Dragons Ascend - The Rise of Fantasy

The success of George R.R. Martin's books shows that fantasy books aren't just kids stuff.

From a piece in the New York Times...

It’s a high time for high fantasy. Novels about wizards outsell (and often outshine) the most glittering literary fiction titles; the contemporary romantic hero generally sports a pair of fangs; and even now the five remaining earthlings who haven’t read “The Lord of the Rings” are being hunted down and put to the sword. Yet for all of fantasy’s successes, there remains a chip on the spaulder of the genre. As Michael Agger put it in 2009, reviewing Lev Grossman’s Harry Potter-­influenced novel “The Magicians”: “Perhaps a fantasy novel meant for adults can’t help being a strange mess of effects. . . . Sounds like fun, but aren’t we a little old for this?” And with that, hundreds of years of fantastical writing are reduced to 20-­sided dice, pencil nubs, half-filled Coke cans and the crushing realization that no, your elven rogue’s dagger is not going to be effective against green slime.

There are reasons to think this view of fantasy is needlessly limited, and one of the most obvious is the titanic success of George R. R. Martin, the present and future king of The New York Times best-­seller list. Martin’s immensely popular new book, “A Dance With Dragons,” follows “A Feast for Crows,” which in turn followed “A Storm of Swords,” “A Clash of Kings” and “A Game of Thrones” (even if you admire these books, as I do, it’s hard to argue that Martin has A Knack for Titles). Thus far, the series has included a boy being thrown off a balcony, a woman having her face bitten off, a man having his nose cut off, a girl having her ear sliced off, multiple rapes, multiple massacres, multiple snarfings of people by animals, multiple beheadings and multiple discussions of revenue streams in medieval economies. If kids are reading this stuff, God help their parents.