There was less action, but no less consequences. This was a "payback" kind of book - all the actions from the earlier books are come back to haunt people.

And there were certainly some surprises and some effective moments in this book as well.

I also felt like this was the "woman's" book. Sam and Jaime aside, the great majority of the book was told from the view of female characters. An interesting decision, but I suppose he's running low on male characters in Westeros to use for a viewpoint...

*****TOTAL SPOILERS*********

*******HUGE SPOILERS**********

*****SERIOUS ABOUT THE SPOILERS******

**STOP IF YOU HAVEN’T FINISHED THE BOOK**

**THIS MEANS YOU, SLOW READER***


I totaled screwed myself on reading this one. After spending a month carefully re-reading all the books in the series in prep for AFfC’s release, and making sure that I didn’t take my amazon.com-shipped copy out of the box before I was done with my ASofS re-read (I didn’t trust myself not to peek)—I put “Cersei Lannister” into the wikipedia.com search field on a whim the day I finished ASofS- hours before I was to start reading AFfC. They had already updated her profile with all of the AFfC info—so the first two sentences, which I skimmed before I realized they were HUGE SPOILERS- said “arrested for plotting to kill her daughter-in-law Margaery” and “living in a fear from a prophecy that says her younger brother will kill her.” ARGGHHHH! Can you even imagine two worse things to read before you opened this book?? So, while I loved the Cersei storyline in this. It was a total anti-climax to me. As I was just reading to see how GRRM got her into the cell, already knowing she was headed there.

After Cersei, Samwell was my fav POV in this (I love Arya more, but her POV in this was lame in this one). I do think that GRRM is clinging too tightly to Sam’s insecurities. After all he has been through, I think it is really time for the “I’m such a big fat coward” interior monologue to change. Hopefully we are getting there. Am also not sure why after starving for a year on and behind the wall, he is still so fat. Is it a glandual thing? I guess if the Ironborn close off the port at Oldtown and the city has shortages he may get another crash diet. But surely, with all his clothes repeatedly getting baggy, he should be ‘very stout’ now instead called fat by everyone he meets. Anyway, I loved hearing about the Hedge Knight characters from Aemon in his POVs, although I hoped Aemon would reach the citadel or strike off to reach Dany. I hope Gilly is preggers with another of his “bastards” – a real one this time. And am wondering if the broken horn he has been carrying all this time has something to do with the fact his ancestral seat is named Horn Hill? Or is that a coincidence? Am hoping he will find a copy of Septon Barth’s banned works and discover the Ice and Fire prophecy. It was great to see Aemon figure it all out, and crushing that he never got to see Dany. I liked also seeing the allusions to GRRM’s Hedge Knight in this plot line and in Brienne’s (the shield she has painted). I guess I need to read Hedge Knight now when I re-read the books before ADwD comes out (hopefully next year). Egg and Dunc in that have something to do with the destruction of Summerhall- and that figures into Rhaegar and the prophecy.

Brienne has also been a fav character. But I was a little bored with her in this. Her chapters seemed endless, she kept running into dead ends, and at the end she doesn’t complete her quest at all and it looks like she is going to go off and kill Jaime instead. She has been the girls’ protector for two books now, and it is disappointing to see her not only failing that task (I was so hoping in a book or so she would throw one a door in the Vale, yank Petyr Littlefinger out of Sansa’s bed and geld him) but she’s getting assigned a quest I don’t want to go on. I know she and Jaime were never going to hook up, raise half ugly/half stunning kids on Tarth, and wave cheerily at Dany every time she rode over the island on her dragons. But do they have to try and kill one another again? We already watched that for a whole book. And what is with her backstory? A bet on her maidenhead? And now she wants all those men to die? Other characters have back stories where they vowed revenge because their fathers were roasted alive in their own armor, or small children’s heads were dashed against walls. Her backstory is one I saw in a lousy Freddie Prinze Jr. movie (She’s All That). And she wants bloody vengeance for that? It would have been great to see the ugly duck in the Prinze movie chase him around with a sword, but as I recall, she just pouted for a few hours and then danced with him at prom. Nice to see Pod again, though. I think he will be the foremost knight in the realm if he only lives long enough.

Sansa was alright. But she has never been the most compelling of the Stark children, has she? I think that this section of the book suffered from the elimination of GRRM’s five year gap. He had intended the events of AFfC to take place 5 years after ASofS. And the events in the Vale would have made sense spread out over 5 years. The Lords Declarant would have had time to come to heel under Petyr’s manipulations. But as it stands, he wins two as instant allies in his first meeting and then the rest just decide never to bother him. He even says to Sansa at one point that he is surprised and displeased that Cersei is running the kingdom into the ground so fast because he had hoped for 4 or 5 years to set things up in the Vale. I think that is really GRRM complaining that he has to rush his Vale set up after eliminating the 5 year gap. Petyr’s reference to the war of the Three Queens makes me think that we are actually headed to a war of five queens (to mirror the war of five kings). With the queens being: Cersei, Margaery, Dany, Sansa, and either Asha or Myrcella—maybe Arianne. That is also probably why the book is becoming a little more feminine in tone right now.

In Dorne, I liked the possible alliance with Dany that is being set up. I hope that Quentyn Martell is one of her husbands and Jon is the other when all the dust settles after the final battle. Arianne is a painful, whining, selfish brat. I hated being trapped in that tower with her for a whole chapter. I wanted out more than she did! Am wondering if poor, maimed Myrcella will live to use her strategy game skills in the game of thrones? It is not looking likely. I think both she and Tommen will die before Cersei.

Cersei’s storyline, so unkindly revealed to me before I opened the book, was really awesome. I love it that it has never occurred to her that as the firstborn of the Lannister twins she has two little brothers and not one. I almost feel sorry for her. Things are clearly not going to end well for her. I am hoping that she takes the high septon down with her if she can.

Edmure in the bathtub listening to the Rains of Castlemere really got me. Shades of the red wedding. That is the story I fell in love with and can’t stop re-reading. I almost feel sorry for that stupid horse’s *ss. I can’t believe that while Robb and Cat were dying (and I was sobbing!) That idiot was actually consummating the wedding! And now Roslyn is pregnant and Robb’s Queen Jeyne was prevented from conceiving by her evil mother! ARGHH! I also love it that Walder Frey is down two heirs already. Go Stoneheart. I think if there is ever a video game version of the books, you should be able to hunt and kill Freys as part of it.

Arya’s my hands down fav, so it was nice to see her in the book at little at least. GRRM says she will also be in the next book, so hopefully her storyline picks up. I am okay with her training to be a Faceless Man (Woman?), but am not okay with her having to give up her Arya-ness to do it. At least she didn’t throw Needle into the canal like I feared she would. I really want her to get going on some revenge. I think her storyline definitely suffers from the elimination of the gap. GRRM obviously wanted to just cut to five years later when she is a kick-ass Faceless Person. So this is all Karate Kid-style training to be a ninja filler. I like still touching base with her, though, so no serious complaints.

Next book should be the heavy hitter with Tyrion, Jon, Bran, Davos, more Arya, and Dany. That book certainly seems to be weighted with more heavy hitters. GRRM says it will follow the same timeframe and AFfC and go a little further timewise.

I went to a book signing in Huntington Beach with GRRM this weekend and he said the following (paraphrased not verbatim)

“I have 600 pages to write on A Dance With Dragons. I hope to finish fall of 2006 and have the book out in 2006.”
When asked if he would release a pronunciation guide for character names “I don’t think so. I’m from New Jersey, you know, and half the time I don’t think I’m pronouncing them right myself.” He went on to say that the audio books get most of the names right, although they did not ask him to clarify simple names so in some instances they say things like Pee-TIRE for Petyr, even though he just intended it to be an alternate spelling for Peter.
“You will learn a little bit about the fall of Valyria in the next few books in bits and pieces but not the full story.”
“The 5 year gap was a stupid idea. It worked great for the kids, but I found myself writing chapters for characters like Jon that went “Well, I’ve been Lord Commander of the wall for five years now. Nothing much has happened. Been pretty quiet, really.” And it just didn’t work at all.”
“I am a gardener. I plant seeds and grow the story from them. I am not an architect who lays out a foundation, and then plans walls and plumbing and electrical work. I just water and watch it grow.”
When asked how much of the back story (i.e., Robert’s rebellion, fall of Valyria, etc.) he knew before he wrote the first chapter: “None of it. I discovered it all while writing.”
“The Reach is the most populous area of Westeros and can field the most troops. But never believe any troop estimates you see in the books. They all are incorrect and they vary from account to account. I did this intentionally so that you would not have better information than the characters, who are getting their information from inaccurate or biased sources.”
“Tyrion is the character most like me, but don’t think that makes him safe.”

I think Arya will most certainly reunite with Nymeria. Absolutely George will give us resolution on that...

I know! That seriously pissed me off.

"Oh, No you di'nt, George"

I'm hoping the blindness is just temporary. Maybe the faceless man is trying to teach her a lesson since she is now supposed to be Cat of the canals not Arya Stark?