REVIEW: 'A Game of Thrones'

After the Hunger Games movie came out, in my opinion, the next big series to grip our culture is The Game of Thrones. I was convinced to give the A Song of Ice and Fire books a try after so many of my bookish friends kept raving about it.

So far, I've made it through the first two books and I liked them to the point that I'm willing to watch the TV show. I'm not a fanatic but the writing was enough to lure me happily back into the realm of historical fiction.

The first book, A Game of Thrones, was written powerfully and I polished it off in a weekend. I loved how the author tells the story from multiple perspectives. Not only does it provide a greater depth to the plot, but it also keeps the story moving. Additionally, the multiple characters make it such that if one part is boring, you want to keep reading in order to find out what happens to a character you like.

After I finished the first one, I was eager to read through the second one. Unfortunately, I didn't think that the second book, A Clash of Kings, was as uniformly engaging as the first. There were pieces that kept me going, yet I had no trouble putting this book down when I needed to, unlike with the first book. As sporadic as the plot was, I commend the author for ending the book well. The ending (and the way pieces fell together there) made me want to get the third one, and I resolved to stick with the series.

If you like medieval times, gore, petty love triangles and a dash of adventure, then you ought to give A Game of Thrones a try. Fans of historical fiction, here's another good read for you. Overall, besides some of the unnecessary love scenes, it's a good and interesting series with pretty gripping and original writing style.

Correction: In a previous version of this article, the first book was referred to by the title of "A Song Of Fire And Ice," when in fact that is the name of the series. The title of the first book is "A Game Of Thrones."