#is hating the eyrie to a comical degree going to be my defining trait in this fandom? maybe!

[biichama]

Reading A Song of Ice and Fire: A Clash of Kings After Book Report

So yeah, I think I liked this one better than AGOT? Not that A Game of Thrones wasn't good--it definitely was--but I think George found a little more of his grove with this one. Also, I didn't have any adolescent reading trauma associations with it the way I did with AGOT, which helped.

Also, zero percent of this book took place in my number one least favorite location in Westeros, the Eyrie, so I have to give George props for that as well. Thank you, George. I know you're going to make me go back later because I'm spoiled from fanfiction, but the reprieve is appreciated.

Anyway, I promised another set of commentary on the POVs, so let's go.

Prologue

MAESTER CRESSEN YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS TO ME. But no, like, seriously, I think I mentioned this while I was liveblogging, but I am always impressed with how George can get you to empathize and care about characters over the course of a single chapter. And I do care about everyone on Dragonstone now--I care quite a lot about them. Mostly because Maester Cressen cared. His sad, sullen boy...

(I appreciate that Melisandre gave him the chance to back out, even if he didn't take it.)

But yeah, George did a really good job of making me care about Team Stannis, who I don't think I would have quite so much if he hadn't had Maester Cressen's POV and later Davos', so good job, George.

Arya

So first of all, I love Arya a lot and have since the very beginning. Her chapters are always very solid and she feels like a realistically drawn kid put in horrible, terrible, traumatic circumstances. And she's a really good person to view how much all the warring in the Riverlands is fucking it up for the ordinary people who live there.

I was surprised by a lot of little things in her chapters? Like I knew some of the broad strokes through fandom osmosis: Yoren dies along the way, she ends up in Harrenhall, she makes friends with Gendry, she meets Jaqen H'ghar, she develops a Kill List, Hot Pie is there? But the ways that everything happen surprised me. Weasel soup, especially, surprised me. I had no fucking clue that Arya would instrumental in getting Harrenhall back into Northern hands.

Also I was very surprised that the whole cupbearer thing only lasted a single chapter? I guess that's because I had the impression that she spent half a season as one on the show. Actually, the fact she doesn't get to Harrenhall until Arya VI surprised me too, because I'd had some vague idea that she'd be there almost the entire book.

Sansa

MY POOR TRAPPED GIRL. God, I also love her so, so much. Both Stark sisters are really good and you can't make me choose between them. She's just so clever and nobody notices it, because they haven't realized that she's not the same callow, naive kid that she was before her dad was arrested.

She's also very much still a middle school kid (as is Joffrey in the worst possible way) and it's enough to make some of Dontos' bullshit hella uncomfortable. Stop giving her slobbery cheek kisses, dude. Gross. Combined with the perennial weird vibes between her and Littlefinger and it's like she's just a magnet for older men being gross. Poor kid.

(I do not blame her for not leaving with the Hound, though, because he was drunk as a fucking skunk and like... that whole scene where she finds him in her room had such bad vibes and like normally he's the guy that I feel Sansa's most safe around, because his bark is worse than his bite with her. But not just then. I wouldn't have gone with him either.)

Tyrion

So like I've heard that ACOK is really the book where Tyrion gets his chance to shine as, like, a politician and yeah, I get it. He's very good and very competent at his job and it was delightful to see him be clever and tricksy and competent. He's a very fun perspective to be in, definitely, and I get why he's everyone's favorite character and George's special boy. Like okay I don't think he's my favorite? But that's nothing against Tyrion. I still like him a lot.

We get more Tysha context and it's so goddamn sad and even without the stuff I've been spoiled on, you could tell that she did love him, that it didn't matter how they met, because she did love them during the time they were husband and wife. Also, god, they were babies when it happened.

Speaking of Tyrion's girlfriends, I was really surprised by how, like, monogamous he was with Shae, because that is not the impression you get of this guy in fandom, but it turns out that when he commits to a woman he commits. And Shae's kind of blatantly in it for the money and security, but like you can see her getting charmed by him... but then TYRION X happens and he slaps her and you can almost see her mental gears realigning on him. Something deep inside her went fuck you at him in that moment and it's gonna have repercussions.

(Also, and I hate to say this, but while he's not in love with Cersei the way Jamie is, there's definitely some weird undercurrents in his interactions with her that make me wonder about the Lannisters more.)

Bran

MY BOY. MY DARLING BOY. I love him so much. And because I love him, I love Winterfell and all the people there. Like I've heard that people find his chapters boring and pointless and skip them on rereads and I'm like why??? Because Bran's chapters, where you get to know the people of Winterfell and the other people in the North are what make you care about them when everything goes to shit. They're what makes you want to throw Ramsay Snow down a goddamn fucking well.

So yeah, I liked his chapters. They were good. He is good. I hate Ramsay so much more now that I've met Lady Hornwood and she was a real person who was in love with Ser Rodrick and SHE ATE HER FINGERS BECAUSE OF HIM. GOD I HATE RAMSAY SNOW.

(Also the Reeds are great and I am looking forward to seeing more of them even as I am very much sad to be missing our number one feral child Rickon.)

Jon

So yeah, Jon's storyline remains a very good traditional Hero's Journey and I am enjoying it for what it is. I don't have as much commentary on his stuff not so much because I don't like it, but because it's just very much in genre? His stuff is where this is most like a normal fantasy novel, I guess.

I will say that, like, fandom osmosis fucking fooled me once again. Because I thought he'd be spending at least half the book undercover with the Wildlings and that literally does not happen until his last fucking chapter.

Catelyn

MY GIRL. Catelyn chapters always make me happy to read. (She's like Bran that way.) And starting from Catelyn II, her chapters also have Brienne, who I have been waiting eagerly for ever since I began to read these books, because Brienne of Tarth is half the reason I ended up tumbling headlong into this fandom.

(I went into it a little more in my previous book report, but basically after being somewhat traumatized by Bran II in AGOT when I was a teenager, I refused to read further for the next twenty-five years, until taking a chance on a P&P fusion fic with Jamie/Brienne endeared me to the pairing enough to read more. Eventually I gave in and actually started reading the books themselves, starting with Dunk and Egg to ease me into it.)

But yeah, Cat continues to be great and she also continues to not do shit by half, which is one of the things I like best in a character. Catelyn VII and the conversation with Jaime was a fucking highlight and I keep wondering what it would be like to read these books without being spoilered to hell and back, because the way that chapter ends. It's just good. It's so good.

Davos

There is only one problem with Davos and that it's so goddamn hard for my ex-Whovian ass not to call him Davros. Which would be completely unfair to the guy, since he's a good fucking guy and not the evil genius who created the Daleks.

But no, seriously, I really like and appreciate Davos, who is a decent, normal dude in the middle of this goddamn clownshow. I like his dynamic with Stannis, which is so good, and if you'll allow me to be Homestuck on main for a second... they're moirails, your honor, they're so goddamn pale for each other it's ridiculous.

But yeah, Davos is good and I liked his chapters a lot and that goddamn shadow baby scene will fucking haunt me, like what the fuck.

Theon

I suspect I would have hated Theon a lot more without being spoiled for his eventual fate and the things he did and didn't do. As it is, I read his chapters with the constant urge to facepalm, over and over again, because goddamnit, Theon. Like it's very clear that the dice were loaded from the start against this man and he's in a lot of situations where there's been no good options, but still. God-fucking-damnit, Theon. You made an already precarious situation just that worse. Also you made me have to read scenes with Ramsay in them and I really hate that guy. Go away, Ramsay.

Daenerys

Honestly, these were mostly pretty solid chapters? Like Daenerys III is less interesting than some of the others, but Daenerys IV and the House of the Undying more than makes up for it. Like seriously, that was such a goddamn banger of a chapter. I think it might be tied with Catelyn VII for personal favorites from the book.

Again, I definitely wonder what it would be like to read these books unspoiled, because like while I was extremely happy to see Barristan popping up in Daenerys V as 'Arstan Whitebeard,' I bet I'd have been even more psyched to be blindsided by it whenever it actually comes up in ASOS or ADWD.

That said, I can still appreciate a good reveal even if it's for something I knew about, so I'm not too worried. And being spoilered is like my emotional shield to prevent me from sadquitting over the Red Wedding next book like I did a quarter century ago over the yeeting of Bran. Speaking of which, I'm glad to be finally starting ASOS now, since it took me a couple days to write up this post, hahaha.