A Feast for Crows Written by George R.R. Martin
To Download You copy please click here www.5x.co.nz/crows.php It seems too good to be true. After centuries of bitter strife and fatal treachery, the seven powers dividing the land have decimated one another into an uneasy truce. Or so it appears. . . . With the death of the monstrous King Joffrey, Cersei is ruling as regent in King’s Landing. Robb Stark’s demise has broken the back of the Northern rebels, and his siblings are scattered throughout the kingdom like seeds on barren soil. Few legitimate claims to the once desperately sought Iron Throne still exist—or they are held in hands too weak or too distant to wield them effectively. The war, which raged out of control for so long, has burned itself out. But as in the aftermath of any climactic struggle, it is not long before the survivors, outlaws, renegades, and carrion eaters start to gather, picking over the bones of the dead and fighting for the spoils of the soon-to-be dead. Now in the Seven Kingdoms, as the human crows assemble over a banquet of ashes, daring new plots and dangerous new alliances are formed, while surprising faces—some familiar, others only just appearing—are seen emerging from an ominous twilight of past struggles and chaos to take up the challenges ahead. It is a time when the wise and the ambitious, the deceitful and the strong will acquire the skills, the power, and the magic to survive the stark and terrible times that lie before them. It is a time for nobles and commoners, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and sages to come together and stake their fortunes . . . and their lives. For at a feast for crows, many are the guests—but only a few are the survivors. Few books have captivated the imagination and won the devotion and praise of readers and critics everywhere as has George R. R. Martin’s monumental epic cycle of high fantasy that began with A Game of Thrones. Now, in A Feast for Crows, Martin delivers the long-awaited fourth book of his landmark series, as a kingdom torn asunder finds itself at last on the brink of peace . . . only to be launched on an even more terrifying course of destruction.
------------------------------------------------------ Wow, after reading some of the negative reviews of this book (let's call it book number 4A), I was a bit worried. But a needless worry, there is little discernable lettup of quality in this book from the first 3. To be sure, there are not quite the number of seismic events within the timeframe (I'm guessing about 8 months) written about in "A Feast for Crows", but rest assured, there are NOT very many new characters introduced (other than the obligitory references to scores of relationships and relatives!); and the plot is not meandering at all. A Feast for Crows largely tells tales of minor skirmishes and political intrigue that follow the extensive wars that comprised the second and third books. Perhaps the nay-sayers simply are not impressed when there isn't a steady diet of death and destruction or nonstop action? Martin keeps the focus over the story's timeframe to 6 major characters: Brienne, Jaime, Cersie, Sansa, Arya and Samwell; introduces a few characters to flesh out the political climate of the southern land of Dorne (curious about the Red Viper's home?) and describes the ongoing saga of the Ironborn as they seek to infiltrate their way into the mainland. It seems to me that this is a plenty big, but scarcely new, canvas of storylines to keep track of. I appreciated the limited scope of the book to these storylines; many times as I read the first three books, I would skip several story lines to follow the evolution of one or two of the
characters before going back again. This is a perfectly logical approach to the story telling as there is very little physical interaction between the characters in this book versus those to come in the next. Martin's choice to segregate the 4th book into books 4A and 4B isn't the least bit distracting if you can put the other characters on hold in your mind (which you have to do in any book, just for not quite as long a period of time). Within the six major characters storylines, we get (amoungst other things): - An update on the doings of the Westro's most clever (and extremely honorable, in his own way) player, Littlefinger as Sansa's "father". As with most of Martin's characters, Petyr Baelish comes in various shades of grey; readers are afforded a chance to draw their own conclusions as to just how grey... - A momentary look at Catelyn revived (for better or worse!) in Brienne's story - A momentary look at Jon who sends Sam and Maester Aemon on a mission - The releationship of Cersei's son and daughter-in-law; and the administration for the Iron Throne done Cersei's way Several storylines are making a direct beeline for Dany, and it's too early to tell where Brienne will end, so I think it pre-mature to criticize the editing until more has played out. Thus far, I haven't seen any storyline drift into irrelevance so I have no reason to not be optimistic... As for those who liken this release to the crumbled messes that became Jordan's WOT (somewhat revived in KoD), or to a lesser degree Goodkind's SOT, give it a rest! Complain all you want about the lack of action, but the details and pace (reasonably fast for my tastes) of the story are well justified for those readers who are curious about characters and cultures of all of the major kingdoms and how they are reacting to the events of their time. There are no endless fussings over fashions, no endless repetitions of mannerisms, no 200 pages to cover the day in the life of one character (apparently there are those who actually like such ramblings in the WOT world?), no endlessly immature characterizations, no repetative philisophical oratories; the focus remains mainly on the fully adult characters or the evolution of the younger characters that we already know and how they are coping with the aftermath of the preceding books. The few new characters introduced by Martin are reasonably described according to the depth of their impact on the story. My only minor quibble with the book is that for the first time we end with a couple of cliffhangers of an immediate kind; prior to this book, Martin did a pretty good job of leaving off at places that were intriguing, but not in the middle of a life and death situation. Hopefully, these will be resolved as part of Book 4B -- I think it's a bit unreasonable to have to wait for more than a year to see whether or not a couple of the specific main characters live or die. In summary, if you enjoy the way Martin has richly developed his characters and story, and don't mind the reality that most people DON'T change that much (except, of course, for the younger characters who are evolving in ways that might surprise), and don't mind that you'll have to wait until next year to read about Danys, Jon, Tyrion and Stannis, amoungst others, you'll find much to deeply appreciate in this effort.
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