Who's next?
Since I’m still hanging in
there after five books of a Song of Ice and Fire, I think I might be getting to a point where most og the likely outcomes of the series will be acceptable to me. If you, as a reader, can handle the death of noble Ned Stark, there is a chance of getting
through the books.
Character deaths do not make an enjoyable read. It has been known to make me both sad and angry at times. Martin does, however, have a unique way of killing off characters without making me want to fling the book at him. He actually gets away with lots of things in his books that I'd not think possible beforehand. (Like redeeming child-killers Jaime Lannister and Theon Greyjoy, turning Catelyn into Lady Stoneheart, cooking the Freys into a pie and making it a good deed etc.) This just goes to show how good he is at twisting your expectations.
There have been some serious blows during this series. Characters you really love are always hard to see go. The funny thing is how you grow immune to all the horrible things happening, after a while.
In some ways, the death of Lady the direwolf grieved me more than the deaths of Arys Oakheart or Quentyn Martell. Again I think that has something to do with the expectations you have of what the book and Martin's world are going to be like. When faced with Lady's death 200 pages into A Game of Thrones you still haven't caught on to the brutality of Westeros. Even though the book starts with a beheading, I think the entire happening on the Kingsroad where Mycah and Lady both get killed, is the first hint I picked up properly. (Seeing as we have already had Jaime flinging Bran out the window I might be a bit slow - but that's just me.)
Martin paints a picture of a war-torn continent, and he doesn't gloss it over one bit. Reading these books is delving into the darkest sides of humanity there are. At the same time, there is also a glimmer of hope coming through to you via some of the characters. The ones that try to do good, or try to stick with their principals amidst all the horrible things happening. There is Jon, Dany, Barristan, Sansa, Bran, Brienne, Sam, to some degree Tyrion and unexpectedly also Jaime. (I might have missed a few - but this just proves my point..) Some of them will die without a doubt. Even so - Martin has built up a large enough base of characters you can actually sympathize with,so that killing off one of them will not ruin the story. Killing off all of them would, however, have me doubting the value of the books.
One thing though:
Dear George, please don't let Jon be dead! Reading the assault on him in A Dance with Dragons was dramatic enough. There is precedence in your books for characters surviving these situations, and if anyone should survive - Jon should. Now I wont stop reading if he dies, but it would impact my enjoyment of the books considerably!
Oh - and writing this has made me think of so many other related topics that deserve a meta! Reviving dead characters for example. Turning good characters bad or bad characters good - there are so many interesting points to these books - I might never run out of things to discuss or comment on..
To sum this up - there are character deaths I would like to see more than others:
Littlefinger, Ramsay and Roose Bolton, Cersei, Jorah Mormont, Walder Frey, all the Greyjoys etc.
There are however also characters I would really grieve to see go:
Jon Snow, Bran and Sansa Stark, Davos, Tommen, Sam and I am sure there are more!
Character deaths do not make an enjoyable read. It has been known to make me both sad and angry at times. Martin does, however, have a unique way of killing off characters without making me want to fling the book at him. He actually gets away with lots of things in his books that I'd not think possible beforehand. (Like redeeming child-killers Jaime Lannister and Theon Greyjoy, turning Catelyn into Lady Stoneheart, cooking the Freys into a pie and making it a good deed etc.) This just goes to show how good he is at twisting your expectations.
There have been some serious blows during this series. Characters you really love are always hard to see go. The funny thing is how you grow immune to all the horrible things happening, after a while.
In some ways, the death of Lady the direwolf grieved me more than the deaths of Arys Oakheart or Quentyn Martell. Again I think that has something to do with the expectations you have of what the book and Martin's world are going to be like. When faced with Lady's death 200 pages into A Game of Thrones you still haven't caught on to the brutality of Westeros. Even though the book starts with a beheading, I think the entire happening on the Kingsroad where Mycah and Lady both get killed, is the first hint I picked up properly. (Seeing as we have already had Jaime flinging Bran out the window I might be a bit slow - but that's just me.)
Martin paints a picture of a war-torn continent, and he doesn't gloss it over one bit. Reading these books is delving into the darkest sides of humanity there are. At the same time, there is also a glimmer of hope coming through to you via some of the characters. The ones that try to do good, or try to stick with their principals amidst all the horrible things happening. There is Jon, Dany, Barristan, Sansa, Bran, Brienne, Sam, to some degree Tyrion and unexpectedly also Jaime. (I might have missed a few - but this just proves my point..) Some of them will die without a doubt. Even so - Martin has built up a large enough base of characters you can actually sympathize with,so that killing off one of them will not ruin the story. Killing off all of them would, however, have me doubting the value of the books.
One thing though:
Dear George, please don't let Jon be dead! Reading the assault on him in A Dance with Dragons was dramatic enough. There is precedence in your books for characters surviving these situations, and if anyone should survive - Jon should. Now I wont stop reading if he dies, but it would impact my enjoyment of the books considerably!
Oh - and writing this has made me think of so many other related topics that deserve a meta! Reviving dead characters for example. Turning good characters bad or bad characters good - there are so many interesting points to these books - I might never run out of things to discuss or comment on..
To sum this up - there are character deaths I would like to see more than others:
Littlefinger, Ramsay and Roose Bolton, Cersei, Jorah Mormont, Walder Frey, all the Greyjoys etc.
There are however also characters I would really grieve to see go:
Jon Snow, Bran and Sansa Stark, Davos, Tommen, Sam and I am sure there are more!
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