It's funny how the tiniest things can give you a little thrill sometimes. I was searching around on Goodreads and began reading the bio of my favorite living author, George R. R. Martin, when I saw that he had once really been into chess (which is one of my big hobbies). I had no idea that I shared two huge hobbies with my man George!
I'd gladly swap my slightly better talent for chess for his much bigger talent for writing! The bio only says that he directed a few tournaments long ago, so I visited the US Chess Federation site and looked him up. There he was, with a Class A rating.
Hey, George! I'll give you chess lessons if you'll work with me a bit on writing!
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A Crumby Deal
11 hours ago
It's like you two were made to be good friends. What a fun discovery!
ReplyDeleteThere do seem to be a lot of pawns in Song of Ice and Fire.
ReplyDeleteLydia, I wish! It would be awesome to be a friend of his. I imagine he is too absorbed in his own writing to possibly mentor someone like me, but it is a fun fantasy.
ReplyDeleteSounds like a fair trade...
ReplyDeleteI love George, but I really wish he would finish a song of ice and fire series. I'm dying here.
ReplyDeleteYes, we all want him to finish, but more important to me is that he does it right. I would be far more disappointed if he rushed it and it turned out badly.
ReplyDeleteI just discovered this myself! I finished A Clash of Kings late last night and went to sleep thinking about how there were so many similarities with chess. Queen Cersei protecting the weak King Jeoffry, Varys and Tyrion acting as indirectly as Knights, Jon Snow and Rob Stark are more like Bishops, attacking everything in front of them, and of course the Stark children and Dannaerys as pawns who are slowly marching their way towards promotion. I even saw a castling move when Tywinn Lannister changes course to defend King's Landing against Stannis' fleet. I told my husband it was like a chess game being played on a 5-player board.
ReplyDeleteBut you know how it is when you study chess- you see chess everywhere.
So I decided to look up if Martin was a chess player and was so delighted to see that not only was he a chess player, but a bloody good one!
That just made my day.