I missed one, so today you get two

Sorry to my 1-2 loyal fans. Sometimes having a real job means you have no energy left to fun things, like read or write. I'm not reading nearly enough books to keep up with a 2 post per week schedule, but we'll try to persevere through and get some books I have read in the past. Or maybe I'll start getting guest reviews, or reviewing other things, like movies. Movies of books even!
Anyway, here's the first post for today.

Title: The World of Ice and Fire
Author(s): George R. R. Martin, Elio Garcia, Linda Antonsson
Format: Hard Cover
Time to Finish: A long time

I'm an aSoIaF fanatic, so when I heard about this book I started to giving subtle hints to those around me that it would be a wonderful gift. I then started giving less subtle hints.  Finally I bought it for myself. It was cheaper than I expected, but to be honest I was willing to pay way too much money to get this coffee table decoration.
To anyone interested in reading this: it is not a story, novel, or epic. It is a history book about a made up world. Unless you are the most diehard of fans, this book be something you look at a few times and then leave to collect dust. You may even ignore the words and just look at the illustrations, which are fantastic. They're probably worth the cost of the book alone. This is also not worthwhile to TV series only fans. The books and series have started to diverge, and this text is true to the books (as the show should be, but that's an argument for elsewhere). The bottom line is: unless you are obsessed, stay away.
Now that I've scared off the weak of heart: this book is awesome. The book is a text book, but contains tons of information and stories that are not found within the books. The book is "written" by a maestar of the Citidal as a gift for King Tommen I and charts the history of the realm. It starts with the Targaryens and there flight from old Valyria. After spending some time on the great kingdoms of those early days, it is chronicle the reign of the Dragon Kings. It goes through them one by one, in order, explaining the deeds and failings of each ruler. Upon reaching the fall of the dragons, the tome turns to the seven kingdoms. It goes through each one, exploring its history prior to the Andal Invasion and integration through modern day. After the kingdoms are through, the maestar turns to the rest of known world, from the free to cities to the shadow lands. As I mentioned before, this is written by a person within the fantasy realm, so we are only privy to the information he knows about these realms and legends. The further away in time or location, the less concrete fact there is.
I loved this because I'm a nerd, but this is the type of book that needs to be taken in small doses. It is a history text, and the language is a mix between that and a bard telling a story. It's a long, tiring read, which fills your head with completely useless knowledge. But it's fun useless knowledge, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
8/10