A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms - George R R Martin (Book).

Book 1/52

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms - George R R Martin

My Rating: 5/5

A century before A Game of Thrones, two heroes wandered Westeros. When a book cover says that with the legendary name GRRM on top, one just can’t ignore this little gem of a book. Additionally, its TV adaptation is set to be released within the next 10 days or so. I resisted reading this book for years, eagerly waiting for the TV adaptation, so I could read it right before its launch. My timing is perfect. This is from the age when Targaryens are still on the Iron Throne, but unfortunately, the Dragons have gone; only the memory remains. There comes a new hero in the form of a Hedge Knight Ser Duncan, and he calls himself “Dunk the lunk thick as a castle wall” with no background, knighted by a dying Knight who took him as a kid and trained him to be a good one at that. Tagging along with him is a nut case of a boy called Egg, originally he happens to be none other than Aegon Targaryen, the future king of the seven kingdoms. Let me tell you that the kid is hilarious, and the way he takes our giant of a Knight Ser Duncan was totally laugh-out-loud comedy, and the way Ser Duncan keeps trying to punish him was so funny. Even his love interest was a good turn of events, and even on that front, the author kept me asking for more. Their amazing chemistry is the best part of this entire story told in three parts and much to my heartbreak it is hardly 350 pages which so less from GRRM standards, I kept asking for more to no avail though, and guess what, he had no time to continue its second part as his fans are still waiting for the last two parts of his masterpiece “A Song of Ice and Fire” yet. I was eagerly looking forward to glimpses of my favourite kingdoms like Starks, Lannister’s, Frey’s, Dragonstone, Casterly Rock, the Tarly’s and so many more in no particular order and Mr GRRM does obliges on that front, if he ever end up writing this one’s sequel, I guess the great wall is not that far before Ser Duncan will travel that far with his insolent squire to take a look at the wall or may be go beyond that too. A lot of other characters, too, get special mentions like Dondarrions, the burning sword, tourneys where two warriors fight for honour and, at times, gold to survive. The hand-to-mouth story of Dunk with Egg is heart-touching at times as they struggle for their everyday meals and a roof on head, was simply stunning. But the best part about this book is the Illustrations by Gary Gianni, they were simply WOW, the way he gave the faces to so many characters, it was totally outstanding. I believe he has made the TV adapter's job easy by making those illustrations, as it won’t be much for the casting crew to pick up the right actors for those characters, going by his sketches. There are no fewer than 125+ sketches in a 350-page book. 

 

Have you read A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, or are you looking forward to the TV adaptation at least? It is very hard to choose one favourite from Mr Martin, so it is inevitable that almost all his books so far are best sellers. Big time looking forward to so much more from him at the earliest.