This is the second volume of Martin’s epic fantasy “A Song of Ice and
Fire”, the first being A Game of Thrones, which I’ve just
re-read in preparation for reading the third volume,
A Storm of Swords.

In this volume, the Seven Kingdoms, long united under the Targaryen and
Baratheon dynasties, is beginning to splinter into its component pieces
as different lords vie for kingship over the whole realm or just their
own neighborhood. The effluent hit the fan in the previous book, and
in this one we get to watch it spatter.

Enjoying this series, I’ve decided, requires that you carefully manage
your expectations, and that you be patient. Each volume has something like
eight or ten major viewpoint characters, with the corresponding number of
simultaneous plot lines, which mingle and separate and entwine in the most
intricate possible way. He’s telling a big story, and a political story,
and he wants to work in all of the details. And that means it takes
forever for anything to actually get resolved. If you try to read it too
quickly it becomes tedious and boring, and you’ll begin to wonder why
you’re bothering.

This time through, though, I’ve made it a point to take it slow, and to
read it at its own pace, and I’m enjoying it considerably. Yes, the
broad sweep of the story takes far longer to progress than I’d like, but
the incidents along the way, the roadside scenery as it were, easily
holds my attention. And at the end of every chapter, I want more.

It’s a lot like reading Anthony Trollope, really, only with sex and
violence and walking corpses.