Just finished second part of George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" fantasy saga and loved it so much that without any pause I decided to continue with a third part, which truth to be told looked a bit frightening because even my copy is paperback it has more than thousand pages so I was aware that this will be a task that would probably take enormous amount of time to finish and I could easily read two books in the time needed for this only one. But guess what, even though I am fully aware of massive volume in my hands, I swallowed the first 100 pages in one sitting! The unexpected Flu slowed me down somewhat but right now I am enjoying it so much that I have no doubt that I will finish this book in no time - and after all, its not about number of books one reads but how much one enjoys them.
Yesterday I was in Dubrovnik (Kings Landing in TV serial) and bought myself a nice wall map of the whole Westeros and the rest of magical kingdoms - still need to put it on my wall, but it is thrilling to see it all clearly. As I expected, story jumps from one place to another, from one character to another and often I wish Martin just sticks to one character and his adventures, but he is the author and we just have to follow. Of course I know perfectly well what will happen, except that novel is far richer in characters and details so it really feels like a completely different experience. And while in TV serial I was basically bored with parts that dealt with Daenerys Targaryen here I have no problem with her at all, its all very well written and I can easily imagine all the places, clothes and faces author suggests. I think Martin had hugely re-invented the whole fantasy genre and it is thanks to him that it created huge success not only for his, but many other fantasy novels that used to be kind of cult favourites so far. Every few years new publishing phenomenon comes along - usually completely unexpected trend - be it Dan Brown conspiracy theories, Tudor dynasty historical romances and now this explosion of fantasy, it is interesting to see how some people are trailblazers and than the whole industry follows with countless similar titles until the market is saturated, until we all become tired of it and than somebody else comes along with something new that will become the next big thing. The sheer Gargantuan volume of this novel promise that I might need a break from Westeros after a while, we will see. In some countries it was actually published in two volumes.
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