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Should I read Game of Thrones?
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Rappel




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 1:51 am
No.

Started the second book once. The plot is so poor that the author had to introduce constant atrocities just to keep the reader hooked. It was nauseating.
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Rappel




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 1:54 am
dee's mommy wrote:
. (If you have read and enjoyed Lord of the Rings, you will probably like this.)

.


No comparison. The LOTR was squeaky clean, and unique in its genre at the time of writing. GOT is an extremely explicit game of Civilization, in Large Map mode. There is nothing there but smoke and the written-word equivalent of pixels.
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imasinger




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 7:01 am
I happen to love well written fantasy, but couldn't get through even the first book of GOT.

I read the summary on Wikipedia.

I can suggest many other good books in the genre. Some also aren't squeaky clean, but they at least didn't feel like the constant nastiness.

Name of the Wind (if you can tolerate waiting until the last volume is finished). Anything by Brandon Sanderson. I also liked the books of Elizabeth Moon and of Robin Hobb.

But I wouldn't recommend GOT to anyone who asks "should I read this.". Once you're thinking about "should", don't.
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amother
Seashell


 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 7:27 am
imasinger wrote:
I happen to love well written fantasy, but couldn't get through even the first book of GOT.

I read the summary on Wikipedia.

I can suggest many other good books in the genre. Some also aren't squeaky clean, but they at least didn't feel like the constant nastiness.

Name of the Wind (if you can tolerate waiting until the last volume is finished). Anything by Brandon Sanderson. I also liked the books of Elizabeth Moon and of Robin Hobb.

But I wouldn't recommend GOT to anyone who asks "should I read this.". Once you're thinking about "should", don't.


I loved The Name of the Wind, and I liked the second book too, but I read them years ago, and I have been similarly frustrated by the wait for the last book. By the time the third book comes out, I’ll have to reread the first two. . . It’s a good recommendation, though - once the last book is finished.
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youngishbear




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 8:41 am
imasinger wrote:
I happen to love well written fantasy, but couldn't get through even the first book of GOT.

I read the summary on Wikipedia.

I can suggest many other good books in the genre. Some also aren't squeaky clean, but they at least didn't feel like the constant nastiness.

Name of the Wind (if you can tolerate waiting until the last volume is finished). Anything by Brandon Sanderson. I also liked the books of Elizabeth Moon and of Robin Hobb.

But I wouldn't recommend GOT to anyone who asks "should I read this.". Once you're thinking about "should", don't.


I agree with this.

I also feel that if I've held out till now, I can ride it out until the last echos of the hullabaloo fade away. The show is over, after all.
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amother
Mauve


 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 8:51 am
I would have thought that Game of Thrones is a wildly inappropriate book for anyone, especially an orthodox Jewish woman....???
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sarahmalka




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 8:58 am
I have a high tolerance for reading books of a graphic nature (murder mysteries, thriller, romance novels, even horror) from my pre-frum days but GOT was too much even for me. I kept reading up to the second or third one because of the excellent plot but the books absolutely infuriated and sickened me. One thing that makes me so irate is when clearly talented and imaginative people rely on the same sick tropes of rape, incest, and disgusting, gory violence. A lot of science fiction books and shows have the same problem- highly imaginative writers but recycling the same sicknesses that society currently feeds us. OP, GOT is not worth it, IMO.
If you're looking for an exciting and innovative series to dive into, I'm sure you can get lots of good recommendations on imamother. For example if you are at all open to sci fi, check out the Expanse series by James S.A. Corey. (This is not a frum book series, it's just a lot cleaner than GOT.)

(edited for lots of pre-coffee typos, lol)
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FranticFrummie




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 9:27 am
[quote="amother [ Chartreuse ] but also some excellently drawn characters like Arya and Tyrion and Varys. (cant stand Sansa for some reason).[/quote]

SAME!

I love Tyrion so much, and his dark sense of humor is incredibly well written. Arya is such a little spitfire, for some reason she reminds me of DD. Sansa is a whiny, spineless little brat.

The violence and rape were really horrifying, but some of the characters were so compelling that I couldn't wait to see what happened to them next. (And I have to admit, I enjoyed seeing some of the villains getting killed off.)

I'm also pretty good at skimming past key words that I don't want to read, so as things get bad I can skip those paragraphs and get to the plot again.
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tigerwife




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 11:09 am
FranticFrummie wrote:

I'm also pretty good at skimming past key words that I don't want to read, so as things get bad I can skip those paragraphs and get to the plot again.


So this is what I was doing until around 3/4ths of the first book. And then suddenly it occurred to me that a huge part of the book was Martin’s obsession with violence, gore and immoral behavior- it wasn’t like most stories that have a scene or two you can skin through, but rather those scenes are simply integral to the plot and writing. If you would want to censor it, then you’d be left with around 12 pages of unblackened, scattered writing and little idea of what the story was about.

I’m glad for this thread, though, gingertop, because you strengthened my resolve not to pick them up again and literally pour garbage in my brain. (Also, I just read the summary of the show finale and it was a little meh). I would love to start another series as epic as GOT but without the perversion- any other ideas? Preferably a fully written series!
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dee's mommy




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 11:26 am
Rappel wrote:
No comparison. The LOTR was squeaky clean, and unique in its genre at the time of writing. GOT is an extremely explicit game of Civilization, in Large Map mode. There is nothing there but smoke and the written-word equivalent of pixels.


You are right. It is a bad comparison between the two series.
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imasoftov




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 2:57 pm
Rappel wrote:
No comparison. The LOTR was squeaky clean, and unique in its genre at the time of writing. GOT is an extremely explicit game of Civilization, in Large Map mode. There is nothing there but smoke and the written-word equivalent of pixels.

As I previously posted: Crossdressing (Eowyn, female dwarves), women in the army (Eowyn again, and in some circles, men in the army is also a problem). Also intermarriage (Men and Elves, maybe Tom and Goldberry too). And mixed dancing (Beren and Luthien). And there don't seem to be any filters on the Palantíri (I once read a satire in which they connected to something called "Atlantis On Line" ...). Kol Isha (Luthien, Goldberry, Galadriel, Arwen). Magic. Eating rabbits. Smoking (whether it's tobacco like Tolkien intended or weed as they sometimes call it).
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youngishbear




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 3:15 pm
imasoftov wrote:
As I previously posted: Crossdressing (Eowyn, female dwarves), women in the army (Eowyn again, and in some circles, men in the army is also a problem). Also intermarriage (Men and Elves, maybe Tom and Goldberry too). And mixed dancing (Beren and Luthien). And there don't seem to be any filters on the Palantíri (I once read a satire in which they connected to something called "Atlantis On Line" ...). Kol Isha (Luthien, Goldberry, Galadriel, Arwen). Magic. Eating rabbits. Smoking (whether it's tobacco like Tolkien intended or weed as they sometimes call it).


LOL LOL
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imorethanamother




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 5:12 pm
DrMom wrote:
Ditto. I've never seen the TV series because I have heard it is so graphic. If the books are even worse, no thanks.

There's plenty of excellent literature out there that isn't explicit.


I've watched a lot of rated R things out there. I consider myself pretty desensitized. But there are things that go beyond the pale - torturing children and listening to them scream was when I threw in the towel. I was done with the show.

As for the book, I found the first book a good read, the second a bit more meandering, and by the third I found myself too confused to continue.
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imorethanamother




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, May 20 2019, 5:26 pm
sarahmalka wrote:
I have a high tolerance for reading books of a graphic nature (murder mysteries, thriller, romance novels, even horror) from my pre-frum days but GOT was too much even for me. I kept reading up to the second or third one because of the excellent plot but the books absolutely infuriated and sickened me. One thing that makes me so irate is when clearly talented and imaginative people rely on the same sick tropes of rape, incest, and disgusting, gory violence. A lot of science fiction books and shows have the same problem- highly imaginative writers but recycling the same sicknesses that society currently feeds us. OP, GOT is not worth it, IMO.
If you're looking for an exciting and innovative series to dive into, I'm sure you can get lots of good recommendations on imamother. For example if you are at all open to sci fi, check out the Expanse series by James S.A. Corey. (This is not a frum book series, it's just a lot cleaner than GOT.)

(edited for lots of pre-coffee typos, lol)


I totally agree with you. Just one question: Do you think that a world of people fighting over a kingdom (which the book is based on, wasn't it? The War of the Roses?) didn't have its share of violence? And rape?

The thing about Game of Thrones is that he draws out the personal horror, but the overall horror of war he glosses over. I can't find the quote now, but a soldier once wrote about how death was all around him, and death was before him, and it was only looking around that he realized just how horrible the price of winning the war was, because there was no real winning.
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gingertop




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, May 21 2019, 5:49 pm
Thank you everyone. I'm both tempted and turned off. I'll avoid the books for now and probably won't ever read them because the hype is already fizzing out.
I appreciate all the responses.
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dancingqueen




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, May 21 2019, 6:22 pm
It’s a great story with compelling characters, but it definitely goes too far in several ways.
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