[ADWD Spoilers] RAGE

[Ten Thousand Walders]

Well, Quentyn did fulfill a prophecy by dying in the east. (House Martell = Sun) There may be further developments with Sallera and Arianne, perhaps all of the Sand Snakes.

I loved the POV of an outsider going into the dragon pit and seeing them for the first time. Found that to be one of the coolest scenes in the book and totally worth a couple Quentyn chapters to build up to it. Just my opinion.

The hate baffles me somewhat. ADWD was my second to least favorite of the series, after AFFC, but I still thought it was a thousand times better than any other given mid-series fantasy novel I've ever read. Seems like a lot of the complaints are along the lines of "character X did not do Y, and I really wanted that to happen in this book" and I think that's more an issue with the reader's expectations than a problem with the writing.

Seriously, does anybody really want Dany to be flying to Westeros on dragonback with Tyrion at her side, the Wall coming down, Jon hacking down Others with Lightbringer as AA reborn etc. within the first 100 pages of TWOW? Where the hell does that leave the story to go? Like many, I was frustrated that there weren't more resolutions and reveals in ADWD than I might have liked, but I'm really not in a big hurry for this series to be over with.

[Santino]

Apparently GRRM gets his jollies from cliffhanger endings and killing off his main characters. Comparing him to Tolkien is a joke, because Tolkien actually had a point to his stories. They were more than just beautiful language and well written chapters.

I agree with most that Jon will some how miraculously live, but this series has become a joke at this point. UnCat? UnGregor? UnBeric? UnJon? Cheap tricks to pretend Arya's blind to just bring her back in the next book with vision and no particular purpose? A Batman style ending only to have Brienne survive? Did anything happen with Arya or Bran that was significant in ADWD?

It's like he is lost and scared to finish the books. So instead he just fills it with Dunk and Egg type stories (characters meandering around westeros).

The only thing positive that came out of this book for me, is that I hope that he doesn't finish the next book and lets HBO finish the series. This is a case of I wish he hadn't written AFFC or ADWD. The first three books were far superior.

Arya's blindness had a purpose. It was part of her training to hone in her other senses. Bran's chapters in ADWD were important too. He's going to take Bloodraven's place.

We aren't sure what's going on with Brienne, and we'll probably find out next book.

While I do think it would've been nice to bring some sort of closer to a few of the characters (such as Brienne and Jaime), the way the Dany and Jon chapters ended were pretty powerful. Especially Dany's journey through the Dothraki Sea.

The best book so far is probably the third. Of course, that was a bigger blood bath than ADWD. That being said, it seems like Martin's writing style has changed since AFFC. For the better, I think. For one, the prologue in ADWD was the best one yet.

I don't think comparing him to Tolkein is a joke, either. They both do a really good job at immersing the reader into their universe. They both have faced the same problem: each book is a continuation of the last one. Because of that, there is an issue finding a stopping point for each book. Tolkein may have been better as far as plot development went, but his characters were notably stale and underdeveloped compared to Martin. Martin's strength is making EVERY character three dimentional, even antagonists, to the point where even though we don't like them, we still feel for our enemies when they fail. Because of this, there seems to be more at stake with all the war, because no matter what side someone may be on, Martin reminds us that they are people with friends and family that will miss them. Tolkein's war was between good and evil, where good prevailed. Martin's war is more ambiguous, therefore more interesting.

By the way, I say this while being the biggest Lord of the Rings fan ever.

Because of the nature of the series, he must finish it. It's wrong to leave an audience with a story half-written.

[Ser Bullitin The Board]

Interesting.

Not being a best selling author, I have little and less in the way of valid ammunition to trap shoot Lord Martin with other than personal opinion.

A few of my gripes first, given the thread title:

-I did not much care for the Dany filler. I felt she was a bit out of character, maybe that's her "growing up". Not sure. Either way though, the huge volume of material dedicated to how Meeeeeeeereeeeeeeen is run, the name, rank, clothing and re-re-re-re-descriptions of everyone in that pyramid shaped clown car did drag immensely. I only say immensely in comparison to her pace in the first 3 book however. What caught me the most was the seemingly sudden switch of character pace, killed me. Yes, slaves are bad. . still bad. . yes, yes I get it. Personally I enjoy a good steak flavoured with the tears of orphans, and I am aware Dany does not, but I get it. She has no right to screw around with the affairs of others a world away from "home". I understand her point, her attempt, but at this stage of the Game it seems to be a sandbag roped to the end of her plot trains caboose, nothing more. Unlike a fine wine, slaving does not get better with age and I feel that this train is due for a refitting.

-Jon. Damnit!! Jon's dead? Waaaaaaaaait. . . . . . wait. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The cliffhanger was a bust. Unfortunately the way these last "two" books were constructed it did not really work for me to leave it dangling like that. If Jonny-Pooh had had a closing chapter where he groans, rolls over and Edd says "You gave us a fright M'Lord. I was sure you would die. I was sure you would die because the ground is frozen down 4 feet and I was most like to be elected to dig the hole." I would have been okay with the minor chapter to chapter cliffhanger. Unfortunately I will now be "racing" Lord Frey to the prunes before I find out he is alive. If he is dead. . . . seems to accomplish nothing for the arc.

-The books would be better if:

A Game of Thrones, quickly paced, beginning, middle, end, 800 pages.

A Clash of Kings, quickly paced, beginning, middle, end, 900 pages.

A Storm of Swords, quickly paced, beginning, middle, end, 1000 pages.

A Feast for Dragons, slogged, . . . . . middle. . . . , 1,500 pages.

A Dragon with the Winds, moderately paced, beginning, middle, end, 400 pages.

A Promise of Spring, quickly paced, beginning, middle, end, 1000 pages.

I went back and read Feast and the first half of Dance as one book. It was like sprinting in the pool and I'm fairly sure I left a few teeth behind but, it read better somehow.

-Another Targ? I'm fairly certain that the young lad got all the "get shit done" genes from the entire last generation. While Dany would lose a wheelchair race to Abe Vigota. It's to big a necessary comparison for my poor molars to take.

The High points:

-Connington is kicking ass and taking names. Finally, someone found the pedal on the right and got us moving.

-Quentyn. He died. It took a bit to long, but at least we had some Bar-B-Que Martell to swap our Japes that are wind over.

-More set up. Yes, I know, but I'm feeling it's necessary somehow. We shall see.

I'll add more later.

[Rydis]

I was disappointed with the first 2/3 of the book. Nothing happened really. Martin went on and on about how he had problems trying to advance the plot without the 5 year gap, but the plot didn't even advance till 2/3 through the book. It was at a standstill. I even remember reading somewhere that Martin said he liked put in filler because not everything had to advance the plot.

I see no reason why this book took 7 years to put out like this. I think we had been dupped.

That being said, while I still like the book, especially the last 1/3..I think even if we only had the last 1/3 of the book..the series would still be exactly the same. It didn't add anything new for us as readers, and felt stale.

[paddydubh]

-Another Targ? I'm fairly certain that the young lad got all the "get shit done" genes from the entire last generation. While Dany would lose a wheelchair race to Abe Vigota. It's to big a necessary comparison for my poor molars to take.

Absolutely! I'm immensely impressed with the way Griff and Y. Griff managed to accomplish what it's taking Dany ages to do. And without dragons.

To reply to the content in the thread.

I LOVED the first three quarters of this book. Was getting up there with ACOK (which in my opinion is the best book, but there's not much in it). I mean the Tyrion and Dany chapters were a bit slow but there are some chapters which are very evocative in description and really made a great experience. The first two Asha chapters were excellent. The second one was especially descriptive and really made the torturous walk of death through the snow only to face more death a true experience to read.

In terms of new characters, I thought Griff's storyline made an excellent addition as well as the more honed focus on the North's bannermen (Manderly and Dustin). The reemergence of Theon was an excellent read. The chapters in Winterfell were haunting and had quite a few mysteries to figure out.

But then it all kind of fizzled out. The meereen and winterfell confrontations were COMPLETELY unresolved. The Meereen one espcecially left a number of characters in limbo. Tyrion, Jorah, and Barristan needed maybe two more chapters for a little satisfaction. Brienne showed up to sate the needs of fans to know what happened and achieved nothing. Cersei's new chapters could easily have been the start of a new book and gone to conclusion.

So although I enjoyed the book immensely I feel it lacks a sense of closure that the best books in this series has. I think that maybe this is because of the length of time between the two books and the decision to split the books.

All in all what most people are saying I think. What really RAGED me was the inclusion of the Jaime, Areo and Cersei chapters. Achieved nothing in this book that the start of a new book wouldnt achhieve better.

[Free Northman]

The way to have salvaged the 5 year gap while still moving the story along was to include LESS detail, not more.

Instead of having 10 Tyrion chapters between Pentos and Meereen, just have 5. Have longer time lapses between chapters. Like Catelyn leaving Riverrun and arriving at Renly's camp in her next chapter. Tyrion could leave Pentos in one chapter and arrive in Volantis in the next.

Same with Daenerys. Just spread her chapters out. Then you could have 3 chapters of her ruling Meereen, but in each one her Dragons have doubled in size, and she has grown that much more mature and world wise.

Kind of what happens with Arya. We don't know how much time passes between her chapters, but clearly her character has progressed a lot in the meantime.

Honestly, the plot could have progressed MUCH further in this book without sacrificing any important events, AND most of the 5 year gap could have been covered as well.

Then the freed up chapters could have been used to focus on those areas where events were happening at a faster pace, like the Stannis/Bolton conflict, and events on the Wall and with Jaime and Brienne.

But all those repetitive "heading to Meereen chapters" of Tyrion, Quentyn and Victarion just felt like repetitions of one another.

Not to mention Daeny's endless issues about the opening of the fighting pits and hunting the Harpy.

The series could have been completed without ONE mention of the fighting pits and we would not have been any poorer. Heck, Daeny could have decided from the start that the fighting pits were fine, and it would never have been an issue.

But bottomline, greater time leaps between chapters, that's what was required. Now we're STILL stuck with a Dragon the size of a condor with a 20 foot wingspan, when Balerion had a wingspan of hundreds of feet when Aegon invaded Westeros.

That means Winds of Winter will have to cover his growth period, thus delaying Daenerys's arrival in Westeros to Dream of Spring, if she wants any hope of conquering whole armies with her Black Dread.

[NeilSpoon]

I just finished the book and I am...... annoyed.

I was lucky enough to be introduced to this series late 2010, so I was able to read all 4 books in one go, watch the HBO series and only had a short wait till ADWD. If I would have been one of the many people on here who had to wait 11 years to find out what happened to the main characters in the series, I would be proper pissed off to find out NOTHING happens... AT ALL! :S

I didn't mind the first half of the book too much, as a build up of events is to be expected. But after reading on I got more and more worried after each chapter as it became apparent this was going to drag on and on.

If only Tyrion and Jorah could have met Dany about half way through, the Dany and Tyrion chapters would have been so much more interesting. The battle for Mereen could have happened towards the end and the closing chapters for Tyrion/Dany/Baristan would involve moving their arses to Westeros!

The Quentyn chapters seemed pointless as he doesn't interact with anyone relevant and simply dies in the end. Seemed like a waste of time.

Arya's story I don't particularly like either since she joined the House of the Many Faced God. All her chapters since then are the same and boring. I wished she would have remained in Westeros (perhaps joining up with her dead mum and practice killing on Freys :))

Brienne's cliffhanger from AFFC gets resolved as in we know she survived (I assume "sword" was the word), but in the same sentence a new cliffhanger is forged. I thought this felt a bit rushed tbh.

Cersei's chapters were good, but again it ends in a cliffhanger. As did the Bolton/Stannis stand off. As did Jon's chapter.

I am really not impressed that in a book the same size as the entire Lord of the Rings, not one of these cliffhangers gets resolved and the only plot progression was the wildlings on the wall and Dany riding a dragon (minor plot progression really). The book was screaming for a climax. I think as a minimum the battle for Mereen, Cersei's trial by battle and Jaime's confrontation with UnCat should have been finished off.

There is also the odd situation that suddenly the very enjoyable Davos/Rickon storyline was stopped midway through the book.

The only good bits from the book I think were Jon's dealings at the wall, making peace with the Wildlings and using them on the wall. Not sure about the cliffhanger, as I fear that it will be yet another resurrection.

I also really enjoyed the Theon/Reek transformation and the escape of Winterfell with Jeyne.

Victarion is also a POV I really like, as he is a bad motherfucker. But he should have arrived at Mereen, smash the Blockade and join the battle that should have been in full swing by the time he arrives.

I also like the Aegon curveball that was introduced.

But all in all.....a HUGE disappointment I am afraid. I am convinced that HBO can do AFFC + ADWD in less than 10 episodes........

[Raiki]

Wow, it seems like I might be one of very few people who thoroughly enjoyed the last Jon chapter. For the entire book, we were hearing about how the old guard at the wall hated him, and hearing Mel's warnings of 'daggers in the dark'...yet for some reason when Jon made the bad decision that broke the camel's back and the shit hit the fan, everyone was just shocked (shocked!) that Jon came down with a case of sudden-onset-dagger-poisoning.

I, for one, hope that GRRM leaves it exactly as it is. Jon is dead, the old pomegranite becomes the next Lord Commander, and we watch through Mel's eyes as the wall comes down and the Others swarm into Westeros. That makes for a much better story than "Oh yeah guys, I was j/k there about the whole Jon thing. Don't you know that fan favorite characters can NEVER die, even if they're little prats?"

Anyway, that's my 2 dragons.

~R~

[sennahoj]

I only started reading the series this year after hearing about the TV adaptation, so basically I haven't had to deal with major breaks between the books like others have. My longest wait was six weeks between finishing AFFC and the release of ADWD. First of all, I was glad to read the POVs again that were missing in AFFC and I just had to keep reading because I wanted to get to the action. Sadly, the plot didn't quite move along as in previous novels. the Jon POV was still alright in this respect, he got a lot of things done along the Wall with the free folk and all, and his assassination (if he is really dead, I don't know) was not that surprising. On the other hand the whole Meereen business was really disappointing to me. I thought with all the people being there and trying to get there, some major battle would happen. Compared to Dany's development from timid trophy wife to mother of dragons in AGOT, there was hardly any development in the Dany POV at all. A lot of procrastination and just more of the same problems (sons of the harpy, Yunkai army, the flux) in every new Dany chapter, without any resolution. If at least one either Victarion or Tyrion could have actually met Dany and helped her by lifting the siege or teaching her dragon-lore, but no, we get Tyrion sailing this ship then that ship, meeting these sellswords, then others. Oh and too many doublecrossing sell-sword companies for my taste, and when something actually happens (as with Sons of Harpy killing Unsullied in Meereen) there's no POV anywhere near. I really liked the Barristan POV, but why can't he come face to face with the harpies for example?

next up, I don't like the new Targaryen plotline. Why did Illyrio bother with Viserys and Dany, and why did he give her 3 eggs, if he was secretly grooming Aegon for command of the Targ invasion? Or do dragons require the presence of a female Targaryen before they can hatch?

About the Dornish: Good riddance. If they were just there to fulfil a prophecy, the chapters had at least some point but still...

I couldn't care less about what happens to Cersei, but why would anyone put just one chapter of a major established POV like Jaime in the book. I'd rather they had two more Jaime chapters and resolve at least some of the Brienne/Stoneheart mystery than Cersei's walk of shame. One or the other could've been left for the next book, honestly.

Oh, and Reek: I could've done with less of his whining and rhyming (same goes for Tyrion's guilt trip about Tywin), but at least he achieves one thing, abducting Pseudo-Arya.

[Leon]

My first post. I've lurked here in the past, after reading the books, but never felt compelled to join because I'd never seen a topic where my view wasn't being represented by someone. On this topic, though, I see a lot of RAGE and a fair amount of defense about A Dance with Dragons, but haven't seen anyone mirroring my take on it. So here goes:

I did enjoy the book greatly, and though I'm frustrated by some characters' actions (or lack thereof), and the relatively small progression of the overall story (vs. the frantic pace of books 1-3), those aren't truly the source of my discontent.

The real world timeline is what I find incredibly frustrating. At the end of A Feast for Crows, Mr. Martin was kind enough to address the obvious complaint, which is that the book was missing so many characters and story arcs. And, in a nutshell, he said the other half was nearly done. Six years later, we have a book that I just can't believe took 6 years to write from scratch, much less 6 years to touch up a nearly finished companion piece.

I could happily read 10 more books at this pace - in the story. But at this pace in real life, not only would Mr. Martin be dead before that happens, at 38 I likely would be as well. I do hope he gets back to the faster pace with the next book, or we clearly won't be seeing the end of this story.

[Relic]

While i feel no "rage" (boy there are a lot of adolescent males posting here suddenly)i was disappointed with all that was left unresolved by the end of the novel. I image tWoW will have the most intense first half of any of the books if/when it's released. I hope GRRM hasn't written himself into another knot tho.

[Blaine]

While i feel no "rage" (boy there are a lot of adolescent males posting here suddenly)i was disappointed with all that was left unresolved by the end of the novel. I image tWoW will have the most intense first half of any of the books if/when it's released. I hope GRRM hasn't written himself into another knot tho.

Word. There was a ton in the book that I loved and like everyone else, I wanted to see what happened next. But I think the main knot stuff has passed. To me, it felt like the writing was picking up pace by the end of the book. Hopefully that's a sign that words are flowing better now.

[Knight of Ashes]

Word. There was a ton in the book that I loved and like everyone else, I wanted to see what happened next. But I think the main knot stuff has passed. To me, it felt like the writing was picking up pace by the end of the book. Hopefully that's a sign that words are flowing better now.

Is that what Dany's diarrhea was hinting at?

[Lord of Starfal]

At this rate, I think we can expect the series to be finished by Brandon Sanderson.

[Relic]

Word. There was a ton in the book that I loved and like everyone else, I wanted to see what happened next.

yeah that's exactly it. 300 pages into the book i saw that i had 600 pages left and (after shitting my pants in happiness) i was preparing myself for a climax of epic proportions. I almost wish i had been spoiled a tad and told not to expect any major plot resolution. I think i would have loved this book if that was the case.

Either way i don't begrudge GRRM taking 960 pages to tell us the tale he wanted to tell us in aDwD. Better than telling it in 500 pages imo. And if you don't know what i mean... you probably haven't been reading this series for the last 13 years.

[Brucolac]

There is a bunch of stuff I dislike in ADWD, but the thing that makes me cringe the most is whenever I had to read a "murder of ravens".

Murder of CROWS

UNKINDNESS of ravens

Yeah, GRRM, it doesn't sound as sinister, but at least it looks right when you see it on the page. If you are going to use the history, animals and descriptive jargon of our own world; you should get them right.

[Arthmail]

No rage, but disappointed in parts.

The Dany chapters continue to be the most boring in the series. More of her doings sweet fuck all, with a dash of boring man dependency, and then some more nothing.

Bran became interesting for the first time, i wish we had seen some more of him and his companions.

Anything to do with Dorne has been fairly boring since the beginning.

The ending was a joke. Jon is either dead or alive, but it felt tacked on, and to be honest at this point i found myself not caring at all.

Originally i did not like Stannis, but now i wish him all the best of luck. He's one of the few honest characters in the books.

Davos should have his own book. I enjoy his character and his personality immensely.

All in all, i waited some years for this book. During the intervening time i lost interest in the books, and only purchased this one because i managed to get it for 40% off. Now, Martin is still better than many other authors out there. But still, its been a long wait...and for what? Now the resolution for the next book could be brilliant and totally redeem the series to what it was clearly meant to be in the first three books. Hopefully that is the case.

But each half decade that it takes depletes the reason for going on. Jordan might have wandered all over the place and filled his later books with shit, but at least he was putting them out fairly regularily. Martin needs to sit down and finish the friggin series. A book that size should not take more than 2 years.

But he does as he will, and the choice is his. I just can't promise to be waiting around for the next one to come out....unless i can get it for 40% off again, of course.

[gogorath]

I loved the POV of an outsider going into the dragon pit and seeing them for the first time. Found that to be one of the coolest scenes in the book and totally worth a couple Quentyn chapters to build up to it. Just my opinion.

The hate baffles me somewhat. ADWD was my second to least favorite of the series, after AFFC, but I still thought it was a thousand times better than any other given mid-series fantasy novel I've ever read. Seems like a lot of the complaints are along the lines of "character X did not do Y, and I really wanted that to happen in this book" and I think that's more an issue with the reader's expectations than a problem with the writing.

Seriously, does anybody really want Dany to be flying to Westeros on dragonback with Tyrion at her side, the Wall coming down, Jon hacking down Others with Lightbringer as AA reborn etc. within the first 100 pages of TWOW? Where the hell does that leave the story to go? Like many, I was frustrated that there weren't more resolutions and reveals in ADWD than I might have liked, but I'm really not in a big hurry for this series to be over with.

There's some criticisms of Dance I find I agree with, namely that structurally it's not a complete book. This is disappointing because he's avoided this to date. The end does seem quick and anti-climatic. It's okay to have anti-climaxes, but together the book somewhat fizzled at the end.

It's not rage-worthy. And I completely +1 on the criticism of folks who didn't like the book because it didn't go like they wanted. I think my favorite was the person who was furious that the Others didn't attack Eastwatch in this book. Umm, okay, that seems like a random complaint.

I'll up the ante -- I don't need those things to happen int eh first 100 pages of TWOW and I don't need them to ever happen. I'm okay with the story happening as it happens, and frankly, if nothing goes to formula (and that's what people keep expecting), I'm okay as long as it makes sense. Dany and Jon could both die, and I bet it'd be great.

Furthermore, I loved the Quentyn storyline, and I really wasn't bored. There's tons of great character moments and development, tons of neat things to read about and some fantastic sequences. But expectations (the above plot expectations) are impossible to beat. The reality is, for a lot of these people criticizing, they still want something formulaic, something where the main character kicks ass, and no one can beat them. These characters are more real.

I will say, though, things do need to come to an awesome conclusion.

[Davos' Middle Finger]

Amen brother.

ADWD is not anything close to worthy of a thread with the word " rage" in all-caps as the title. There are legitimate criticisms of the book, ones I had myself, but they are not served by hysteric childishness.

[Raksha the Demon]

I loved the POV of an outsider going into the dragon pit and seeing them for the first time. Found that to be one of the coolest scenes in the book and totally worth a couple Quentyn chapters to build up to it. Just my opinion.

The hate baffles me somewhat. ADWD was my second to least favorite of the series, after AFFC, but I still thought it was a thousand times better than any other given mid-series fantasy novel I've ever read. Seems like a lot of the complaints are along the lines of "character X did not do Y, and I really wanted that to happen in this book" and I think that's more an issue with the reader's expectations than a problem with the writing.

Seriously, does anybody really want Dany to be flying to Westeros on dragonback with Tyrion at her side, the Wall coming down, Jon hacking down Others with Lightbringer as AA reborn etc. within the first 100 pages of TWOW? Where the hell does that leave the story to go? Like many, I was frustrated that there weren't more resolutions and reveals in ADWD than I might have liked, but I'm really not in a big hurry for this series to be over with.

I didn't expect Jon to be hacking down Others with Lightbringer within the first 100 pages of TWOW. And I don't hate ADWD; but the book did disappoint me.

I did expect, by the end of ADWD, that Dany would be more in control of her dragons, Dany would have learned more about the serious flaws in her father's reign from the very earnest and truthful Barristan, and that she'd be preparing to leave Essos for Westeros with dragons and swords at her disposal. I did expect that Dany and Tyrion would have met and allied. I did expect that we'd learn more of Jon's parentage than hints about Ashara Dayne's stillborn daughter or rumors about Ned and a fisherman's daughter; and that Jon would come closer to becoming Azor Azhai or the PHWP or Aragorn or whoever...Instead, we've got a cute new DragonBoy Aragorn; and, with his introduction, enough new possibilities to lengthen the series by another two books, i.e. nine books instead of seven. (unless GRRM kills off DragonBoy in TWOW, in which case I would say, what was the point of all that?)

The main plots of the series, i.e. the disposition of the Iron Throne and the conflict with the Others, did not advance much. The minor plots of the series? Well, some advanced (Cersei, Jon, Theon, Davos) and some crawled (Dany, Tyrion, Doran/Dornish). There seemed to be more setup than plot going on in ADWD; and at this point in the series, I feel there should be more plot, the major pieces should all be moving towards a final conflict with more speed; so the momentum can rise in TWOW and the conflict explode in the last book (and possibly part of TWOW as well).

I enjoyed parts of ADWD; but GRRM has set a high mark with the first three books, he built up a huge tapestry of plot threads; and there's still no end or resolution in sight, just more plot threads and some of them aren't going anywhere, or are going too slowly. I felt we needed a lot more buildup than texture; and GRRM now wants to emphasize texture...