A Game of Thrones
by George R. R. Martin
The recap
In the Seven Kingdoms, summers can last for years, and so can winters, and the long summer is drawing to a close. When King Robert Baratheon rides north to ask his old friend Eddard Stark to become his chief adviser, the honorable lord of Winterfell reluctantly leaves his castle and family for a royal court thick with intrigue, where the queen's wealthy Lannister family guards its interests by any means necessary. Far to the north, the ancient Wall that shields the realm faces stirrings of something long dismissed as legend. Across the narrow sea, the exiled heirs of the dynasty Robert overthrew dream of reclaiming the throne. Told through the eyes of a large cast, including Stark children, a sharp-tongued dwarf and a young princess married off for an army, Martin's opening volume treats fantasy like hard-edged history, with shifting loyalties, real consequences and no guarantees for anyone. Dense, gripping and morally complex, it launches an epic that rewards patience with total immersion.
Why read it
For readers who want fantasy with the texture of real history, full of politics, betrayal and characters who can genuinely lose, and who are ready to commit to a long series.
Fun facts
- 01
Martin was working on a science-fiction novel in the summer of 1991 when an unrelated image, a boy finding a dead wolf in the snow, took hold of him and grew into the book's opening chapter.
- 02
He came back to prose after years writing for Hollywood, on television series such as The Twilight Zone and Beauty and the Beast.
- 03
Martin originally planned the story as a trilogy before it expanded into the much longer A Song of Ice and Fire series.
- 04
The novel won the 1997 Locus Award for best fantasy novel, and its Daenerys chapters, published separately as the novella Blood of the Dragon, won the 1997 Hugo Award for Best Novella.
- 05
It was not an instant bestseller, but it built a loyal following; HBO's adaptation premiered in 2011 and ran until 2019.
