

please, don't judge this way and let people decide. and IMHO you can't tell WoT is horrible when there are things like brooks or goldkind-whatever-it-s-spelled out there.

Ok, i think i'm going out topic. I am done!

EDIT

:fencing: I really don't want to start a WOT discussion on this site, so naturally I will... just kidding.

..dang! too late!! ok, no more WoT talks

[tullem]

A few years ago I was ditching a boring college class (economics or something) and ended up at a target. I browsed the book section and the cover blurb from Jordan caught my attention. Always looking frna good fantasy series I bought the it, and within three weeks I had purchased and read (and reread) all three books (at the time) in the series.

[Carldog]

It's was around 2004 and I was finishing college. For five years I never had a chance to do rec reading and decided to dive into something other than text books. I jumped back into Star Wars but all the books were lame so I moved over to fantasy and tried re-reading some stuff from back in the day... WoT (couldn't finish; just wasnt getting it done), Goodkind;( really, people like this?) Dark Elf (good for a few hundred pages). Ran through a bunch more, but not much stuck, I needed to find the one.

One day the coke head next door was reading ASoS as I was coming back from work, he let me borrow AGoT but I did start on it until my broher recommended it.

Well, I'm sure you can figure out what happened next...

[Whitebeard]

Actually, it's not... the general consensus is that the 10th books is the worst, and we are talking about WoT, that means it's still above the average. i don't think any wot fan would ever say that 7 books out of 13 are "downright horrible", and )there are some of "the middle books" (like the 6th, the 9th or the 11th) that are something really, really good.

please, don't judge this way and let people decide. and IMHO you can't tell WoT is horrible when there are things like brooks or goldkind-whatever-it-s-spelled out there.

Ok, i think i'm going out topic. I am done!

It's true enough that i don't visit many WOT fansite/forums like dragonmount,etc but on any of the "neutral" sites i visit where there's a literature section and WOT is discussed, that seems to be the consensus. AND IMO (which means that's why i think, not that any one shouldn't decide for themselves) Books 5,8,9,10, and 11 are nigh unreadable.

Books 1-4 are good. 6, and 7 and 12 are tolerable. 13 is good again, and i haven't read 14.

If i can remeber correctly, book 11 is 'Crossroads of Twilight', which is easily the worst book in the series by far, i don't know how it can be really good when its horrible on all levels.

[Whatever]

If i can remeber correctly, book 11 is 'Crossroads of Twilight', which is easily the worst book in the series by far, i don't know how it can be really good when its horrible on all levels.

Because Crossroad of Twilight is the 10th.

BTW, let's stop with the WOT discussion :)

[Corvinus85]

It's true enough that i don't visit many WOT fansite/forums like dragonmount,etc but on any of the "neutral" sites i visit where there's a literature section and WOT is discussed, that seems to be the consensus. AND IMO (which means that's why i think, not that any one shouldn't decide for themselves) Books 5,8,9,10, and 11 are nigh unreadable.

Books 1-4 are good. 6, and 7 and 12 are tolerable. 13 is good again, and i haven't read 14.

If i can remeber correctly, book 11 is 'Crossroads of Twilight', which is easily the worst book in the series by far, i don't know how it can be really good when its horrible on all levels.

Sorry I have to respond. You are off by one book. Crossroads of Twilight is book 10, and yes it's the worst. Book 11, Knife of Dreams was really good, 12 & 13 which were written by Sanderson were also really good, IMO almost as good as books 4 & 5 which are my favorite. 14 will come out at the beginning of 2012.

OK WOT discussion ends now

[mimi]

Waaaaaaaay back in 1997 or so, I was scouring the library for new SciFi books. I generally try to read new books from the library or borrowed first. If I think they're a keeper, _then_ I'll buy them. I had read fantasy for y-e-a-r-s by then and was thoroughly sick of them. WoT really turned me off by the 3rd book or so - thus the switch to science fiction.

I thought that if I attempted to read yet another book with talking, trained dragons I would scream. Saw the nice new big thick Game of Thrones book and decided to gamble on it. Checked it out of the library and.....***Loved it**....til the dratted dragons were born. I was so disgusted that I put it down. Finished. Done. Not interested anymore. Well, that didn't last very long! GRRM's writing is SO good that the book 'haunted' me. By the next day, went to the bookstore and bought HB Got and waited with bated breath for the next books. Bought new hardbacks as soon as they were out. The _only_ books I've _ever_ purchased without reading first (no storage room and not much extra money). A Dance With Dragons is already ordered from Amazon right now. My first pre-order.

I suspect GRRM could write about navel fuzz and it would be terrific. (NOT a suggestion....)

Have a few of friends that have followed my suggestions and like the books,too. Although a couple don't like the violence. My son-in-law has not read the books but I've convinced him that the HBO series will be good so he awaits almost as eagerly as me.......

[Grip]

On another forum I saw a discussion about fantasy literature with amongst others WOT and ASOIAF..At that time I had read all the then published WOT books and I felt ready to try something different..So in autumn 2009 I went to the library and was immediatly hooked..

Until that time I really didnt know anything about ASOIAF, its hard now to imagine why I didnt notice it earlier..

[Azador]

I first heard about the books in summer 2000. I was twelve, at sleep-away camp, and in the middle of reading the new Harry Potter book. One of the leaders (who I thought was particularly cool and wise) was talking to his friend about A Storm of Swords. He was visibly upset and said he couldn't believe what had happened during what I now realize was the Red Wedding. His friend consoled him and urged him to keep reading. I desperately wanted to read whatever book could have this effect on a sixteen-year-old, so I asked him the name of the author and made a mental note of it (two R's, like Tolkein!).

Since I was at camp, there was no way to acquire the book immediately. I forgot about it and continued reading the fantasy I was enjoying at the time---Dragonlance, Eddings, the Wheel of Time, etc. At some point later on, I noticed A Game of Thrones in a bookstore. I remembered nothing about Martin's series except that someone important died halfway through A Storm of Swords.

I know I was caught up with the published books just before Martin announced he was scrapping the five year gap. But I can't believe how young I was! I thought I was fourteen or fifteen, but I was barely thirteen when I started reading. I'm sure my parents had no idea these books were different from anything else I liked to read. I do remember a lot of the heavy stuff from early in A Game of Thrones bothering me---Dany's second chapter, the incest, Lady's death... I really identified with Robb and Jon, since they were a little older than me, and with Arya, since Sansa was my sister's age. I loved the books because I couldn't predict what was going to happen next, and I immediately swore off all of the 'boring' fantasy I'd been so enthralled with before ASoIaF.

[The Snark Knight]

I heard about the series on the website tvtropes.org and as it was listed on all the pages about fantasy deconstruction, mixed up morality and characters suffering completely horrible things, I trawled my local bookshops until I found AGOT and was instantly hooked.

[Whatever]

I heard about the series on the website tvtropes.org and as it was listed on all the pages about fantasy deconstruction, mixed up morality and characters suffering completely horrible things, I trawled my local bookshops until I found AGOT and was instantly hooked.

completely out topic: i love tvtropes :D

[Hamster of Doom]

completely out topic: i love tvtropes :D

Hear hear!

[Ser Roland]

I picked up AGoT in my Middle School library (Yea I know, that books seems a bit much for Middle School kids.) Ever since then I have been hooked. I was a very advanced reader for that age :D

Wow....my story seems a bit boring compaired to everyone esle. :drunk:

~Ser Roland

[Steve the Pirate]

A boyfriend recommended AGoT to me, very urgently. The book was slow going at first, but he warned me that it was a little slow but awesome once the characters were set up. Of course he was right. My love for the books far outlasted my love for that guy.

[Maegor The Cool]

Random library find. Saw the quotes on the cover, read a tiny bit of the prologue in the actual library and knew straight away it was something different. Before AGoT i was a huuuuuge Wheel of Time fan but had become disillusioned with the constant prattle about clothes, non-usage of magic weapons and the total stalling of the story. Never found anything in the fantasy genre that compares and have successfully converted stolid realists into recognising it's fantastic.

[Ser Nevarc]

It was actually left in my house by my rogue-ish, literary uncle, who buys books for vacation and leaves them about. The map originally sucked me in, and I devoured the book in 3 days.

The next morning, I hopped on Amazon and bought the following 3 books. (AFFC had just been released) without question.

It really must be an enjoyable enough series to get me to buy the whole thing after reading just one book.

[zmflavius]

A friend got AGOT for me on my birthday, some time in 2005-2006ish I think, if the inside cover saying ADWD would come out in 2006 is anything to judge by.

[delikat]

It must have been in early spring 2007, when I picked up several books of the German BamS-Fantasy-Bibliothek, a collection of first volumes of 10 different fantasy series.

The books I chose:

"Drohende Schatten" - first half of EotW (I liked it, but not well enough to read the following WoT volumes immediately, that's what I am doing now while waiting for ADWD)

"Das erste Gesetz der Magie" - "Wizard's First Rule" by T. Goodkind (hated it and never finished it)

and.. tada.. "Die Herren von Winterfell" - first half of GoT

I went through within a day or two and ordered all 4 books (the English originals) at Amazon as soon as I closed the book.

[winterqueen]

I was reading something online about Sean Bean and Game of Thrones was mentioned, this was in Dec 09. I read a review on Amazon.com and thought, I will read the first book and see if it's any good. It took me awhile to get through the first few chapters but when I got to "the things I do for love", I was hooked.

[Dreesen]

In 1996 my best friend and his wife were in the process of moving to Portland Oregon. My friends wife was in Portland looking for a job and my friend was living with me while he continued working until she found a job. One day I came home from work and my friend had purchased a bunch of new books. I looked over the books he had bought and one was a hardbound book called A Game of Thrones. I noticed the author was George R.R. Martin. Now I was already a fan of Martin having already read Fevre Dream and all of the Wild Card novels. So I asked my friend if I could read it since he was reading another book he had purchased. I read the book in 2 days and told my friend it was the best fantasy book I had read at the time. Too this day ASOIAF is the best fantasy series I've read in my 30 years of reading fantasy novels.

Dreesen