A Dance With Dragons: A Song of Ice and Fire book 5

by George R.R. Martin, 1016 pages

I picked up the most recent volume of A Song of Ice and Fire with trepidation, knowing full well it might be several if not many years before we see the two concluding volumes of the series. With each book more and more layers of plot are added as well as new characters are making their debut. It might be hundreds of pages before you find out what happened to a favorite character when they were in a tight spot. Or, in the worst case, you might never find out what happened to them...at least not in this book. Talk about unresolved cliffhangers.

I still enjoy aspects of Martin's world-building and appreciate the care he gives to different cultures across the Narrow Sea. But I am getting tired of Martin's gruesome glee at killing off major characters. For one thing, it makes you very wary about getting attached to any characters at all because you never know if they'll make it to the end of the chapter, let alone show up alive in the next book. So maybe it's a good thing that there will be a long breather before the next book makes it into print. By then maybe I will be so dis-engaged from Martin's world that I won't even care if all of Westeros disappears under thousands of feet of snow and is crawling with blue-eyed zombies.. Winter is Coming. Meh.