Long ago, in a time forgotten, a preternatural event threw the seasons out of balance. In a land where summers can last decades and winters a lifetime, trouble is brewing. The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes to the north of Winterfell, sinister forces are massing beyond the kingdom’s protective Wall. To the south, the king’s powers are failing—his most trusted adviser dead under mysterious circumstances and his enemies emerging from the shadows of the throne. At the center of the conflict lie the Starks of Winterfell, a family as harsh and unyielding as the frozen land they were born to. Now Lord Eddard Stark is reluctantly summoned to serve as the king’s new Hand, an appointment that threatens to sunder not only his family but the kingdom itself. Sweeping from a harsh land of cold to a summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, A Game of Thrones tells a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; a child is lost in the twilight between life and death; and a determined woman undertakes a treacherous journey to protect all she holds dear. Amid plots and counter-plots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, allies and enemies, the fate of the Starks hangs perilously in the balance, as each side endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.

A comet the color of blood and flame cuts across the sky. Two great leaders—Lord Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon—who hold sway over an age of enforced peace are dead, victims of royal treachery. Now, from the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns. Six factions struggle for control of a divided land and the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms, preparing to stake their claims through tempest, turmoil, and war. It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles. Here is the second volume in George R.R. Martin's magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R.R. Martin's stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.

Here is the third volume in George R.R. Martin's magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings. Together, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction. Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the wars rage as alliances are made and broken. Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms. His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of the sorceress who holds him in her thrall. Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun. Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenerys, mistress of the only three dragons still left in the world. And as opposing forces maneuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mythical Others—a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable. As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords...

Crows will fight over a dead man's flesh, and kill each other for his eyes. Bloodthirsty, treacherous, and cunning, the Lannisters hold power on the Iron Throne under the young king Tommen. While the war in the Seven Kingdoms may have ceased, its bitter end ignites new conflicts. The Martells of Dorne and the Starks of Winterfell are driven by a desire for vengeance for their fallen. Euron Crow's Eye, a pirate of the darkest reputation, returns from the ruins of Valyria to claim the Iron Isles. In the cold north, beyond the Wall where the Others loom, apprentice Maester Samwell Tarly carries a mysterious child to the Citadel. In a world rife with incest, fratricide, alchemy, and murder, only those with the sharpest steel and coldest hearts can hope to prevail.

In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance—beset by newly emerging threats from every direction. In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death. But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her. As they gather, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the queen, with an entirely different goal in mind. Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys. But his newest allies in this quest are not the rag-tag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who could undo Daenerys’s claim to Westeros forever. Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone—a structure only as strong as those guarding it. There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, will face his greatest challenge. For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice. From all corners, bitter conflicts reignite, intimate betrayals are perpetrated, and a grand cast of outlaws and priests, soldiers and skinchangers, nobles and slaves, will face seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Some will fail, others will grow in the strength of darkness. But in a time of rising restlessness, the tides of destiny and politics will lead inevitably to the greatest dance of all.

The Winds of Winter is the eagerly awaited sixth novel in the epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. The previous book, A Dance with Dragons, didn’t cover as much story as Martin had planned, leaving out a significant battle sequence and concluding several character arcs with cliffhangers. Martin has promised to tackle these unresolved storylines "very early" in The Winds of Winter. He plans to kick off the novel with two major battles that were being set up: the battle in the ice and the battle at Meereen, also known as the battle of Slaver's Bay, before moving the story forward from there.

Originally titled A Time For Wolves. The seventh and apparent final book of George R.R. Martin's acclaimed series, A Song of Ice and Fire.

The never-before-seen history of Westeros and the lands beyond, with hundreds of pages of all-new material from George R.R. Martin. If the past is prologue, then George R.R. Martin’s masterwork—the most inventive and entertaining fantasy saga of our time—warrants one hell of an introduction. At long last, it has arrived with THE WORLD OF ICE AND FIRE. George R.R. Martin, in collaboration with Elio M. García, Jr. and Linda Antonsson, has written a comprehensive history of the Seven Kingdoms, featuring the epic battles, bitter rivalries, and daring rebellions that lead up to the events in the bestselling A Song of Ice and Fire series. Collected within this volume is the accumulated knowledge, scholarly speculation, and inherited folk tales of maesters and septons, maegi and singers, including over 170 full-colour illustrations and maps, family trees for the Houses Stark, Lannister, and Targaryen, and in-depth explanations of the history and culture of Westeros. This is the definitive companion volume to George R.R. Martin’s dazzlingly conceived universe; THE WORLD OF ICE AND FIRE is indeed proof that the pen is mightier than a storm of swords.

HBO’s hit series A GAME OF THRONES is based on George R R Martin’s internationally bestselling series A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE, the greatest fantasy epic of the modern age. George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series has set the benchmark for contemporary epic fantasy. Labelled by Time magazine as one of the top 100 most influential people in the world, Martin has conjured a world as complex and vibrant as that of J.R.R. Tolkien’s, populated by a huge cast of fascinating, complex characters, and boasting a history that stretches back twelve thousand years. Three great storylines weave through the books, charting the civil war for control of the Seven Kingdoms; the defence of the towering Wall of ice in the uttermost north against the unearthly threat of the Others; and across the Narrow Sea the rise to power of Daenerys Targaryen and the last live dragons in the world. This collection A GAME OF THRONESA CLASH OF KINGSA STORM OF SWORDS, 1: STEEL AND SNOWA STORM OF SWORDS, 2: BLOOD AND GOLDA FEAST FOR CROWSA DANCE WITH DRAGONS, 1: DREAMS AND DUSTA DANCE WITH DRAGONS, 2: AFTER THE FEASTPreview chapter of THE WINDS OF WINTER