too many characters?

[Roger]

is it just me or are there too many characters in this series? it's a bit of a pain in the ass to keep jumping to the appendix. if it just me then ok... i guess i'm a bit concerned. blasted anti-perspirant.

[Robin]

There's a lot of characters but I think that's part of what makes the series so great - it's so complicated and you get to see all the different view points. It makes it feel more realistic. That's not to say all books should be this way - probably few authors can pull off such a complicated plot with so many characters with their extensive back stories.

[Ricky0282]

I love the scope of the story and the character count contributes to that.

[IUHoosier]

GRRM just keeps adding more and more in subsequent books, so prepare yourself. But also keep in mind - he very, very rarely adds a character that isn't important at some point in the story. So even though its confusing, there's a reason for each viewpoint - it may not be in the current book, but perhaps two or three books further out. The depth of the story is absolutely phenomenal.

[Terry]

I think it's important to keep up some momentum with these books. The scope and number of facts and characters will get on top of you if you're reading it sporadically, but if you immerse yourself and read it at a good pace, they come alive. For that reason, I don't recommend a break between books, and if you're reading a newly published one after a gap, I'd say re-read the old ones first (I've read #1 five times now, once when it was published, once when #2 was, etc.).

[Terry]

I think what's happening there is that events that go on (for example) in Dorne and the Iron Islands are important, and I think when he tried to write just from the POVs we already had, he wasn't happy with the amount of exposition/reporting he was having to do. It's a shame because I agree that the minor character POVs do seem to bloat it a little and break up the rhythm somewhat, but not having seen the alternative I guess I trust his judgement that it was necessary.

[Whitney]

One other thing I appreciate about the wealth of detail, aside from adding to the richness of the world, is the way it serves to keep events from being more predictable. In sparser books, a sudden unusual detail is a tip-off to the reader - i.e if a particular dish and who eats it is mentioned, you can be pretty sure it's poisoned; if a tree along the road is noted, there's probably someone lurking in the branches; if one of the 'small folk' is given a name, you know he's probably a knight in disguise or something. In this series, those things are lost among the details as they would be in 'real' life.

[moore]

What challenges me, along with the immense amount of characters, is the way the sands of time flow in the series. When we read a chapter and then jump to another, time will not go back and immediately pick up where Martin left off. I love that, but I find myself needing to hold tight and let him remind me of what I need to remember for that particular timeline.

[D.S.]

there's alot of characters but i don't think there's too many at least not too many POV characters ... there may perhaps be a few too many secondary characters but I've never found it to be a problem in the earlier books in the series anyway

[Vorrutyer]

Judging by the rate George kills the characters, he could run out of them fast.

[Byron]

As long as he keeps the story interesting the amount of characters is fine. However, I found myself getting bored in the fourth book because there were just too many threads by that point, I will give the current book a chance since I really like his writing, and hopefully he brings it back in a bit.

[Davytron]

You'll be surprised at how pivotal seemingly minor characters can become later on the series.

[Willi]

Terry wrote: "I think it's important to keep up some momentum with these books. The scope and number of facts and characters will get on top of you if you're reading it sporadically, but if you immerse yourself ..."

I agree.These books take a lot of focus. I tend to skip to the good characters so I have to go back and read at my leisure.

[Lisa]

I agree, too many characters with too little impact on the final conflict. They are well written, but by book four I'm wading through a lot of story and new characters I don't care about.

[One]

I think George no longer knows what he wants from this series. Is it a fitting end? Is it a need for publication and recognition? Or is it a need to just continue and continue writing? He needs to answer this question and go from there because to be quite honest, it needs to END!!!!. The more he introduces the harder he is making it on himself to wrap it up neatly. Much more and the desired ending [If it exists in George's mind at all] will need to be rushed and unkindly done.

[ally ¯\(ツ)/¯]

This isn't a light and airy beach read. If you stick with the series you'll realize good things come to those who wait. This series is a work of art!

[Robin]

One wrote: "I think George no longer knows what he wants from this series. Is it a fitting end? Is it a need for publication and recognition? Or is it a need to just continue and continue writing? He needs to ..."

Supposedly he already knows the ending and has told the producers of the show in case he does not live long enough to write it himself. I think he just finds that as he writes towards the end, the journey there takes longer to write than he realized. I think in his head, he's thinking "Okay, to get to the end - point D - I have to write about points A, B, and C first" but he doesn't realize how much A, B, and C entail until he's writing it. And that's because it's not really about the ending, it's about the journey there. If you're not enjoying the journey, stop reading it.

[S]

The books are brilliant, but they do sort of get out of control. By the time you get to DWD there at least twice as many POV characters as in GOT.

[Chris]

I think you are doing yourself a disservice if you skip around in the books like I have seen some people say they do.

[Albert]

The books are an excellent read. I've only read them once, and I will certainly be reading them again. However, they do have a number of faults, minor ones admittedly, but still somewhat annoying. He has introduced too many characters, but as another poster mentioned, the rate that he kills his major characters off he has to introduce new ones. What I find mildly irritating is Martin's ignorance of what many of his readers want. We, as readers, invest a great deal of time in his characters, especially if we sympathize or emphasize with them. We vicariously live their lives and, rightly, grieve, (maybe grieve is too strong a word for a fictional character, perhaps aggrieved) but still we readers do invest this time and would like to see the character develop further. Perhaps, imo, Martin's biggest mistake (SPOILER) was killing off Rob Stark at the red wedding.
Another moan is his maps, I wish he'd hire someone to do a decent map of his fantasy world.
Last moan, two of his books, can't remember which ones, run in a parallel time zone, but the books don't, if you see what I mean, which means when you're reading the second book, you're going over events that have happened in the first parallel book and you already know the outcome. I felt as though I was reading backward and going over what I'd already read.
End of moans. Now where is my G.O.T. Book One?

[Mitali]

Albert wrote: "What I find mildly irritating is Martin's ignorance of what many of his readers want."

No offence, but readers aren't writers' clients or something. A writer has no artistic obligation to take into consideration his readers' wishes. Personally, I would have a very low opinion of a writer who compromised the artistic integrity of his work in order to pander to readers' whims.

In any case, it's not like the readers all have the same wishes. GRRM can't very well oblige them all even if he wanted to.

Albert wrote: "Another moan is his maps, I wish he'd hire someone to do a decent map of his fantasy world."

He already has. If you want paper-based maps, look for the The Lands of Ice and Fire collection. If you want digital ones, then just Google them - there are dozens of good maps out there, some fan-made, some officially endorsed.

[Robin]

Albert wrote: "What I find mildly irritating is Martin's ignorance of what many of his readers want."

Sorry but I have to agree with Mitali. Novels are a work of creativity and authors are not contracted by readers to give them exactly what they want. Readers are entitled not to like something and express their opinion on it but they can not expect authors to suppress their freedom of creativity. They are under no obligation to write just to please certain readers. I say certain readers because plenty of readers prefer Martin's tendency to kill off main characters. This is a gritty, brutal world Martin created - it's not a fairy tale. Good people died unjustly and their deaths may never be avenged. Some people like that because it's more real. If you don't like that kind of story, don't read this series.

"Another moan is his maps, I wish he'd hire someone to do a decent map of his fantasy world."


This wasn't decent enough for you?

[Ken]

I'm almost finished with Storm of Swords and just felt the need to chip in on a discussion. Yeah, there are probably too many characters but the story keeps almost all of them involved in the narrative.

Storm of Swords was if Martin was watching some daily soap opera with all the matchmaking and who is sleeping with who. I think Storm of Swords is going to be my last one for a bit. I'm starting to skip over the lists of families, their siegels and barding of the horses. Those sections along with the lyrics just make me want to put them behind me as quickly as possible. A lot of the characters are becoming too internally conflicted. Jon, Sansa, and especially Danerys spend too much of their waking day wondering they are doing the right thing.
Tyrion and Arya are more focused. As a result, I like their chapters better.

[Albert]

Thank you Mitali and Robin, both of you are one hundred percent right, a reader shouldn't expect a writer to suppress their creativity just to pander to the whims of one reader, ie me. And another thank you to Robin for pointing out 'The Lands of Ice and Fire'. In my defense. I bought Martin's books second hand and they are older editions.

[Felicia]

I definitely like that GRRM writes through so many characters because the story is so complex that I don't think it would make sense if it was told through only one or a few characters at once. In GoT there are not as many characters but then as the story progresses (through the books) and gets more complicated you need more characters to make sense of the story.

[Jeanine]

Davytron wrote: "You'll be surprised at how pivotal seemingly minor characters can become later on the series."

I agree!

[Holly]

I love books with a huge cast of characters; it keeps things interesting and I don't have any trouble keeping track of who is who.

Anybody ever read The Old Man and the Sea? Only two characters to keep track of, and very little action. I don't recommend it.

[Hannah]

The characters make the series! Without the dynamic cast of characters I would have never been interested in this book. Characters to me are the most important part of a novel.

[Ben]

Holly wrote:
Anybody ever read The Old Man and the Sea? Only two characters..."
Spoiler alert: The Sea is not one of the characters. I disagree on your anti-recommendation of this book however; I thought it was well done.

Back on topic though, when there aren't a lot of characters who can you kill off?

I think Martin does a good job at building his characters, so while there are a lot; it's not like there are a ton of flat characters... They're all well rounded.