Steven C. (SteveTheDM) - , reviewed on 6/4/2012 + 204 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

The third book in Martins epic A Song of Ice and Fire series, A Storm of Swords is by far the better of the first three. Of course, theres a caveat with that: I watched the first season of HBOs Game of Thrones miniseries between the time I finished A Clash of Kings and when I started this one. And that had a fascinating impact.

It didnt spoil the story, of course, because the HBO series only covers the first book. But what it did do was root the story in strong visuals. Faces became associated with names, and as I read the book, I really had a deeper connection to all of the characters than I ever did before, and even a better connection with their likely emotional states than I had in the first two books. The HBO series is recommended on its own merits, of course, since its awesome, but I think it truly does help bring Martins world more fully to life for readers as well.

This book is, of course, the continuation of events after the events of a Clash of Kings, and this book, this one more than the others (so far), had me stop in my tracks and wonder at the ruthlessness with which Martin treats his protagonists. When I have to shut the book and spend a good ten minutes just thinking about what the freaking heck just happened and what that means for the world and how wrong all of my assumptions were... Well thats where Martin takes us. Shocking, surprising, and worth all the words he poured out onto the pages here.

Im quite eager for the fourth book now, more so than I thought Id be. (Which is why I dont yet have the fourth book. Grrrrr....)

5 of 5 stars.

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