Are You Waiting for Winter?

If you're like me, you enjoyed the Game of Thrones TV show but are darn ready to see the next book in the A Song of Ice of Fire series. To pass the time time, let's sharpen our own writing knowledge by talking about the techniques that Martin used to make us care about the characters so much.

Yup, if you want to write your own successful fiction, you have to make your readers care about characters, and that's what Martin does so well.

Here's the Technical Name for G.R.R. Martin's Narrative Style: Third-Person Limited Omniscient

The A Song of Ice and Fire (ASOIF) books aren't unusual for using third-person narration. I haven't conducted a survey, but most popular fiction books use third person.

Just in case you forgot, here's a quick summary of third person:

• The narrator never says "I" or "We" or refers to himself.
• The narrator does refer to everybody as he, she, they, or by name or nickname.

If the narrator did refer to himself/herself as I or we, that would be first person. An example of an interesting use of a shifting, first-person narrative style would be Bram Stoker's Dracula, and you might want to read my Steem article about that classic horror novel here: https://steemit.com/writing/@theinsideout/saving-dracula-how-to-explain-the-classic-vampire-story-s-enduring-popularity

What's Different About Narration for Game of Thrones and Other ASOIF Books?

Just in case you're only a show watcher, only the first book is actually called Game of Thrones. The series is called A Song of Ice and Fire. It's OK if you refer to the series as GOT, but I just wanted to head off any confusion.

Anyway, Martin doesn't just use third-person narration. He changes the point-of-view (POV) character in every chapter. In other words, you get a glimpse into what the POV character does, sees, or things, but you only view other characters through that person's perspective.

How Does This Shifting POV Really Help You Care About Characters?

The easiest example is Jaime. When you meet him in the beginning in the book, it's through the lens of the Starks. He appears to be only a bad guy. He's arrogant, he killed a king, and for goodness sake, he pushed a kid out of a window. Yes, Jaime has done some things that would make any reader dislike him.

Later, we get to visit Jaime's POV. Pushing Bran out of the window was bad; however, we come to understand that King Robert probably would have killed Jaime and his whole family (legitimate and otherwise) if he found out what Jaime did. Also, we learn that Jaime killed the Mad King because the Mad King was about to torch King's Landing.

Jaime might not earn a total pass for pushing Bran, but it's easy to understand the Kingslayer title isn't justified. Also, as the book progresses, Jaime evolves a bit. Instead of hoping this guy swallows poison, we readers start to sympathize with Jaime and later, we might even root for him a bit.

Is Martin's POV Style Unique?

Martin will admit that he borrowed the technique from other fantasy books he liked. There aren't that many different choices for point-of-view styles, so it's hard to find anything that's every totally new. However, Martin was fairly unique in that he did NOT center the story around one or two protagonists.

In the first book, it was easy to believe Ned would be the hero of the books, and later, some people might have thought it was Robb. Well, I don't want to spoil anything, but if you've read the books or seen the TV show, you know how that worked out. It's possible to argue that Jon, Dany, and Tyrion are three important characters, but you can't really leave out the contributions of Jaime, Arya, Sansa, Bran, The Hound, Brienne, Theon, and dozens of others.

Martin Might be Slow, but He Isn't Lazy!

So, I'd say that Martin is fairly unique in that he certainly wasn't lazy about only making us care about one or two main characters. Also, even the heroes have their bad days. Jon regretted it, but he wasn't exactly a good boyfriend for his wildling lover in the end. Also, he could have handled his brothers better to avoid that nasty fate at the end of Dance With Dragons.

Is Jon mostly sympathetic? Yes. Is he perfect. No.

That's the beauty of this narrative style. You see Jon through his own perspective, but you also get to view him from the point of view of other characters.

And Just Because I <3 Jaime

So What Do You Think?

I wrote this because I love writing and reading. We become better writers by practicing and studying other writers. I hope you follow me here: https://steemit.com/@theinsideout

Please contribute to this discussion of Martin's writing style or the books or show in general. I generally comment upon and vote upon RELEVANT comments. In return, I appreciate the support of the community here.