A Game Of Thrones (AGOT) is the first book of a series called A Song Of Ice And Fire (ASOIAF), which takes place in… Oh crap, everyone has seen the show or at least heard about, well, AGOT (the book) is the material from which the first season of AGOT (the show), was adapted. Every season of the show corresponds broadly to one of the books until season 6, because there are currently only 5 books in the series, though George R.R. Martin, aka Samuel Tarly, aka the author, has planned for a 7 book saga. Considering the first book was published in 1996, when I was -10 years old, and the 6th one is still in the making it is highly probable that I’ll have multiple children and a house in the countryside before the end, but if waiting is the price for quality, so be it.
A Game Of Thrones, as the first book of a fantasy saga, has the enormous task of introducing, well, everything while hooking the reader with an enticing story. Since ASOIAF takes place in a universe so rich, "everything" here means a lot. There are so many characters, places, relationships, and laws, all quite apart from the usual fantasy archetypes. There are no elves nor dwarves, I mean, there are a few dwarfs but they are not a distinct species and seen mainly as freaks, like they were/still are in our world. Instead we are told that there were, but maybe still are, wightes, wights, children of the forest, and two species of humans called the First Men and the Andals. The only “normal” creatures mentioned are dragons and giants. But all of this isn’t described with a lot of depth in the first book, because most of the story is centered around humans.
Every chapter follows one character, which changes every chapter, there are 8 points of view, excluding Will, who serves only for the prologue. We follow mainly members of the Stark family, which is the ruling family of the North, which includes all the kingdoms north of the Neck, which is the narrowest point of Westeros, the continent in which most of the characters reside. North of the North is The Wall, a gigantic (~700 feet) ice wall, protecting the kingdoms of men, whatever that means. Other than Starks we follow Tyrion Lannister, a rich, hated and quick-witted dwarf, and Daenerys Targaryen, a princess exiled in Essos, which is the second continent that we know of in the books. It is far bigger than Westeros, but mostly made of deserts and cursed places.
The fact that the world is strange and the ways it works, like weird seasons and creepy gods and magic, make it so interesting that I lost a few hours of sleep reading, but the most original and engaging quality of the book is that it is real, and brutal.
Everyone is deeply messed up, which, combined with medieval societal norms and huge inequalities in power, generates atrocities all over the place. There are a few honorable people, but none is entirely pure, and the most honest ones make stupid decisions that have horrendous consequences. Take Ned Stark for example. He is called to be Hand of the King, he accepts because he is honorable, even though it smells like a bad decision. He goes to King's Landing, the capital of the Seven Kingdoms, and refuses to lie, spy or trick others because he is honorable. He barely even thinks about it. He tells his main opponent that he will ban her and her children from the city. To ensure he has the ability to do that he makes an alliance with Littlefinger, a schemer who told him on his first day in town to trust no one. Unsurprisingly all this honor and stupidity end up badly for Ned. Somehow unlike most other stories, none of what happens to characters is deserved but everything is logical. Because the author doesn’t have an outline but just lets the characters make internally coherent choices, the story flows seamlessly. The imaginary cultures depicted just make sense, in every detail from their clothes to their rituals to their hierarchies. Every action is motivated and most characters are complex and have complex reasons to do things.
Take Viserys for example. He is the last son of a king that was killed during a revolt because he was mad, like burning everyone alive style of mad. He is in exile in Essos, called the Beggar King because he lives on the charity of a richer man. The fact that his family tree looks more of a line doesn't help with his mental health and he is a bit impulsive and presumptuous. So when the opportunity arises he sells his sister, Daenerys, to savage horsemen called Dothraki, if in exchange they accept to fight for him. Did I explain she is 13? Because that might be important to the story.
More generally the youth in AGOT is really young. Ned Stark's daughters Arya and Sansa are like 8 and 12 years old at the beginning of the book. And Sansa is already betrothed to Joffrey Baratheon, heir to the king. Most of the conflict in the book comes from the fact that Joffrey, Myrcella and Tommen Baratheon are actually bastards, their father being Jaime Lannister, the Queen's twin brother, rather than Robert Baratheon, the King. Unsurprisingly both Jaime and Queen Cersei are shown as narcissists, which seems obvious since they are twins in love with each other.
While they are in Winterfell, everyone goes hunting except them, so they sneak up in a tower and make further babies, but they are discovered by Bran Stark, who is only a boy who loves climbing. Jaime pushes him from the tower. That is when you understand that there is no plot shield. And it is in the first few chapters. At one point Littlefinger tells Sansa Stark that she shouldn't believe the songs about knights and maidens, that life is far more ugly than that. This reads like a meta-commentary on the book.
Like Jon Snow, who is presented as Ned Stark's bastard, is young, and torn between his love for his step-family, while feeling isolated because he knows he won't inherit anything, and can't sit at their table when there are important lords present. But he likes his uncle Benjen, who is a knight of the Night's Watch, the organization taking care and protecting the Wall. They all wear black, call themselves brothers and take a vow to not father children, nor hold lands. Most are former criminals who had a choice between the wall and the gallows. But Jon being young and stupid decides to join anyway. Knowing that once the vows are taken, desertion is a death sentence.
But, being young and stupid, he still wants to desert when he learns that, after the King's death, his heir Joffrey imprisoned Ned Stark, because he accused him of being an incestuous bastard. Robb Stark, Ned's heir, gathers an army, to recover his father and two sisters. But Arya fled, and his father is executed, to everyone's surprise, by the impulsive sadistic little cunt Joffrey.
The book ends on a promise of war, chaos and suffering, which makes it impossible not to read the second opus.