A Dance of Crows / A Feast for Dragons

[joenotcharles]

Last year I posted a suggested reading order for George R. R. Martin's A Feast For Crows and A Dance With Dragons. The object was to interleave chapters to get the story in roughly chronological order, rather than split by geography.

Last month I saw a couple of people in a row walking around with copies of A Dance With Dragons, and it made me want to re-read it. So I sat down with my split reading list to see how it held up.

Not too shabby, but I could do better.

There were three problems with the first version:

1. I wasn't agressive enough in moving chapters around. There's one plot involving a new character who's talked about near the end of A Feast For Crows and introduced near the beginning of A Dance With Dragons - I thought, "There's no way I can move this late enough to come after the foreshadowing." So I didn't even try.
   
   But when I re-read it after a palate-cleansing several months, I realized that his introduction falls totally flat without the foreshadowing. And I also realized that I can move his introductory chapter back by over half a book without affecting much. So I did that, and it works much better now. (The only problem is that now the rearranged books don't quite work in chronological order - a few minor background details when this new character is introduced are wrong, and when he goes on a journey it seems to take him half the amount of time it takes other characters to cover the same amount of ground. The reason is, of course, he was originally introduced around the time those characters started their trek and then dropped out of sight, making his own long journey offscreen. Now he's introduced around the halfway point and somehow manages to beat them to their destination. Not a huge deal in a series that already fudges time and distance to help the plot, although usually not this blatantly.)


2. In the first version there's one point where I hedged and gave two possible reading orders. I thought that one worked better but involved an annoying amount of flipping between books, so I posted an alternative that involved less flipping. No more! Anyone who's going to bother following my list isn't going to be put off by having to switch books more often. This version only contains the order that I think works the best.


3. When you put these two books together, you get 1600 pages without a break in the pace. That's too long! There has to be some inflection point around the halfway mark. Even if you finish one 800 page book and then immediately pick up the next 800 page book, the knowledge that you've finished a section is a psychological relief. It feels like a fresh start. So it's important to have a pair of chapters near the middle that feels like an ending followed by a new beginning, so that the reader can put a mark and say, "There. I just finished a 'book'. I can take a break and come back to the next 'book' later if I want." To get this feeling I split up the prologues again, moving one of them to around the middle, and making sure the chapter before it ended with a dramatic revelation that would work well as a climax. (And if you've read A Feast For Crows, you can probably guess which one.)

So here's my updated reading order, now split into two virtual books, which I've titled A Dance With Crows and A Feast For Dragons. Page numbers are from the first hardcover printing; hopefully the chapter titles will be enough for people to follow along in the paperbacks. (As a bonus, they're closer to equal length, rather than one 600 page book and one 900 page book - that 900 pages was a slog.)

A Dance With Crows

Dragons 1-15 (Prologue)
Crows 16-70 (The Prophet, The Captain of Guards, Cersei, Brienne)
Dragons 16-82 (Tyrion, Daenerys, Jon, Bran, Tyrion)
Crows 87-171 (Arya, Cersei, Jaime, Brienne, Sansa, The Kraken's Daughter)
Crows 71-86 (Samwell)
Dragons 95-178 (Jon, Tyrion, Davos, Jon, Daenerys, Reek, Bran)
Dragons 192-202 (Davos)
Crows 172-311 (Cersei, The Soiled Knight, Brienne, Samwell, Jaime, Cersei, The Iron Captain, The Drowned Man, Brienne, The Queenmaker)
Dragons 179-191 (Tyrion)
Dragons 203-231 (Daenerys, Jon)
Dragons 243-252 (Davos)
Crows 312-444 (Arya, Alayne, Cersei, Brienne, Samwell, Jaime, Cersei, The Reaver)
Dragons 232-242 (Tyrion)
Dragons 253-275 (Reek, Jon)
Crows 445-545 (Jaime, Brienne, Cersei, Jaime, Cat of the Canals, Samwell, Cersei)
Crows 587-604 (The Princess in the Tower)

End of A Dance With Crows (811 pages)

A Feast For Dragons

Crows 1-15 (Prologue)
Dragons 83-94 (The Merchant's Man)
Dragons 276-350 (Tyrion, Daenerys, The Lost Lord, The Windblown, The Wayward Bride)
Crows 546-586 (Brienne, Jaime, Cersei)
Crows 605-627 (Alayne)
Dragons 351-433 (Tyrion, Jon, Davos, Daenerys, Melisandre, Reek)
Crows 628-684 (Brienne, Cersei, Jaime, Samwell)
Dragons 434-959 (Tyrion, Bran, Jon, Daenerys, The Prince of Winterfell, The Watcher, Jon, Tyrion, The Turncloak, The King's Prize, Daenerys, Jon, The Blind Girl, A Ghost in Winterfell, Tyrion, Jaime, Jon, Daenerys, Theon, Daenerys, Jon, Cersei, The Queensguard, The Iron Suitor, Tyrion, Jon, The Discarded Knight, The Spurned Suitor, The Griffin Reborn, The Sacrifice, Victarion, The Ugly Little Girl, Cersei, Tyrion, The Kingbreaker, The Dragontamer, Jon, The Queen's Hand, Daenerys, Epilogue)

End of A Feast For Dragons (834 pages)