Fire & Blood (HBO Tie-in Edition): 300 Years Before A Game of Thrones Audiobook

Fantasy lovers, and fans of Game of Thrones will love this novel set in the same universe as George R. R. Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice. It tells the alleged history of the Targaryen dynasty, in chronological order from Aegon's Conquest to the ascension of Aegon III.

The novel’s key takeaway theme is imperialism and colonialism. The Targaryens are a group of conquerors and invaders, no matter how sympathetic the individuals are. Their invasion was purely driven by hurt pride and desire for power. When King Argilac Durrandon requested Aegon to help defend him against King Harren, he offered his maiden daughter to Aegon. Aegon deflected the offer of the king’s daughter to his bastard brother, which offended the king. After the king refused, Aegon decided to invade Westeros.

Dragons were used as weapons of mass destruction and were the reason for Aegon’s successful invasion. This makes for a fascinating and dramatic invasion. Yet, readers may want to sympathize with and like certain Targaryen family members. The cool dragons and the likable characters blurs the lines in Martin’s narrative, making it difficult to see the dragons as weapons and the Targaryens as forceful invaders. Martin shows his audience his discontent regarding imperialism and colonialism, reminding us how easy it is for society to decide who rules based on bias. Even within the text, the maesters, who wrote the in-story histories, show their bias to the Targaryen reign. Martin uses propaganda, and the power of words to convince both the readers and the Westerosi of the Targaryen legitimacy.

Fire and Blood is the first installment of the fictional history of Westeros. It details the series of events, including war and colonialism, and the Targaryen family’s ability to ride dragons that propelled them to power. With the backdrop of an extensive fantasy world, Martin plucks through real world themes of war, pageantry and the European Renaissance to explore how imperialism and colonialism can be accepted by society when done so with enough sympathy, propaganda, and brute force.