Just finished the book tonight...
Spoiler Space
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Spoiler Space
Spoiler Space
Overall, I thought the it was pretty good, although I was expecting it to be a bit more eventful (although after ASOS, the eventful/non-eventful bar had been risen considerably higher). Currently, I would probably rank the book as the fourth best in the series.....ASOS-->AGOT---->ACOK->ADWD---->AFFC. To me, it was very similar to AFFC, but much more enjoyable since all of my favorite characters were present. I get this feeling from ADWD and AFFC that's akin to what I got from ACOK; they continually build and build and build on the story, eventually leading to all hell breaking loose in the next book. That isn't to say that they are filler or anything, but ACOK really set up all the craziness in ASOS, and I feel these last two books have done the for TWOW. If TWOW isn't on the same level of ASOS, I will be probably be very disappointed.
I have to agree, though, that the Meereen story was very drawn out and very slow. For how many chapters were dedicated to it, nothing truly interesting happened until the last 200 pages or so. Hopefully the whole Meereen arc gets wrapped up in TWOW, as so far it's not been terribly exciting (to me).
Martin has clearly not lost his knack for killing off important characters.....nor creating new ones to hate (Fuck you Ramsay, lol)
Really interested to find out the role Arya is going to play...and especially Bran since he's, you know, sitting in a cave whispering to people from the trees.
Hopefully the whole Aegon thing doesn't just become a side note. Revealing him as a player was one of the highlights of the novel, so hopefully he turns out to be a big factor.
I can only pray that it won't take Martin another 12 years to release the final two books. He's 62, and despite what he says about being a healthy person, I'm still a little worried. I would hate for this series to end in the same fashion as Wheel of Time. I read the first 4 books in about 6 months, and waited for just over a year for this one to be released, so I can't even imagine having to wait till my mid 30s to finish the series.
Oh btw, Strong Belwas is the man.