{"product_id":"a-feast-for-crows-isbn-9780553801507","title":"A Feast for Crows","description":"\u003cb\u003eTHE BOOK BEHIND THE FOURTH SEASON OF \u003ci\u003eGAME OF THRONES,\u003c\/i\u003e AN ORIGINAL SERIES NOW ON HBO.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eHere is the fourth book in the landmark series that has redefined imaginative fiction and become a modern masterpiece in the making.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA FEAST FOR CROWS\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eAfter centuries of bitter strife, the seven powers dividing the land have beaten one another into an uneasy truce. But it’s not long before the survivors, outlaws, renegades, and carrion eaters of the Seven Kingdoms gather. Now, as the human crows assemble over a banquet of ashes, daring new plots and dangerous new alliances are formed while surprising faces—some familiar, others only just appearing—emerge from an ominous twilight of past struggles and chaos to take up the challenges of the terrible times ahead. Nobles and commoners, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and sages, are coming together to stake their fortunes . . . and their lives. For at a feast for crows, many are the guests—but only a few are the survivors.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eA GAME OF THRONES \u003cb\u003e•\u003c\/b\u003e A CLASH OF KINGS \u003cb\u003e•\u003c\/b\u003e A STORM OF SWORDS \u003cb\u003e•\u003c\/b\u003e A FEAST FOR CROWS \u003cb\u003e• \u003c\/b\u003eA DANCE WITH DRAGONS“Of those who work in the grand epic-fantasy tradition, Martin is by far the best. . . . This is as good a time as any to proclaim him the American Tolkien.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eTime\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A fantasy series for hip, smart people, even those who don’t read fantasy.” \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eDetroit Free Press\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“[A] once-in-a-generation work of fiction that manages to entertain readers while elevating an entire genre to fine literature.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eMilwaukee Journal Sentinel\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“These are the best heroic fantasies I’ve ever read—layered, complex, true to the characters, real as the bloodiest of real life is, and stunningly, fascinatingly page-turning. . . . Amazing stuff.”\u003cb\u003e—Jeff VanderMeer, \u003ci\u003eThe New Your Review of Science Fiction\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“George R. R. Martin has created the unlikely genre of the realpolitik fantasy novel. Complete with warring kings, noble heroes and backroom dealings, it’s addictive reading and reflects our current world a lot better than \u003ci\u003eThe Lord of the Rings\u003c\/i\u003e.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eRolling Stone\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“THE MOST impressive modern fantasy, both in terms of conception and execution, is George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. . . . A masterpiece that will be mentioned with the great works of fantasy.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eContra Costa Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eGeorge R. R. Martin\u003c\/b\u003e is the #1 \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of many novels, including the acclaimed series A Song of Ice and Fire—\u003ci\u003eA Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e A Dance with Dragons\u003c\/i\u003e—as well as \u003ci\u003eTuf Voyaging, Fevre Dream, The Armageddon Rag, Dying of the Light, Windhaven\u003c\/i\u003e (with Lisa Tuttle),\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e Dreamsongs Volumes I \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e II\u003c\/i\u003e. He is also the creator of \u003ci\u003eThe Lands of Ice and Fire,\u003c\/i\u003e a collection of maps from A Song of Ice and Fire featuring original artwork from illustrator and cartographer Jonathan Roberts, and \u003ci\u003eThe World of Ice \u0026amp; Fire\u003c\/i\u003e (with Elio M. García, Jr., and Linda Antonsson). As a writer-producer, Martin has worked on \u003ci\u003eThe Twilight Zone, Beauty and the Beast, \u003c\/i\u003eand various feature films and pilots that were never made. He lives with the lovely Parris in Santa Fe, New Mexico.\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCersei\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe dreamt she sat the Iron Throne, high above them all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe courtiers were brightly colored mice below. Great lords and proud ladies knelt before her. Bold young knights laid their swords at her feet and pleaded for her favors, and the queen smiled down at them. Until the dwarf appeared as if from nowhere, pointing at her and howling with laughter. The lords and ladies began to chuckle too, hiding their smiles behind their hands. Only then did the queen realize she was naked.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHorrified, she tried to cover herself with her hands. The barbs and blades of the Iron Throne bit into her flesh as she crouched to hide her shame. Blood ran red down her legs, as steel teeth gnawed at her buttocks. When she tried to stand, her foot slipped through a gap in the twisted metal. The more she struggled the more the throne engulfed her, tearing chunks of flesh from her breasts and belly, slicing at her arms and legs until they were slick and red, glistening.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd all the while her brother capered below, laughing. His merriment still echoed in her ears when she felt a light touch on her shoulder, and woke suddenly. For half a heartbeat the hand seemed part of the nightmare, and Cersei cried out, but it was only Senelle. The maid’s face was white and frightened.\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe are not alone, \u003c\/i\u003ethe queen realized. Shadows loomed around her bed, tall shapes with chainmail glimmering beneath their cloaks. Armed men had no business here.\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhere are my guards? \u003c\/i\u003eHer bedchamber was dark, but for the lantern one of the intruders held on high. \u003ci\u003eI must show no fear. \u003c\/i\u003eCersei pushed back sleep-tousled hair, and said, “What do you want of me?” A man stepped into the lantern light, and she saw his cloak was white. “Jaime?” \u003ci\u003eI dreamt of one brother, but the other has come to wake me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Your Grace.” The voice was not her brother’s. “The Lord Commander said come get you.” His hair curled, as Jaime’s did, but her brother’s hair was beaten gold, like hers, where this man’s was black and oily. She stared at him, confused, as he muttered about a privy and a crossbow, and said her father’s name. \u003ci\u003eI am dreaming still, \u003c\/i\u003eCersei thought. \u003ci\u003eI have not woken, nor has my nightmare ended. Tyrion will creep out from under the bed soon and begin to laugh at me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut that was folly. Her dwarf brother was down in the black cells, condemned to die this very day. She looked down at her hands, turning them over to make certain all her fingers were still there. When she ran a hand down her arm the skin was covered with gooseprickles, but unbroken. There were no cuts on her legs, no gashes on the soles of her feet. \u003ci\u003eA dream, that’s all it was, a dream. I drank too much last night, these fears are only humors born of wine. I will be the one laughing, come dusk. My children will be safe, Tommen’s throne will be secure, and my twisted little \u003c\/i\u003evalonqar \u003ci\u003ewill be short a head and rotting.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJocelyn Swyft was at her elbow, pressing a cup on her. Cersei took a sip: water, mixed with lemon squeezings, so tart she spit it out. She could hear the night wind rattling the shutters, and she saw with a strange sharp clarity. Jocelyn was trembling like a leaf, as frightened as Senelle. Ser Osmund Kettleblack loomed over her. Behind him stood Ser Boros Blount, with a lantern. At the door were Lannister guardsmen with gilded lions shining on the crests of their helmets. They looked afraid as well. \u003ci\u003eCan it be? \u003c\/i\u003ethe queen wondered. \u003ci\u003eCan it be true?\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe rose, and let Senelle slip a bedrobe over her shoulders to hide her nakedness. Cersei belted it herself, her fingers stiff and clumsy. “My lord father keeps guards about him, night and day,” she said. Her tongue felt thick. She took another swallow of lemon water and sloshed it round her mouth to freshen her breath. A moth had gotten into the lantern Ser Boros was holding; she could hear it buzzing and see the shadow of its wings as it beat against the glass.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The guards were at their posts, Your Grace,” said Osmund Kettleblack. “We found a hidden door behind the hearth. A secret passage. The Lord Commander’s gone down to see where it goes.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jaime?” Terror seized her, sudden as a storm. “Jaime should be with the \u003ci\u003eking \u003c\/i\u003e. . .”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The lad’s not been harmed. Ser Jaime sent a dozen men to look in on him. His Grace is sleeping peaceful.” \u003ci\u003eLet him have a sweeter dream than mine, and a kinder waking. \u003c\/i\u003e“Who is with the king?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Ser Loras has that honor, if it please you.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eIt did not please her. The Tyrells were only stewards that the dragon-kings had upjumped far above their station. Their vanity was exceeded only by their ambition.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSer Loras might be as pretty as a maiden’ s dream, but underneath\u003cbr\u003ehis white cloak he was Tyrell to the bone. For all she knew, this night’s foul fruit had been planted and nurtured in Highgarden.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut that was a suspicion she dare not speak aloud.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Allow me a moment to dress. Ser Osmund, you shall accompany me to the Tower of the Hand. Ser Boros, roust the gaolers and make certain the dwarf is still in his cell.” She would not say his name. \u003ci\u003eHe would never have found the courage to lift a hand against Father, \u003c\/i\u003eshe told herself, but she had to be certain.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“As Your Grace commands.” Blount surrendered the lantern to Ser Osmund. Cersei was not displeased to see the back of him. \u003ci\u003eFather should never have restored him to the white. \u003c\/i\u003eThe man had proved himself a craven. By the time they left Maegor’ s Holdfast, the sky had turned a deep cobalt blue, though the stars still shone. \u003ci\u003eAll but one, \u003c\/i\u003eCersei thought. \u003ci\u003eThe bright star of the west has fallen, and the nights will be darker now. \u003c\/i\u003eShe paused upon the drawbridge that spanned the dry moat, gazing down at the spikes below. \u003ci\u003eThey would not dare lie to me about such a thing. \u003c\/i\u003e“Who found him?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“One of his guards,” said Ser Osmund. “Lum. He felt a call of nature, and found his lordship in the privy.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNo, that cannot be. That is not the way a lion dies. \u003c\/i\u003eThe queen felt strangely calm. She remembered the first time she had lost a tooth, when she was just a little girl. It hadn’t hurt, but the hole in her mouth felt so odd she could not stop touching it with her tongue. \u003ci\u003eNow there is a hole in the world where Father stood, and holes want filling.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf Tywin Lannister was truly dead, no one was safe . . . least of all her son upon his throne. When the lion falls the lesser beasts move in: the jackals and the vultures and the feral dogs. They would try to push her aside, as they always had. She would need to move quickly, as she had when Robert died. This might be the work of Stannis Baratheon, through some catspaw. It could well be the prelude to another attack upon the city. She hoped it was. \u003ci\u003eLet him come. I will smash him, just as Father did, and this time he will die. \u003c\/i\u003eStannis did not frighten her, no more than Mace Tyrell did. No one frightened her. She was a daughter of the Rock, a lion. \u003ci\u003eThere will be no more talk of forcing me to wed again. \u003c\/i\u003eCasterly Rock was hers now, and all the power of House Lannister. No one would ever disregard her again. Even when Tommen had no further need of a regent, the Lady of Casterly Rock would remain a power in the land.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe rising sun had painted the tower tops a vivid red, but beneath the walls the night still huddled. The outer castle was so hushed that she could have believed all its people dead. \u003ci\u003eThey should be. It is not fitting for Tywin Lannister to die alone. Such a man deserves a retinue to attend his needs in hell.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFour spearmen in red cloaks and lion-crested helms were posted at the door of the Tower of the Hand. “No one is to enter or leave without my permission,” she told them. The command came easily to her. \u003ci\u003eMy father had steel in his voice as well.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWithin the tower, the smoke from the torches irritated her eyes, but Cersei did not weep, no more than her father would have. \u003ci\u003eI am the only true son he ever had. \u003c\/i\u003eHer heels scraped against the stone as she climbed, and she could still hear the moth fluttering wildly inside Ser Osmund’s lantern. \u003ci\u003eDie, \u003c\/i\u003ethe queen thought at it, in irritation, \u003ci\u003efly into the flame and be done with it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eTwo more red-cloaked guardsmen stood atop the steps. Red Lester muttered a condolence as she passed. The queen’s breath was coming fast and short, and she could feel her heart fluttering in her chest. \u003ci\u003eThe steps, \u003c\/i\u003eshe told herself, \u003ci\u003ethis cursed tower has too many steps. \u003c\/i\u003eShe had half a mind to tear it down.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe hall was full of fools speaking in whispers, as if Lord Tywin were asleep and they were afraid to wake him. Guards and servants alike shrank back before her, mouths flapping. She saw their pink gums and waggling tongues, but their words made no more sense than the buzzing of the moth. \u003ci\u003eWhat are they doing here? How did they know? \u003c\/i\u003eBy rights they should have called her first. She was the Queen Regent, had they forgotten that?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBefore the Hand’s bedchamber stood Ser Meryn Trant in his white armor and cloak. The visor of his helm was open, and the bags beneath his eyes made him look still half-asleep. “Clear these people away,” Cersei told him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Is my father in the privy?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“They carried him back to his bed, m’lady.” Ser Meryn pushed the door open for her to enter.","brand":"Random House Worlds","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304392839397,"sku":"NP9780553801507","price":36.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780553801507.jpg?v=1767720454","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/a-feast-for-crows-isbn-9780553801507","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}