More comparable to LOTR. GOT goes to great lengths to pretend it’s not a fantasy at times. It’s very much a fantasy, but you can read 300 pages at a time without it feeling all that different than historical fiction about the War of Roses.
The first book was actually built intentionally to feel like FOTR, but it branches out from there.
Where it is most similar to GOT is in its scope. The books were all 800 pages or more, and there are 14 of them. There are literally hundreds of characters, a deep history, a massive world to explore and a very deep plot.
It is set at the end of a midieval period. The world is on the verge of discovering military uses of black powder and the steam engine, but still a few years away.
This is my favorite fantasy series. Part of that is because I discovered it at 15. I bought the first book the day my family moved back to Texas from Stillwater, and there is no doubt it spoke to me largely because three of the main characters are teen age boys leaving home for the first time. I’m not sure it would be my favorite had I discovered it at 35, and to be sure my favorite characters then aren’t necessarily my favorite characters now.
Apocalypse - This world is 3,000 years into recovery from two back-to-back apocalypses. The first was the War of Power in which the Dark One himself was able to touch the world. The “Dark One” in this series being a diety on equal footing with the Creator of the universe. In the war both halves of the One Power were used for violence at ridiculous levels. Had the war gone on long enough it could have ended humanity. As it was, 100 of the strongest male “Wizards” (which is not a term used in this series, but the word fits, mostly) went against their order and sealed the Dark One and his 13 strongest followers outside the Wheel of Time, but the seal was brittle because it was only one half of the creative force. The second apocalypse is because the Dark One touched Saidin (the male half of the power) while he was being sealed away with it and left his taint on it. That taint causes all men that touch Saidin to eventually become sick and go mad. For 300 years these insane male wizards laid waste to the worled in what was known as The Breaking.
Aftermath - The female half of the source became the only safe half. Their order take patches to never use their power for violence against humans, never use it to create a weapon for humans to use against humans and to never lie, and they use their power to bind each member to this. They hunt down all men that can touch the source for “gentling” (severed from the part of them that can touch Saidin), all women that can touch it for training and indoctrination and guard the world’s knowledge and try to keep it prepared for the next time the Dark One returns.
All of this is problematic because the prophecied messiah is a man. The return of a man who went mad and began The Breaking of the World, but also the man who lead the Hubdred Conpanions that ended the War of Power.
One of these women knows this messiah has been born already, and that their age is coming to an end. She has been hunting for him for most of two decades when the story begins (there is a novella about the day she learned this and the first few months after as well called New Spring).
Anyway, I’m excited. It could be a fun ride.
