My Review of Fire and Blood: A History of the Targaryen Kings from Aegon the Conqueror to Aegon III








When I first saw this book in stores and read what it was about, I was excited and thought maybe I should buy it but instead I ended up getting it from my local library. I am glad that I did because while I am somewhat of a fan of Game of Thrones (I have read some of the books and watched three episodes of the final season of the tv show) and I love history even if it is fictional I found this book to be average, some bits of it were good and enjoyable to read others not so much.



Some of the things that I liked about the book was that it provided more information about the history of the Game of Thrones world and how it got to the point where the books begin, I especially liked this because quite often when reading a book it will give a little bit of backstory and not much else which  usually leaves me wanting to find out more. Another thing I liked about this book and something I think the author George R. R. Martin did well was that it was written as if it were a real history book with the fictional author in the book commenting on some of the sources and recommending other works if the reader wanted to find out more about certain events that the book did not cover in great detail, I think this was a great touch.



This book also had some illustrations of some of the events described which I was not initially a fan of but grew to like as I got more into the book, because it made it easier for me to visualise other events that there were not illustrations for.



While I did like some aspects of the book like the ones mentioned above there were some that I did not, one of those being that while in the last pages there was a list of all of the Targaryen kings up until the time when the book series begins this book only goes up to Aegon III leaving over a hundred years of fictional history that is not covered. If there is going to be another book covering the kings not covered in this book then that’s great and I can see the point of having the list, otherwise I think it should have been left out or it should have stopped at Aegon III.



Another one of the aspects of this book that I did not like was that it did not cover all of the reign of Aegon III just the regency period. I think if you are going to end at him then you should include the history of all of his reign, because otherwise it just feels like George R. R. Martin decided to stop writing without finishing the book or even give it a proper ending. Again, if there is going to be another book covering the other Targaryen kings then this criticism does not matter so much, so I hope there will be another book.



If I had to rate this book, I would give it a 5 and a ½ out of 10 because while I like that it is written as if it were a real history book and I like the background information it gives you about the world of the Game of Thrones books, there were enough aspects of the book that I did not like to make me think this book was average at best and certainly not worth the price that some retailers have been selling it for. That being said if you like the book series then chances are you will like this book.

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