The Culture

With the first season of Game of Thrones coming to an end, I am probably going to take some time out from comic reading to do more book reading (I currently only tend to read novels on the commute to and from work which is only about an hour each day). I have been watching and enjoying the series but if the book is half as good then this will be a great read and I will want to devote most of my time to it and the sequels (I currently have the second book as well).

I was going to say that I am not a big fan of fantasy – indeed I do tend to read science fiction when it comes to books – but the more I thought about it the less true it seemed. For instance, if you have been a regular reader of this blog then you will know that my favourite comic imprint is Vertigo from DC and a lot of their output and my favourite titles are fantasy based such as Hellblazer, Books of Magic, Fables and Sandman. But even when I think of books I have read the Harry Potter series, the urban fantasy of Jim Butcher and Mike Carey and the fantastic worlds of Robert E. Howard and Clark Ashton Smith. Also one of my favourite authors is Neil Gaiman so when I say that I am not a fan of fantasy then I guess I am talking of the high fantasy of Lord of the Rings type books.

In terms of this kind of fantasy I think I have only read Tolkein and Stephen Donaldson’s Thomas Covenant chronicles so I think it is well past time for me to try something new – well at least new to me as A Game of Thrones was first published 15 years ago. Based on the TV series I wouldn’t describe this book as high fantasy either – but that’s OK if it is not as that is not necessarily what I am after – how do you top Tolkein after all.

So I will post here less frequently than I have been but will return towards the end of the summer.