A new George R.R. Martin book has just been announced! Calm down, it’s not the long-awaited The Winds of Winter, volume six in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. That book is currently expected for publication in 2020, followed by book 7 A Dream of Spring in 2021.
No, this is the first book in a new duology which chronicles the history of the Targaryen dynasty. Fire and Blood is due on November 20th, 2018 in the US, Canada, the UK and most other countries. It was only just announced officially on his own website, you can find the article here.
This is not a novel like his other books, instead, it’s “imaginary history”, as the author himself says. It’s set 300 years before A Song of Ice and Fire, and it details the history of the Targaryens in Westeros and their conquest that united the Seven Kingdoms through the Dance of the Dragons. It will be illustrated with over 75 black and white portraits and scenes by Doug Wheatley and it’ll be sure to add to die-hard fans’ appreciation of the epic world that Martin created all those years ago.
This is the blurb:
Centures before the events of A Game of Thrones, House Targaryen – the only family of dragonlords to survive the Doom of Valyria – took up residence on Dragonstone. Fire and Blood begins their tale with the legendary Aegon the Conqueror, creator of the Iron Throne, and goes on to recount the generations of Targaryens who fought to hold that iconic seat, all the way up to the civil war that nearly tore their dynasty apart.
What really happened during the Dance of the Dragons? Why did it become so deadly to visit Valyria after the Doom? What is the origin of Daenerys’s three dragon eggs? These are but a few of the questions answered in this essential chronicle, as related by a learned maester of the Citadel and featuring more than eighty all-new black-and-white illustrations by artist Doug Wheatley. Readers have glimpsed small parts of this narrative in such volumes as The World of Ice & Fire, but now, for the first time, the full tapestry of Targaryen history is revelaed.
With all of the scope and grandeur of Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Fire and Blood is the ultimate game of thrones, giving reader a whole new appreciation for the dynamic, often bloody, and always fascinating history of Westeros.
Who’s excited?
I have to admit something: I’m not excited. I’ve never read anything by George R.R. Martin, I haven’t seen the TV show, but I do know some of the storylines since it’s impossible to escape this monstrous epic of a hysteria! I know, I know, I’m missing out, it’s the biggest thing since The Lord of the Rings, blablabla. But. But, habitual readers of my blog will know that I don’t start a book series before it’s finished. And it’s just ridiculous how unfinished Game of Thrones is. Martin has been promising new books for years, literally years. And I can’t handle that. I need to know the ending. I need the story to be finished. Maybe once all the books ar eout, I’ll start. Who knows?
Happy reading,
Loes M.