Iron, Fire and Ice: The Real History That Inspired Game of Thrones

I was looking forward to reading this book based on Ed West's previous history books and my love of the Game of Thrones world. I thought this book would cover a lot of the historical figures and events that inspired George R. R. Martin. However, the author connected very little of the history in this book to Martin's characters or had a very good grasp of the books or the show.But my biggest pet peeve was how the chapters in the book were not in chronological order. The book jump from one era to another then back again. Also, the last sentence at the end of many chapters would hint at what was going to be discussed next, but then the next chapter would be on a totally different subject.Much like Martin's books and the show, there are many characters involved in the history. However, unlike Martin, the author does not give a index of a who's who, and he keeps changing back and forth calling character's by their names and then their titles.I gave this two stars instead of one because it does contain some interesting historical facts, but I do not recommend this book to anyone looking gain a sense of the history behind Martin's work.

I haven't had the chance to read much of this so far. But what I have read, I have enjoyed and look forward to completely it soon.

Fascinating and fun read. History made very enjoyable.

While interesting and engagingly written, there are some issues with the text.The footnotes are frequently mismatched to the text, either referring to a different passage in the text or mis-numbered.The passage on the history of Ancient Egypt also contains errors.Tetisheri was not a pharaoh as West claims, she was a queen considered the matriarch of the 17th/18th Dynasties and particularly honored by her grandson Ahmose I and his sister-wife Ahmose-Nefertari. She was also the mother of at least one of the warrior kings of the 17th Dynasty, Sekenenre Ta’a. Ironically, as this passage is about royal incest, Tetisheri appears to have been born a commoner, not part of the royal family.The title “God’s Wife” was a common one for royal women during the New Kingdom and is in reference to the god Amun.As for incest in the Egyptian royal family, it occurs far earlier than the 16th Century BC. King Djet and his consort Merneith of the 1st Dynasty (ca 2950 BC) were closely related. None of the information above is particularly hard to come by or limited to sources only specialists are likely to be aware of or have access to, so I’m not sure if this was sloppy editing or something missed (which happens to the best of us).Given the problematic footnotes and factual errors, I’d encourage readers to independently confirm information they find particularly interesting or plan to cite in their own work (which you should do anyway), but for those with a historical bent, tracking down and confirming information is half the fun.

Not personal enough. Jumps around too much

Great book ever. Glad to read.

This is one of the best books I have ever read and I have read more than 2000 in my life. It is packed with amazing and little known facts concerning the early history of Europe so the book should be a real treat to anyone interested in history and the struggles of Europe as a continent from 7000 BC to present day.

New book as described. Sent quickly. An excellent read.

This book includes some very interesting historical information and how it ties in with the television series, although more tie-ins and less historical details would have been better. At times, the history drags on after for some time after the tie-in has been established. The biggest disappointment lies in the high number of typos, which causes the book to appear rather amateurish. A professionally published book should not have typos which are so severe that the meaning of the sentence is lost!

Interesting historical facts together with the tie-ins to GOT, however the descriptions of the many barbaric practices across all civilisations, becomes overly repetitive.