[ADWD Spoilers] RAGE

[variance]

Speaking of editing, ADWD was in dire need of some. Anyone else notice the number of typos? Just off the top of my head:

Kevan, when speaking to Cersei, says that Lancel is her "nephew" when obviously Lancel's her cousin. WTF?

"starboard" appeared as "larboard"

At one point, "loose" was written when it should have be "lose", and at another point "losing" was written when it should have been "loosing".

And a bunch of others - it definitely threw me off.

There was one time 'herself' was replaced with 'himself'. I scratched my head at that.

It may be fixable, but GRRM has to definitely finish off that useless Aegon storyline. I thought I hated Dany in the first three books, but I revile the whole Aegon reveal/storyline. I can't wait for Aegon to be offed and before the midway of TWOW. Hopefully the whole Golden Company invasion gets squished by the Tyrells.

The first third of TWOW had better be brilliant to finish off all those cliffhangers. And next time, if they need to cut pages, don't put in the appendices. :excl: There's 50 pages of appendices would could have been used to wrap up 1 or 2 of the cliffhangers.

I am hoping Aegon replaces Dany. Connington can get shit done.

She's way past "sweet enough". She's ASoIAF's Jar Jar Binks.

She isn't redeemable. She needs removed as a character or turned into the major bad guy that Jon has to help defeat.

I don't mind any of the ones that were mentioned, but "I'm just a young girl etc." made me roll my eyes whenever I saw it. <_<

Yep, annoying.

[Swordswench]

There was just waaaay too much "slavery is bad, m'kay" going on. I mean, chapter after chapter when I thought that was pretty well established way back in pre-ADWD Dany POVs. It made the Essos material really drag along and had the feel of that unit of review you had to go through when school would start back up after summer vacation. A lot of the Jon chapters had the same feel when it came to the wildings. "Okay class, today we're reviewing wilding culture."

The Bonnie Prince Aegon arc was kind of an irritant. But overall another Targaryen in the mix has interesting applications, and for that alone I suppose it's endurable.

No slog matches learning the intricacies of Meerense politics, though. Ugh. And pining for Daario only compounded it as well.

Stannis' snowed-in army got on my nerves, too. We could've gotten to the point where they're 3 days ride from Winterfell and all snowed in and dying a lot earlier along than we did -- especially with a storm that big.

Jon's assassination was my real rage moment, though. All this stuff still left up in the air and unresolved and here's yet another thing to wait it out for.

[Cape]

First, let me say that I understand those who say that we expected too much from aDwD, and that we cannot get as much plot progression as hoped. But I still think we are entitled to a "good" book, something I don't think aDwD was.

Any book, no matter if it's part of a series, should include the following: a start, a build- up, a climax, and some kind of resolution. The resolution does not need to be complete, but it should be present to some degree. ADwD (and aFfC) sadly to a great extent lacks both climax and/or resolution. Instead we get endless amounts of cliffhangers right before the climax or resolution. This is a flaw that can not be cured even by GRRM's prose or the fantastic scenery of asoiaf.

As to the the fact that aDwD and aFfC are build- ups for tWoW, I don't think that really is a valid argument. Many of the story arcs of aDwD could easily have been partly or completely resolved without taking away all the excitement. E.g. Jon being healed or revived and possibly declared AA in aDwD would have been a satisfactory resolution and a good end to his aDwD story- arc, but it would not have resolved his long term story arc of beating the Others. Furthermore, a conclusive battle of Mereen would have resolved Dany, Tyrion, Barristan, and Victarion's aDwD story- arcs, but it would not damage Dany's story arc of reaching Westeros and possibly becoming queen.

The reason why I still enjoyed aDwD, and will at least give tWoW a shot, is because they are parts of the asoiaf series, a series which still is among the best I have read, thanks to aGoT, aCoK, and aSoS.

Lastly, please pardon my language and any inconclusive or weird arguments, its late and I want to sleep.

[Ser_Not_Appearing_In_This_Book]

Also GRRM needs to stop relying on these catchphrases repeating them over and over again. I seriously raged every time I read "You know nothing, Jon Snow." Practically every time he uses this phrase I'm lost because it doesn't even make sense in the context it's used. Little and Less is more, please.

Fixed that for ya ;)

[Sasha Steelsong]

We can only hope that Ramsay has wronged the local miracle worker.

LOL. Given Ramsey's general disposition, I don't think a wronged miracle worker will be hard to find.

[Kennit]

Assuming Jon died, what purpose(story-wise) does his death serve? Ned's execution, for example, triggered the War of the Five Kings.

[Lord Davos]

Fixed that for ya ;)

Also GRRM needs to stop relying on these catchphrases repeating them over and over again. I seriously raged every time I read "You know nothing, Jon Snow." Practically every time he uses this phrase I'm lost because it doesn't even make sense in the context it's used. Little and Less is Much and more, please.

There you go, now it's fixed. :D

[The Liddle]

"omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings""omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg is Stannis really dead?" "omg those slavers are going to get what for!" "omg is Jon really dead?" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" The End

I was going to write a synopsis, but no need. You nailed it.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

"omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings""omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg is Stannis really dead?" "omg those slavers are going to get what for!" "omg is Jon really dead?" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" The End

Hahahahaha! Har.

That's the perfect summary of this book.

[Panjer]

Jesus Christ, I'm all for criticizing parts of the book you don't like but it's becoming more like whining. I'm sure if Game of Thrones was the 5th book to be released people'd complain about Ned's death and how it was just there to shock people.

Dance has the same problems Feast has; it's essentially one giant filler episode.

[firestorm]

I felt 100% the same way after immediately finishing the book and finding my way here. Plenty of people think that Jon isn't dead/will be revived/something else but I thought it was bullshit to end his arc like that and leave us for 5 years wondering about it.

Thoros of Myr seems like a mere parlor trickster compared to melissandre, and he was able to kiss of fire wake Dondarion over 6 times.

I am quite sure Mel can do the same for Jon

[The Non-Human]

[font "Georgia, Times, Times New Roman, serif"]

Be not too quick to invoke rage for the Song of Ice and Fire, for with rage too did begin another famous song, the far more ancient Song of Ilion, whose own very first word is Rage:

Μῆνιν

ἄειδε, θεὰ, Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος

οὐλομένην, ἣ μυρί’ Ἀχαιοῖς ἄλγε’ ἔθηκε,

πολλὰς δ’ ἰφθίμους ψυχὰς Ἄϊδι προῒαψεν

ἡρώων, αὐτοὺς δὲ ἑλώρια τεῦχε κύνεσσιν

οἰωνοῖσί τε πᾶσι· Διὸς δ’ ἐτελείετο βουλή·

ἐξ οὗ δὴ τὰ πρῶτα διαστήτην ἐρίσαντε

Ἀτρεΐδης τε ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν καὶ δῖος Ἀχιλλεύς.

Which in Alexander Pope’s 1715 rhyming translation runs:

The

Wrath

of Peleus’ Son, the direful Spring

Of all the Grecian Woes, O Goddess, sing!

That Wrath which hurl’d to Pluto’s gloomy Reign

The Souls of mighty Chiefs untimely slain;

Whose Limbs unbury’d on the naked Shore

Devouring Dogs and hungry Vultures tore.

Since Great Achilles and Atrides strove,

Such was the Sov’reign Doom, and such the Will of Jove.

Or, more modernly, in Robert Fagles’s far more readable 1990 free‐verse translation:

Rage

—Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus’ son Achilles,

murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans countless losses,

hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,

great fighters’ souls, but made their bodies carrion,

feasts for the dogs and birds,

and the will of Zeus was moving toward its end.

Begin, Muse, when the two first broke and clashed,

Agamemnon lord of men and brilliant Achilles.

More readable, but alas, far less beautiful.

As for the people complaining about the book. They are missing the forest for the trees. Thats all that can be really said about them.

[buku.banzai]

"omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings""omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg is Stannis really dead?" "omg those slavers are going to get what for!" "omg is Jon really dead?" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" The End

lol one more time for posterity.

And all of this snow and not a single Other.

[The Liddle]

Well said ser. The story needs proper build-up. Some people rant and rage about the cliffhanger endings and character delving that Martin has done with his last two novels. I think it's essential that he did things things to keep us interested and on our toes for the last two novels. As well as make things really interesting for tWoW and aDoS. You can't go from point A to point D without going through B and C.

Also keep in mind that Jon doesn't have to die and be resurrected although that will likely be what happens so the wall can fall. We already know red priests have magical healing powers. He might just be healed before losing so much blood that he dies.

Disagree. The whole "it's a middle act" excuse makes no sense. ASoS was the original middle act of a story that was actually going somewhere and it was best book in series bar none. The split of feast and dance makes little and less sense to me now as each book was bloated drivel that desperately needed cutting. Dany's "meerenese" knot was nothing more than a writer inexplicably unable to get his character to act in character.

[Knight of Ashes]

Dany's "meerenese" knot was nothing more than a writer inexplicably unable to get his character to act in character.

Ha! Good one.

[The King of Ashes]

The most distressing thing about this book is that it started off so strong! Tyrion's eerie chapters on the boat to Volantis, Jon taking off Slynt's head and fighting 'rattleshirt', Davos' chapters with Wyman Manderly, and Bran's introduction to Bloodraven. That was all really riveting stuff and it felt like George was back on form...

Then we got the second half.

Nothing happened. The pacing on Daenerys' chapters was horrific and Jon's chapters were depressingly dull. Tyrion spent the second half of the book moping about with an increasingly annoying girl and a silent Jorah Mormont and half of the best POV's disappeared to be replaced with ones not even remotely connected to what had been going on before.

Then you've got the big problem of getting no closure or climax in ANY of the POV's. I heard George wanted to split AFFC and ADWD by location cos he didn't want to end the first book with 'to be continued' but he effectively did it here anyway!! I don't even want to mention Jaime's ending, it wounded me so badly.

Theon's arc was brilliant throughout though and I did like the chapters I got from Jon Connington (probably cos both stories actually progressed).

Overall it was a solid book and better than the previous one. But god it falls short of the glory which was the first three. I'm hoping that these two novels were George's hump that he needed to get over to move forward with the series but I can't help feeling that he's lost it entirely.

I hope I'm wrong.

[Sand Snake No. 9]

I am hoping Aegon replaces Dany. Connington can get shit done.

I've come to the conclusion that Aegon only appeared because GRRM had to get SOME Targ to Westeros to do the thing he set up in the previous books: strike while the kingdom is in chaos. He should take a lesson from himself regarding the pacing of those chapters. Where Dany hasn't been able even to make the decision to go to Westeros, all it took was one cyvasse game with Tyrion to get Aegon, his caretakers, and 10,000 of the world's best sellswords on ships heading West -- and they actually get there!!!! Yeaaaa!

[Ethan Dirtch]

This is a thread for people to rage about what happened in the book.

I'll start:

He killed my nigga Jon!!!!! :crying: :angry2: WTF????

I mean, I still have hopes that he might survive (and I don't mean as Ghost, cause that's just stupid), but that was a hell of a cliffhanger.

I wonder how many years we're gonna wait for this one to resolve. I want GRRM to come out and say it right now: Yes he is dead or No, he is still alive

Now can someone kindly point me towards a topic where people can post their own reviews. I'm sure there is one, but I'm too upset and exhausted to look for it. 3 days it took me to finish it. I pushed myself to finish it as fast as I could, missed work and other stuff, and for what? To have my favorite character killed at the end. :tantrum:

What if he didn't go into Ghost, and instead...WENT INTO WUN WUN!?!? Giant Snow! Jon Wun Wun? Wun Jon Wun?

Here's how it's gonna go:

Someone: Hey GRRM, is Jon Snow really dead, for real?

GRRM: Being stabbed in the back multiple times is usually fatal

Someone: Yeah, but so is getting thrown out of a tower, and lots of other things. Can't you just give us a straight answer?

GRRM: I don't understand why you people keep asking me this! Jon Snow was clearly stabbed multiple times!

*TWOW rolls around, 150 pages in Jon Snow has his first PoV chapter of the book*

You think he'd wait 150 pages? ;)

"omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings""omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg there's so much snow" "omg Meereen's in trouble" "omg what are we going to do with these Wildlings" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" "omg is Stannis really dead?" "omg those slavers are going to get what for!" "omg is Jon really dead?" "omg how am I going to get to Dany" The End

You forgot the chapters of "omg i can't see", "omg now i can see", "omg can i has dragons", and "omg i has stretch marks"

I think people had unrealistically high expectations for the book. I, who started reading the series a few months before AFFC was released, was satisfied by ADWD. I did not expect some grand epic events for the first half, as that coincided with AFFC. The second half had lots of events people seem to overlook, you want the story to be HERE and NOW instead of a proper buildup. ADWD seemed to be more of a midway title like AFFC that spends the time with the characters instead of swooping action everywhere before release, and I wasn't that wrong.

I hated AFFC when it first game out. Now it's my third favorite in the series after ASOS and ADWD. I hated the Cersei, Brienne and Ironborn chapters at first and could not believe Martin wrote such crap. Now here I am six years later and I find the Ironborn chapters tolerable, Cersei chapters good and Brienne chapters some of my favorites.

Sure, I didn't like how Dany sat in Meereen for most of the novel. That doesn't mean that I won't like it tomorrow.

Give the book some time before you jump here full of righteous fury and start smiting every small thing you do not like. Wait a week without interacting with any ASOIAF related content, and then read the book again. If you still despise it, that's fine. But don't trust your first impressions, you were way too hyped when you first read it.

Well, for me, the silver lining I go to is that it's *technically* only half a book. GRRM's made no secret that the 4th book was split into two. As I wondered aloud in another thread, would people still feel the same if they could read one GINORMOUS book, with the chapters ordered as they should be?

With that said, and if I was to consider ADwD as a full book (and, really, I should considering it was about $27 up here in BC, and the fact it's a heavy, unwieldy, hardcover book that either hurt my neck to read, or hurt my wrist to hold up for hours at a time), my biggest rages would ultimately fall to the inconclusive cliffhanger ending. In spite of that little caveat I gave just a couple lines ago, ADwD and AFFC by proxy had the least satisfactory endings to my recollection of the thus-far 5 book series.

My other 'rage' was seeing Dany get married again, no matter how short lived that marriage might be. I still secretly pine for a Jon Snow and Daenarys marriage!

[Raistlan]

A big annoyance for me was that now *every* *single* *chapter* has the structure of a surprise thrown in on the last couple paragraphs or the last page. This can be effective when used sparingly to make you eager to get back to a POV, but having it so regular and predictable lessens the impact immensely. You start a chapter having a pretty good idea of the direction of the chapter, and are just wondering what twist will be coming at the end of it.

[Hedge Knight]

George has two of them (editors), and uses them. Having edited himself, he knows as well as any (and better than most) that they can really help. Anne and Jane have edited all the books in the series to date.

I would love to have the 2 editors respond to the main criticisms of this thread.

I love the books and the characters/plots and got a bunch of people into the books and the HBO series. They all also voice the same criticisms as on this thread. It isn't just one or 2 loudmouths venting. I can't blame GRRM too much.... as a writer, he writes. It's the editors that need to edit and tighten everything up. That is what is lacking.