[Xietor]

I agree with Edi somewhat. The early Martin books are excellent, despite what i think is overkill on feeding a man's
prurient interest. To me, there were two major drawbacks in the books, and the unnecessary and somewhat offensive aggressive feeding of the prurient interest is somewhat degrading to the intellect of the reader.

Second, martin himself admitted that killing off too many main characters was what stumped him in continuing the series.

He DID kill off too many of his major story lines, by his own admission, and the creation of new ones, like that stupid female knight, was a poor substitute for some of more interesting characters he killed off.

To add insult to injury, when he finally(years later and after burning the 1st effort) managed to publish another book in the series, it does not include anything about the 2 most interesting characters left alive, Jon Snow and his crippled little brother.

I would strongly advise against buying A Feast for Crows, but i do recommend the earlier books. His earlier books get an 8/10 but could have been even higher had he not dwelled on the issues raised by edi, which assumes the average fantasy reader is a 15 year old boy wanting masturbation material. The killing off of main characters is fine to a degree, but not if leaves the storyline bereft of meaning.

And it is not open to debate that he killed off too many main characters, martin admits that mistake himself.