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A Clash of Kings

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51de7tjxvgl_sl160_A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, Book 2) continues George R.R. Martin’s epic series. It practically starts off where the first book left off — I can’t imagine anyone reading the second book without reading the first. I was hoping that some of the conflicts would be resolved in this book, but they weren’t. It’s like watching an episode of Lost: you think you’re getting answers, but you’re just getting more and more questions. But that’s not a bad thing at all.

A few new characters are introduced in A Clash of Kings, but I was really just interested in the fate of the Starks. I changed favorites as I went through the book because a few characters finally had their motives revealed. I got a little bored of all the lords and knights and the minor politics in the middle, but kept reading nonetheless.

Reading these books reminds me of watching a long-running television series because so much is going on. Almost every chapter has some sort of “aha!” moment or at least a cliffhanger. And the end of the A Clash of Kings? Unsatisfying, which compelled me to immediately start the next book in the series.

Review: A Game of Thrones

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51va4rfs6xl_sl160_A Game of Thrones is one of the best fantasy novels I’ve ever read. This may sound like high praise especially after only reading the first book of the series, but A Song of Ice and Fire series may just well be the Lord of the Rings of my generation.

I know the old saying about not judging a book by its cover, but I had put off reading A Game of Thrones for a while because the cover was so generic with its orange gradient background and silhouetted wolf on the cover. I’m sorry I waited so long. The 800-plus page book is such a page-turner that I read the whole thing in less than a week.

The beginning of the novel may put some people off and I certainly was confused, but just keep with it. The novel is laid out with each chapter coming from the perspective of a revolving set of characters. The first few chapters are hard to read through because there’s not much to go on, but readers who continue will soon be rewarded.

A Song of Ice and Fire is not a fantasy novel for the weak at heart because it spares no punches. There are unexpected deaths, incest, torture, twists, and all sorts of back-stabbings. What really won me respect for this novel is that George R. R. Martin isn’t afraid of killing characters that other authors would keep alive. When good characters die, it opens up a realm of possibilities of where the story can go because readers know that there are no limits.

I took a long hiatus from reading fantasy novels because I was put off from the genre from reading too many Terry Goodkind novels. This series is an awesome welcome back to the genre. Every part of the first novel is exciting, even the political back and forths that usually bore me. I’m probably late to the party on this, but even if you’re on the fence about this book, at least read through the first hundred pages of A Clash of Kings to see if the series is for you.