A Dance With Dragons

Finally! After a year and a half or so, I'm completely caught up with the A Song of Ice and Fire series. As has been mentioned many times before, George R R Martin managed to crank out three fantastic books in the first 4 years and since then the series has completely slowed down and people have argued over the quality of what has come since then. Book four, A Feast For Crows, is everyone's least favorite just because so little is happening and so few of the main characters were fan favorites. A Storm of Swords ended with complete chaos in King's Landing, and yet when the next book picked up focusing almost entirely on King's Landing, not all that much happened, although I though GRRM pulled off some great cliffhangers to end it on. A Dance With Dragons focused nearly entirely on characters who didn't show up in A Feast for Crows, so let's take an in-depth look at each of them, shall we? Minus the prologue and epilogue one-offs, of course. Some spoilers are ahead but nothing story-ruining.

 

Tyrion Lannister- Tyrion is the one who caused so much chaos in King's Landing, and the last we heard of him Varys was sneaking him off to Essos on a boat. At this point Tyrion is probably most people's favorite character and his biting, sarcastic wit is as strong as ever; unfortunately Tyrion rarely ever meets up with anyone who can keep up with him in that regard so it feels a little wasted. I thought I had some idea as to what Tyrion would be up to in A Dance with Dragons, but I was very wrong.

 

Jaime Lannister- Jaime returns for one quick chapter in the Riverlands which then ends with the same cliffhanger we saw in Brienne's chapters in A Feast For Crows. Still though I thought it made sense to save this chapter for Dance rather than tack it on to the end of Feast.

 

Cersei Lannister- Feast's main character returns for a few more chapters here and both were much more interesting than anything that happened to her in Feast.

 

Jon Snow- Great chapters! For a guy whose character has been criticized for being a little bit boring compared with the more three-dimensional characters we've seen elsewhere, Jon really managed to carry all of the action at the Wall, and I liked watching him grow into his role as Lord Commander of the Night's Watch. His story ended with a few cliffhangers, but no one's really buying either of them.

 

Bran Stark- Bran only got three chapters in Dance, and two of them have already made it to the show; still though I thought they worked much better in writing than on television, and I get the feeling Bran will be a much more important part in the story moving forward.

 

Arya Stark- She's long since stopped going by "Arya", but still. Arya gets a couple chapters here after her three or four in Feast, but she made them count. We're still just watching her in training but the world of the faceless men is one that I want to read more about.

 

Daenerys Targaryen- If any story suffered in Dance, it was that of the Khaleesi. We've seen her mature so fast from a scared young girl into a brutal but just conqueror. So to see her regress back to a teen girl, unable to make tough decisions and wanting to throw it all away for "love", was pretty disappointing. Her story picked up towards the end, and she's in an interesting place by the end of the book, even though you could say it's just more regression.

 

Barristan Selmy- Dany's chapters in Meereen were mostly frustrating, so it was nice to take a break for a bit and get some point-of-view chapters from her trusted advisor and new point-of-view character, Barristan Selmy. There were only a few, but I enjoyed them.

 

Quentyn- The title "A Dance with Dragons" feels like the most appropriate in the series, as a reoccurring theme here is that lots of families in Westeros are starting to take Dany and her dragons seriously and realizing what a useful ally she could be in whatever plans they have. Quentyn (last name omitted) is one such character, on his way to Dany and her dragons with hopes that he can convince her to leave Meereen and come back to Westeros. He's not alone though, because...

 

Griff- is another character on his way with a small group of his own. What's their story? No info here!

 

Victarion Greyjoy- is a third Westerosi seeking Dany's favor. As we all know, the Iron Islands have thrown their hat in the ring in the War of the Five Kings, and they could certainly benefit from Dany's dragons and huge army.

 

Asha Greyjoy- We've seen her before, and I like that the tv show is really giving her a lot more material than the books have- I feel like Asha is the best window into the Greyjoy family- a little like a younger Brienne who isn't quite as freakish. Her story in this book gets her involved with some of the other major players, so I liked them.

 

Theon Greyjoy- Book-wise it's been assumed that Theon is dead for two books now, so I'm curious if it was a big surprise for Theon to suddenly show up out of nowhere as the fourth 'main character' in Dance. This was ignored in the show, which kept Theon around and showed him getting tortured for the entirety of season three and even introduced a failed rescue attempt. Theon has been a chore to watch lately on the show, so it was nice to see his chapters actually picked up a lot as he becomes an important player again and struggles to regain his sanity.

 

Areo Hotah- Maybe the least personality of any recurring character, Hotah is really just a window into what's happening in Dorne, getting one chapter here after his one chapter in Feast. The chapters are good at least even if I don't have much of a feel for the character.

 

Davos Seaworth- Like Bran, Davos hasn't been heard from since halfway through Storm, and also like Bran, Davos yet again disappears halfway through the book. His chapters were great, though.

 

Lady Melisandre- Melisandre got her own chapter this time around too! Even if it wasn't too important, it was nice to see how much Melisandre mixes actual magic with cheap illusions to keep up her mysterious aura.

 

So yeah, lots of new faces getting focused on- it's no wonder Martin had such a hard time balancing the story and making it all work. It still doesn't quite feel like the series can wrap up any time soon- there are so, so many loose ends, but I'm hopeful that finishing off the complicated plot of the "Meereenese Knot" and the fact that GRRM already had a lot of chapters for Winds of Winter already written at the time of Dance with Dragons' publication means that the wait won't be too much longer before the next book arrives. Maybe I'm just being optimistic, which this series has proven over and over again is usually a mistake. For now though, if I need a Game of Thrones fix to hold me over until March, there is a new video game...