Thursday, June 28, 2018

Review: A Storm Of Swords by George R.R. Martin


A Storm Of Swords by George R.R. Martin


Series: A Song of Ice and Fire #3
Pages: 1179
Genre: Adult high fantasy
Publication Date: August 2000


Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage, alliances are made and broken. Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of the sorceress who holds him in her evil thrall. Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons left in the world. And as opposing forces maneuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mystical Others—a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords.





This review is for book #3 in a series. I tried to keep it as spoiler-free as possible, but you might want to read my reviews for books 1 and 2.




The third book in the series is where the . . . ah . . . poop hits the fan. The first two books are buildup and this one is the explosion. In this installment, wildlings attack the wall, and teenage Jon is left to defend it. The allied families start betraying each other (with deadly consequences). And Joffrey gets exactly what he deserves. It’s all so, so brilliant. The first two books in the series are good, but this one is what I was waiting for. Crazy stuff is definitely happening now. Zombies are on the move, and no one can be trusted.

I can’t imagine what it was like for people who read these novels as they came out. I’ve seen every episode of the TV show multiple times, so I knew what was going to happen in the book. Still, reading it was shocking. I’m sorry to all you readers who unknowingly stumbled into the Red Wedding. I knew it was coming. I spotted all of the foreshadowing. Despite being prepared, I read the Wedding scene at 1 in the morning and had to scream silently so that I didn’t wake the whole house. My poor favorite characters! George R.R. Martin is a monster!

The chaos at Joffrey’s wedding made me feel better, though. I understand that he’s a child, and I shouldn’t wish for bad things to happen to children, but he’s fictional, so it’s okay, right? I imagine that Joffrey’s wedding was another shocker for readers who didn’t know that it was coming.





I've lost a hand, a father, a son, a sister, and a lover, and soon enough I will lose a brother. And yet they keep telling me House Lannister won this war.A Storm of Swords









Like in the first two books, my favorite point-of-view character is Tyrion. He’s smarter than everybody else. The other characters are constantly trying to vilify him, even when he’s done nothing wrong. In this book, he finally becomes the monster that everybody accuses him of being, but he does it for the good of the kingdom. He’s the only one who’s intelligent enough to overthrow the dictators.

My other favorite point-of-view is Arya. She’s easy to love because she’s such a little badass.

My favorite point-of-view that is added in A Storm of Swords is Jaime. He’s terrible to Brienne, and I hate him for it, but he’s hilarious. He always has the perfect comeback. My favorite scene in this whole giant novel is the one with Brienne and Jaime in the pool. I love that they finally have a real conversation instead of just insulting each other. I hope that George R.R. Martin finishes this series because I need to know where their relationship goes! Jaime needs to dump his creepy sister and hang out with nice, normal people like Brienne.
 



We look up at the same stars and see such different things.A Storm of Swords




As much as I like this book, I did get bored occasionally. I feel like there are a lot of scenes where the characters are just talking. There is a lot of description and way too many names. I got impatient to get back to the action. Less yacking, more whacking off heads please.

Also, I’m going to put off reading the next book for a few months. I’m nervous about it because I’ve heard that it focuses on minor characters and leaves out some of my favorites. (No Tyrion and no Jon? What is this madness?) I’ll definitely read the book eventually, but I’m not massively excited about it right now. I need some recovery time before I dive back into Westeros. A Storm of Swords was intense (in the best possible way).





TL;DR: This book is everything I wanted. The best in the series so far.











30 comments:

  1. It's my favourite book in the series! I loved that second half where it all goes mad! These are amongst my favourite bits from the series-end of season 3 and season four where everything happens to Tyrion!

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    1. Yes! The second half is brilliant. I especially like that there is so much Tyrion in it.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  2. HAHA where the poop hits the fan. Love your introduction to this book review, and I'm so intimidated by this series, I'm waiting for the series to finally end before purchasing it and reading it in one sitting :)

    The Red Wedding. I don't watch too much of GoT but even that is one of the saddest and bloodiest events in book history

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    1. Haha, I wanted to use a stronger word than “poop,” but advertisers don’t like that word, and I’m trying to be good.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  3. I LOVE THIS BOOK! The first three books are great, and then I felt like the series dropped off in excitement. I almost want to re-read them now that I know what's going to happen, but that such a time commitment. :p Great review!

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    1. I’m worried that the series will drop off in excitement. That’s one of the reasons why I’m holding off on finishing the series. I want to catch up on my Goodreads goal before I start a book that might be a slog.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  4. I'm yet to brave any of the GoT novels although I have seen the first five TV series so I know that much of the story arcs. I imagine the books have way more detail though. Would watching the TV show help me keep a track of who's who?

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    1. I don’t think I would have been able to read these books without seeing the show first. The show helps me keep track of the characters. There are so many characters that I would have been confused if I didn’t already know them.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  5. Those books are too big for me!!! I decided to watch the show instead lol. I am sure the book is better but oh well. Glad this was a great installment!

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    1. Honestly, I like the show more than the books. It cuts out a lot of the extra characters and clutter.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  6. I think basically the next two books were like one giant book that he split in two, and he did that by splitting the POVs. Tyrion is absolutely my favorite character; he's the smartest and the funniest one. I agree, there are way too many names sometimes.

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    1. I’m curious about the next two books. It’ll be interesting to see how the story is split.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  7. I love the show! I did try reading the first book after watching a couple of seasons but it was so slow with all the wold development. I just wanted to just back into the meat of the story. Maybe I should have started with the third books. LoL

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    1. Yep. The first book is repetitive if you’ve already seen the show. There is a lot of worldbuilding, and I already knew all that stuff.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  8. Ah, I'm so glad you also appreciate Jaime's hilariousness! My favorite POV is easily Sansa, who only got two chapters in AFFC and none in ADWD so I feel your pain :( George also released one of her TWOW chapters on his website a couple years ago, but it still isn't enough! Fingers crossed the sixth book comes out...sometime...when I'm alive...

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    1. I really hope this series gets finished. I don’t want to read 10000 pages and then not ever have an ending.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  9. I'm looking forward to reading this one! I'm still not over watching The Red Wedding. I used to hate Jamie but now I love him and totally ship him with Brienne.

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    1. YES to Jaime and Brienne. He could be a wonderful person if he gets away from his creepy sister and spends some time around normal people.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  10. I bought book one and need to read it , my husband keeps bugging me too. It does tend to have a bit of slow parts that bore me I agree

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    1. There are a lot of slow parts in the series. I get impatient with them, especially because I’ve already seen the show and know what’s going to happen.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  11. It was really weird how they split up books four and five like they did.

    You're right that there are a huge number of names in this series. It's a little hard to keep track of them all. Then again, these books take a long time to read, so if Winds of Winter ever comes out, I might just read it without rereading these. If the seventh book ever comes out, I might reread them to refresh my memory... because that's probably going to be a LOOOOOOOOOOONG time from now.

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    1. I think I’ll have to rely on my horrible memory because I don’t know if I’ll ever reread these. It takes me 2-4 weeks to finish each one.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  12. You are a reading beast taking on this monster of a book. Did you watch the TV show? If so, it is still a fulfilling read knowing so much of the story beforehand?

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    1. Yes, I’ve watched the TV show. Honestly, I don’t think I’d be able to read the books without seeing the show first. There are so many characters! I would have been confused. Even though I know the plot, I think the books are fulfilling.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  13. You are so brave to dive into this series! Haha! Just having seen the show, I can totally see how you could've gotten bored at times. There were many scenes I completely zoned out in. I do love Tyrion though! Great review!

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    1. Yeah, there are a lot of scenes where people are just talking. I wish they’d do something while talking.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  14. This is my favorite book so far in the series as well. So much craziness! I actually just started the fourth book this weekend and can't decide what I think of it so far. I'm just over 200 pages in and there have been lots of mentions of Tyrion but no actual signs of the man himself so far. Same with Jon. We'll see how it goes.

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  15. The Red Wedding was horrible. All those people, the cream of the North- that was tough to read. Especially the first time I did, before the show- it comes out of nowhere and is so shocking! I love Arya's and Jaime's POV's too- they're the BEST.

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  16. Ugh, I haven't been able to get through the second book yet! I feel so much like it's info dumping and build up, although I still felt like book one had a plot regardless of it being a lot of world building too :/ Which is a shame because it sounds like things really take off here!

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  17. My son just finished the second book, but wanted a palate cleanser, so he went to B&N to get his next Dresden Files but they didn't have it. He bought this book, but when he got home he decided he was going to read the fourth Dune book from my bookshelf. 😂

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