Well I had a really good month in overall book reading, as I finished 5 books to put my total for the year at 21 out of 40 books.  However as you can see below, I'm only through 14 of the 40 books that I wanted to take off my TBR pile.  So on one hand I'm on good pace to achieve the amount of books I want to at least read, but on the other not the book I wanted to read.  Oh well, I'll take the upside in any event.

 

A Sword Sworn to Justice

 

The graphic novel adaptation of the second of George R.R. Martin's Dunk & Egg novellas, not only stays true to the originally written story but gives it life with fantastic renderings of all the characters, the locales, and the action. Drawn by artist Mike S. Miller and livened by colorist Mike Crowell, The Sworn Sword gives both "Game of Thrones" book and show fans a great look into the history of the Seven Kingdoms as Ser Duncan (Dunk) the Tall and the future King Aegon (Egg) V learn about the greatest threat to the Targaryen throne nearly a century before Robert’s Rebellion—the Blackfyre Rebellion.

 

The story begins almost two years after The Hedge Knight, Dunk and Egg are in the service to Sir Eustace Osgrey who holds a small tower but reminisces about his family’s ancient glory and his own immediate family’s misfortune.  A nearly two year drought has gripped Westeros after the Great Spring Sickness—think the Black Death—resulting in water and people being short, which is when Ser Eustace’s stream disappears.  After Dunk and another sworn sword, Ser Bennis, search upstream they discover that Ser Eustace’s neighbor Lady Webber has built a dam to divert the water.  Soon things escalate and the two nobles begin to lob threats and promise blood vengeance as Dunk tries to find a way to make peace.

 

Of the work surrounding the graphic novel itself, I can only praise the work of Miller and Crowell who not only brought into visual life Dunk and Egg but so many other historically important characters in very consistent way throughout the entire book. It is hard to find fault with the work of these two men save with pointing out a few continuity errors, which unfortunately happen in every graphic novel.  But when it came to the memories of Ser Eustace Osgrey about the Battle of the Redgrass Field that ended the threat of Daemon Blackfyre, the artwork is fantastic and brings the memories of the battle alive and giving justice to some of Martin’s best writing.

 

If you're a fan of the "A Song of Ice and Fire" world and haven't gotten this book yet I, what are you waiting for?  I highly recommend this graphic novel adaptation of The Sworn Sword as well as the novella itself, you won’t be disappointed.

Extraordinarily disappointing, this second tale of Dunk and Egg feels like an excuse for Martin to pad out the rich history of the world he has created, because it adds virtually nothing of interest to the story of his two protagonists started with The Hedge Knight.

Maybe my reading of this was coloured by how long it has been since I last visited the literary version of Westeros. But since I'm not allowed to complain about that, lest Neil Gaiman remind me the football-mad, aging, perfectionistic author is not my bitch, or GRRM himself scold me for wondering if he might go the way of Robert Jordan, I'm just going to settle on this one being a huge steaming pile of meh.

Recommended for massive fans of the Song of Ice and Fire series only.

2 Clouts About the Ear for The Sworn Sword.

i also read The Hedge Knight and The Sworn Sword: The Graphic Novel. i first read George R.R. Martin in the anthology Legends. i love Dunk & Egg. i also love fantasy anthologies. i would never normally read the fantasy series by these authors because they are more than 10 volumes or just feel like it because the books are so very long. anthologies give me a chance to read their work.

anyway, i did enjoy the graphic version of the stories.
i plan on reading all of the Song of fire and ice series this way. but my goodness those GN's are taking forever to make.

This book roared out of the gate. Before the end of the first chapter, the reader is thrown into the middle of a battle. Then that battle ends and so does any action in the novel for quite some time. The only thing that kept me reading was the promise of something coming.

After the battle, Tancred is forced to flee to save his life. That was an event that seemed to take forever. Either die or get better already. Tancred doesn't die so we have to sit through his recovery. Then Tancred gets a mission. Alright! More action! Pump your brakes. Boring boat ride. Little action. More boring journey. Some action. More boring journey. You get the point. This pattern continues for the vast majority of the book. So what was it that kept me reading this novel (Especially when Uhtred was beckoning. And let's be honest ladies, who doesn't have a crush on Uhtred?)? Somewhere in the background of all this boredom was a promise. A promise that something big was coming. Something exciting was looming. So I kept reading. Then the last 100 pages hit me like a ton of bricks. A promise was kept. Without giving anything away, if the author had stretched out the last 100 pages throughout the novel, this book probably would have been more than three stars. If the author had focused less on the how did we get here, things would have been much better. If not for the last 100 pages, this book was maybe two stars.

One other issue I had with this novel was the characters. Tancred isn't quite strong enough to carry a book by himself. He needs a little better supporting cast. Wace and Eudo could have benefited greatly from a little more focus and fleshing out. Maybe that's to come in later novels. My interest has been peaked enough to at least hold them at the library.