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by **LOLtron** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:42 pm

Reading Realms reviews the fifth volume in the Song of Fire and Ice epic by George R.R. Martin: A Dance with Dragons.

Genre: Fantasy

Rating:3.5 smileys

Cover Blurb:

In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance -- beset by newly emerging threats from every direction. In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death. But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her. As they father, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the queen, with an entirely different goal in mind. Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys. But his newest allies in this quest are not the ragtag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who could undo Daenerys's claim to Westeros forever. Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone -- a structure only as strong as those guarding it. There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, will face his greatest challenge. For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice. From all corners, bitter conflicts reignite, intimate betrayals are perpetrated, and a grand cast of outlaws and priests, soldiers and skinchangers, nobles and slaves, will face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Some will fail, others will grow in the strength of darkness. But in a time of rising restlessness, the tides of destiny and politics will lead inevitably to the greatest dance of all.

Review

Fans have waited a long time for this latest volume and the first question many might have is 'was it worth the wait?'... A question perhaps unfair of me to answer since I only read the entire series a few summers ago so I have only waited a couple years myself. Enough for me to be past anxious though so I will answer with both a yes and a no.

Why both? Well yes in the sense that it is great to be able to return to the world and read about the characters I love and see where the story will go. But the no is what I'll get into in my review. The book fell a little short with me and it may be something that I personally had issues with that other readers may not. As I got to book three in the saga it began to feel like things were being dragged out in the series. I don't think Martin was trying to swindle the readers or anything of the sort, I believe he just kept adding layers to a story that originally was only meant to have less character viewpoints and be wrapped up in a smaller number of volumes.

I think this is why book four focused on characters many people didn't care for -- characters that were not really big viewpoints in earlier books (with a couple exceptions) and why when we get to this book it feels like Martin is just 'circling the wagons' when we read their viewpoints. Technically of course the story continues with Jon Snow, Tyrion Lannister, Daenerys; but once all is said and done and you look back not a lot happened compared to other characters. In a way it feels like he is still trying to get his pieces into position to move toward a conclusion. Even so, both Jon and Tyrion's viewpoints were interesting; Daenerys began to annoy me a bit as the story went on though.

Also a bit over half way through the book (as Martin explains at the beginning) this story catches up to where he ended with the last and we start getting all the other character viewpoints from book four mixed back into things. So for me the character I love to read about felt like they were stalling and then things got 'spiced' up by having characters I dislike reading about mixed in. And of course on top of this we have new viewpoints added as well. Also, as a reader I'm all for cliffhangers, but if you are going to take years and years to come out with the next volume.... Or if you spend a thousand pages building up to a point where things actually start happening only to end the story... Maybe you should either wrap up a few things so a volume actually feels satisfying or not do those things to begin with. When I finished this book I just felt very... well- unsatisfied.

Perhaps you can understand what I mean by saying both 'yes' and 'no' now. I was definitely glad to visit Martin's world again and ride along with some great characters. I just wish more happened in the book. You could sum up everything in the book in a few pages and not really miss much it was so fluffed up. Martin says he knows the end and it will be wrapped up in a few more books... I hope so. It seems like all he can do is keep layering on more viewpoints that a reader is less and less invested in than the characters they fell in love with from the start and when he gets to a point he isn't sure what to do with characters he has built up he just has them killed off. It's starting to lose it's emotional impact.

In this review I realize I have mostly talked about the negative issues I have with the story, but that isn't to say there are not positives as well. I think any fan of the series will want to keep pushing through to see where it goes from here and I'm sure readers that are more into story than characters could get more out of it as well than I did. But for me this novel was better than the last but not as good as the first few.

Bottom Line:

Fans of the series will keep reading this despite my review and new readers will have built up to this book that it will matter little as well. I posted this review more for others to chime in with their opinions and share various viewpoints about the story. A Dance with Dragons is out in hardcover now, the first four novels in 'A Song of Fire and Ice' have been recovered and are out in paperback for those that want to try the series out.

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by **Punchy** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:51 pm

This whole issue over cliffhangers is selective memory bullshit, all the other books ended with cliffhangers too. Arya's ending in Game Of Thrones, in the book you didn't know it was Yoren who grabbed her until the next book, it could have been anyone, Jon went beyond the wall, that's all we knew. Theon's ending in Clash Of Kings... it looked like he was dead, the same for Davos, Jaime was either dead or freed. The endings of Storm Of Swords also had plenty, with Tyrion, he shot his dad, and there was no indication of where he was going, Littlefinger literally pushed Lysa Arryn off a cliff. There was Brienne's word in Feast, and Cersei was left in the cells.

There was no resolution to long running mysteries in the previous books either, the two central mysteries raised at the beginning of Game Of Thrones, which were 'who killed Jon Arryn?' and 'who sent the assassin to kill Bran?' were not answered until the very end of Book 3!

People seem to be condemning Dance With Dragons for doing the same thing as all the other books did. Part of this is because this is the first time a lot of fans have had to wait for the book. I myself was able to read 1 to 4 all the way through, and all the cliffhangers were answered straight away for me. Not so now, but that doesn't mean that the other books didn't have cliffhangers or had tons of resolution, they didn't, and people are remembering wrong.

by **xaraan** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:02 pm

Well, you have to actually take into consideration what I actually said... that I don't mind cliffhangers. It's the cliffhanger, then not putting out the next volume for a million years that I think is annoying.

And the other issue about them was that I felt like nothing was happening nearly the entire book and then as soon as things actually started happening to move the story, it was over.

But like I said, you have to actually read what I wrote.

by **SuperginraiX** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:14 pm

I thought this was a Dance with Dragovon. :smt026

by **Punchy** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:28 pm

xaraan wrote:Well, you have to actually take into consideration what I actually said... that I don't mind cliffhangers. It's the cliffhanger, then not putting out the next volume for a million years that I think is annoying.

And the other issue about them was that I felt like nothing was happening nearly the entire book and then as soon as things actually started happening to move the story, it was over.

But like I said, you have to actually read what I wrote.

It was a general reaction to what I've read elsewhere, I just used your complaint as a springboard.

The world doesn't revolve around you y'know!

by **Rockman** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 8:02 pm

I agree this series got seriously padded in book 3.

by **xaraan** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 9:47 pm

Punchy wrote:
It was a general reaction to what I've read elsewhere, I just used your complaint as a springboard.

The world doesn't revolve around you y'know!

That's crazy talk. I'm pretty sure it does.

by **xaraan** » Thu Jul 21, 2011 9:51 pm

Rockman wrote:I agree this series got seriously padded in book 3.

Well even Martin said, not that he padded it but that the story had grown to more viewpoints than he originally planned.

Interesting story still as it's grown but many readers follow characters in a story as much as the story itself. I'm like that. So it loses something as characters are killed off for shock value or too many new viewpoints get added in.

by **Rockman** » Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:32 pm

xaraan wrote:
Well even Martin said, not that he padded it but that the story had grown to more viewpoints than he originally planned.

Interesting story still as it's grown but many readers follow characters in a story as much as the story itself. I'm like that. So it loses something as characters are killed off for shock value or too many new viewpoints get added in.

Its getting a bit silly.

Each viewpoint is now being added to tell a linear story, a Melisandre chapter? Really that was a bit much. Same with Ser Grandfather.

by **48THRiLLS** » Mon Sep 05, 2011 11:18 am

Ok, finally finished this (reading time has been hard to come by). I fully agree with the review... while I enjoyed reading this book, I felt disappointed when I finished it.
There were so many things just left hanging:
Bran and Tyrion was just sorta forgotten about
Jon and Daenarys obviously
Stannis? I know there has to be more to it than that letter
Things I did like though:
Varys killing Ser Kevan and telling him about Ageon
I loved crusty Ser Granpa and his stubborn honor throughout the book and especially in his own chapters
The Frog Prince being killed made me laugh out loud... fool

I know that it is part of a series and these things will be addressed but I feel if we were given some sort of conclusion with just one of the plot lines I would have felt better about this book.

by **Rockman** » Mon Sep 05, 2011 1:07 pm

48THRiLLS wrote:Ok, finally finished this (reading time has been hard to come by). I fully agree with the review... while I enjoyed reading this book, I felt disappointed when I finished it.
There were so many things just left hanging:
Bran and Tyrion was just sorta forgotten about
Jon and Daenarys obviously
Stannis? I know there has to be more to it than that letter
Things I did like though:
Varys killing Ser Kevan and telling him about Ageon
I loved crusty Ser Granpa and his stubborn honor throughout the book and especially in his own chapters
The Frog Prince being killed made me laugh out loud... fool

I know that it is part of a series and these things will be addressed but I feel if we were given some sort of conclusion with just one of the plot lines I would have felt better about this book.

Yeah ser grandfather's chapters got a lot better by the time I finished reading the book.

I agree with everything you said.

by **AaronW** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 6:52 pm

Just finished the book.

It was good I guess, a bit better than #4 but still not near as good as the first two or even the third.

[Reveal] Spoiler: Click to Expand

With Jon now dead, I think they could have told the story beyond the wall without getting the reader to invest so much time into that one character. I'm running out of characters I give a fuck about is the problem. No resolution to anything other than Jon, and that was more like "why the fuck did I spend so much time with this character if he is to die like this?"

I don't mind cliffhangers but the last two books could have been one 500 page volume and told the same story. I'm starting to think this could have been a better trilogy rather than this sprawling work.

by **Lord Simian** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 6:54 pm

AaronW wrote:Just finished the book.

It was good I guess, a bit better than #4 but still not near as good as the first two or even the third.

[Reveal] Spoiler: Click to Expand
With Jon now dead, I think they could have told the story beyond the wall without getting the reader to invest so much time into that one character. I'm running out of characters I give a fuck about is the problem. No resolution to anything other than Jon, and that was more like "why the fuck did I spend so much time with this character if he is to die like this?"

I don't mind cliffhangers but the last two books could have been one 500 page volume and told the same story. I'm starting to think this could have been a better trilogy rather than this sprawling work.

[Reveal] Spoiler: Click to Expand

I would bet a lot of money that Jon's not dead...

by **AaronW** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 6:55 pm

Good review and I agree with the last paragraph a lot. I'm normally far more story than character, though any great story needs great characters to drive it, but I'm starting to think more of pushing through it as you say than being like "fuck I can't wait for the next book".

by **AaronW** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 6:57 pm

Lord Simian wrote:
[Reveal] Spoiler: Click to Expand
I would bet a lot of money that Jon's not dead...

[Reveal] Spoiler: Click to Expand

Yeah there is a good chance, I hope not but getting stabbed 4+ times from all angles is going to be hard to recover from. Maybe, maybe some of the Wildlings will save him from the fatal blows but it doesn't look good. But you are probably right.