Lately my appetite for fantasy books was whetted by the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan. The downside of that series was that the books were quite long and the plot took so long to develop. Of course this helped create a very complex background and would create a large community of fans who devoured every detail in the 13 (soon to be completed in 14) books.

The newest fantasy series that took this genre with a storm is A Song of Ice and Storm by George R R Martin. The fifth book has just been published and it looks like the series has another two books to be published.

A Game of Thrones is the first book of the series, and it has just been covered in a very successful HBO TV series (first season covers the first book, but the whole series is named Game of Thrones and the second season is sure to be filmed). The book is - in contrast to the Wheel of Time series - very action-oriented. Although it presents lots of characters and a complex history, it has proper progress in every chapter and seems to have been written with a cinematic representation in mind. Although there is very little hint of supernatural in the first book, the signs are there, hinting that there will be more coming.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book and will be starting the second one in the series soon.