Reviews
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Was game, now thrown
A Game of Thrones by George R R Martin
Reviewed: 2014-10-03, 08:57, My Rating: 3.0 out of 5, review contains spoilers: No
I had high hopes for this - lots of enthusiasm on book sites. I read a few chapters, got inside the heads of a few characters. Fine. Then I watched the first episode - it all tallied.
No more gore than normal for the genre. The sex likewise.
But I've lost interest.
I think the problem is that even in this first book the book is too consciously plotted. I can see the hand of the author everywhere; whenever he gets the chance to turn the screws, he does. I've stopped investing any effort in learning about the minor characters - they're pure cannon fodder.
There are no real surprises anymore. It's just fantasy soap-opera, with well-scheduled climaxes. I've read enough like this not to need to read another one. And certainly no desire to read another six, which I gather is the author's current plan.
It's not bad, by any means. It's well-written. The main characters are well drawn. But I happen to think that a novel should be a journey, not a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
A Game of Thrones on Amazon
