Customer Reviews

A Dance With Dragons: Part 1 Dreams and Dust (A Song of Ice and Fire, Book 5)

5 star:		(159)
4 star:		(39)
3 star:		(28)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

Despite a lot of negative amazon reviews I still found myself reading this book long into the night - the intrigues, places and characters still pull you into a world that is fantastical yet totally believable.

BUT...as with A feast for crows I found the split storylines (events in Kings Landing and Westeros covered in Book 4 and parallel events in Essos/the North in Book 5) unbelievably frustrating- what on earth posessed GRRM to pursue this? The reader is constantly trying to remember the events of Book 4 and how they fit into A dance with dragons. I found that I cared less what happened to Danaerys etc. because I had not read about them for so long, and I wanted to know what was happening in Kings Landing- but to no avail.

Worth buying, but in my opinion this series is no longer the great fantasy epic that it could have been.

Well, after years of waiting, Dance with Dragons came out and did not fail to disappoint. The writing's been getting slower and slower on Martin's end, and the quality of the story is getting worse and worse. Feast for Crows already felt average compared to the 3 previous books, but we were all willing to accept that because we thought the book was a pedestal for Dance with Dragons to dazzle us with its pure might. Needless to say, it was a complete disappointment as Dance with Dragons is the most uneventful book in the series. Basically, nothing happens. The status quo doesn't change, characters seem to stay exactly where they are, the plot lines barely evolve (Tyrion wasn't entertaining. How is that even remotely possible? Tyrion's dialogue alone could make the first 3 books worth reading, well, lemme tell you what, not in this one). Martin is pulling a Robert Jordan on us, dragging on his series while the quality of the writing and story worsens periodically. Dance with Dragons is Song of Ice and Fire's equivalent to Wheel of Time's Path of Daggers (thankfully not quite a Crossroads of Twilight). Yes, for those of you who know that it means, it is that bad. Considering that I thought of Song of Fire and Ice would go down in history as one of the greatest fantasy epics ever written, I'm starting to have doubts now. Martin better pull a hell of sixth book to get his story back on track. He didn't ruin anything with this book as he barely added or removed anything, so there is still hope. But at the rate Martin's writing, I'll probably be worrying about putting my kids through college by the time he's done (and I don't even have kids yet).

I love this series, but after growing old waiting for this book, I was disappointed to find that it was not worth the wait or the ageing process.. Nothing happens. Danny sits around and doesn't even bother setting off for Westeros. Tyrion sets off to find Danny and doesn't get there. And if I can word this without too many spoilers .... after crafty old Doran Martell has plotted away and bided his time for so many years, his master plan comes to absolutely nothing and the reader is left wondering why she even bothered to read about it when it never went anywhere. And perhaps most disappointingly of all, for a book entitled "A Dance with Dragons" there was really not much in the way of dragons, dancing or otherwise. And this applies to dragons in the literal sense as well as the Targaryen sense. Sigh. I am already calculating how old I'll be when the next book comes out, and it is not a good thought. I have a very serious concern that Mr Martin will never actually finish this series, especially if any further books he manages to produce move as slowly as this one. I am surprised and disappointed to report that, as I neared the end of the book, I flipped forward a few times to se how much I had to get through before I could read something else. Not something that has happened to me so far in this previously superb series.

This book picks up less where a Feast For Crows left off, but more where A Storm of Swords left off. It and Crows are sort of in parallel, and this book follows the more interesting characters. I really did lose interest during Feast For Crows, but this one picks up what's happening to Tyrion, Jon, Dany.

The answer, unfortunately, is 'not much. Because in the 704 pages of the text, hardly anything happens. There is a lot of talking, some sailing, a bit of torture, some sharpening of swords. Winter is still coming, we are still afraid of the Others, we are still waiting for Danearys to cross the sea with her dragons, we are still waiting for someone to take on the Lannisters.

The main problem I have with the series is that Martin gets more and more long winded. What he needs most is a strong editor who can, basically, chop the books in half and just get things moving again.

I do still want to see what happens, but it gets harder to stick with each book.

And if his publisher, by some chance, reads this: it matters to you - I have stopped buying them and am now borrowing from the library. If you can get get Mr Martin down to 350-400 pages a book, it might just pick up again

Thankfully, I've only been reading this series of books for a few years, which gives me a chance of still being alive when it's finished. If it's finished. As other reviewers are saying, the author is getting on a bit now and if he continues to write at such a slow pace he'll probably go the way of Robert Jordan and die before he finishes the final book.

The shame of this all is that the first books were awesome. The TV series is great, too, and bound to boost book sales. But I'm loathe to recommend those books to anyone as there's no sense that they'll ever get a conclusion. Even the TV series seems doomed, really: as great as it is, they can't release a series a year and actually deliver a conclusion - just five or six years of build up, then a "to be continued..." (in 10 years). It's like stopping a season of 24 half way, then making us wait for Keifer Sutherland's unborn son to grow up so he can star in the second half.

Back to this book: I got it in hardback as the complete volume and gasped at the weight of it - so much so, that I bought it on Kindle too so I could actually read the thing. It was a bit of a plodder. I still like the characters, I still like the richness of the world, but I'm finding it hard to connect with the newcomers and really just want to find out what happens to the people I've got to know through the last few years of reading. As a writer myself, I can appreciate that it takes time to write books - particularly if you're not on it everyday (and Martin has published other books, consulted on the TV series and probably had a life, too). But this doesn't feel like 6 years of real, loving effort. More like a bit of self-indulgence, or maybe a chore - like the pretty average job I make of mowing our lawn, but then I'm not pretending to be a master gardener and I haven't made buckets of cash from cutting grass.

The REAL scary bit is that I bet I buy the next one. And, as much as I don't want to wait for it, I'd hate Martin to do a rush job of it. All this effort deserves a truly storming ending.

George Martin doesn't really write novels, he channels history from some other weird world that exists somewhere inside his head. Anyone who reads history knows it's messy, unpredictable and often the good guys don't actually exist and even if they do they often lose! All this I have accepted since I reached the end of book 1 in a state of shock and trauma! So I won't complain about the plot, I won't complain about some of the deaths and I won't even complain about the absence of some of the lead characters (or their decidely bit part appearences)

No the huge frustration for me was the long build ups in tension and drama followed by complete anti-climax! The number of times we reached a moment of real drama only for Martin to close off the chapter and dump us somewhere else in his world where sod all was happening only to bring us back 150 pages later when it was all over. The worst example of this (if you will excuse a small spoiler) was the confrontation between Stannis and Roose Bolton. A battle that crawled towards a conclusion, then changed it's mind, then disappeared and then finally happened when we were not looking though we were told of it's outcome through a letter!!! A letter?!! Ahhhh!!!!! How frustratinhg is that I do not buy heroic fantasy full of heavily armoured characters with names like 'Bloodbeard', Eric Anvil-breaker and the Tattered Price, all armed too the teeth only for them never to come to blows!

I couldn't help but be suspicious that Martin is now writing story that can portrayed easily on the small screen as we have seen in the, it has to be said, excellent TV series which concentrates on the drama but avoids full pitch battles for budgetry reasons. Well I don't want to read a book with a small budget!

It's such a shame because characters I really care about just seem to drip from the end of Martin's pen whereas other authors can write 600 pages full of faceless no-ones with the personality of a slug, but the colour charaters here are carrying an awful lot of text with precious little actual plot to go round. It's like the start of book one was the big bang and Martin is now desperately trying to describe all the universe as it expands outwards at the speed of light and spreading himself too thin in the process. There are now so many people in this story in all honesty I have forgotten who half of them are and so don't really care what happens to them.

And yet...and yet I know when in presumeably the next 10 years or so the next volume comes out I shall have to go out and buy it to know what does actually happen but please George do make something happen and let some it of it be actual battle!

What a boring book! The first 3 books were excellent but now he just waffles on and on. I feel this is all just padding so he can sell more books.The shame is that I am now just not interested in buying the next book.

I was largely disappointed and feel cheated. The story in last two books indeed emanates no sense of direction. It just goes on and on around. The book is composed out of loosely related threads and each chapter leaves you with the sense on incompleteness.
The whole series of books remids me episodes of Dallas TV series which one can start watching from any point and stop as easily ater figuring out that it leads nowhere and there would be more of the same sort after skipping a season or two.In all his books author intensively uses episodes of violence, incest, betrayal and exploits other ways to play on negative emotions of the reader but I still don't see much purpose for fair share of them other than to please someone who particulary likes such things all by themself. Even tough the books are written in genre of fantasy, I find it annoying when new characters pop out of nowhere carrying some unexpected properties and introduce even more unexpected twists to the threads which show no signs of end anyway. Some ot the threads then end abruptly and I suspect the real reason to this is not to make a story but rather author's inability to develop that thread in his future writing. All in all, I wish I knew before what I am reading. It would've saved me a lot of my time.

Yes, I know I'm not the first to say that the book disappointed me. It was too long and nothing new happened. Tyrion and Dany, my favorite characters ever since the first book, were unrecognisable: flat, uninteresting, frankly boring. No character development at all, either for those two or any of the others. The new POVs introduced added nothing more than pages to the story. The plot itself didn't seem to move an inch. Maybe, if I had not had to wait such a long time between books, I would have been less disappointed. But to have to wait for years only to realise that I must wait for I don't know how many more for the next book, well, that feels like a downright betrayal.

Let's hope that Mr Martin reads our comments and will take some of them to heart in writing the next book. It's OK to rest comfortably on your laurels, knowing that your readers are hooked by the quality of the first books and are dying to find out what happened to their favorite heroes, but it is quite another to make them feel cheated of their money and their time, because sooner or later they'll decide to visit the nearest library rather than their bookstore, and then where will Mr Martin and his publishers be?

I have stuck with all 5 so far but very much doubt I will read any more, there are still so many lose ends, some of which stem from the very first book, that I feel almost cheated by this one. I have read reviews comparing this sage to The Lord of the Rings, sorry Mr Martin, you lose hands down. At least in the Lord of the Rings one knew who the good guys were and the story moved everyone along. In this tale, some characters seem to have disappeared without trace, I suppose they may return in later books but who knows? For others, situations arise our of nowhere, no build up, no suspense, things just happen and in some cases the character in question is never heard of again. This may be the authors tool for keeping his readers enthralled but for me it hasn't worked, I skimmed through the last few chapters of this book in case there was anything of interest and apart from the epilogue there wasn't. The epilogue itself does bring a conclusion for two characters but again, the end comes out of nothing, there is no explanation and yet again a cliff hanger style ending to the book. My enjoyment of this saga has decreased with each book so I will now happily abandon them all to whatever fates the author has in store for them.