George R.R. Martin

George R. R. Martin was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, in 1948 and earned journalism degrees at Northwestern University. In the 1970s he published science fiction stories, including in Analog, brought out his first novel, Dying of the Light, in 1977, and moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, at the end of 1979. Fevre Dream (1982) is a vampire novel set on the Mississippi River in the steamboat era, beginning in 1857. In the 1980s he wrote for television, on the revived Twilight Zone and on Beauty and the Beast, and began editing Wild Cards, a shared-world series in which an alien-engineered virus released after World War II gives some people powers.

A Game of Thrones (1996) began A Song of Ice and Fire. Each chapter is told in the third person from one character's limited perspective, and a novella drawn from its Targaryen chapters won the 1997 Hugo Award for Best Novella. Four more volumes followed through A Dance with Dragons (2011). HBO's Game of Thrones (2011–2019) eventually moved past the published books, House of the Dragon (2022–) draws on Fire & Blood (2018), his history of House Targaryen, and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2026–) adapts his Dunk and Egg novellas. He also wrote worldbuilding for the 2022 video game Elden Ring.

Start with A Game of Thrones and read the main series in publication order; it is one continuous story, not a set of standalones. Go in knowing it is unfinished: five of a planned seven volumes are out, The Winds of Winter has been in progress since 2011, and A Dream of Spring is meant to follow it.

For a shorter, complete visit to Westeros, read A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2015), which collects the three Dunk and Egg novellas about a hedge knight, Dunk, and Egg, a Targaryen prince who later becomes king, set some 90 years before the main series. Outside Westeros, Fevre Dream is a complete standalone and a good test of whether his prose suits you before taking on the long main series.