Title: The North Remembers
Author: SilverRavenStar
Rating: M
Genre: Drama/Adventure
Pairing: N/A
Chapters: 113
Words: 617,085
Updated: Aug 1, 2014
Published: Jan 28, 2012
Status: Complete
Summary: In the ashes of war-torn Westeros, the fate of the remnants of House Stark - and that of their lovers, allies, friends, and foes - hangs in the balance. Has turned into my best attempt to complete the entire ASOIAF saga.
Link: Here
This is a straight sequel, picking up the story threads of GRRM's tapestry right after ADWD. The greatest compliment I can give this fic is that it genuinely feels like something Martin might right, right down to the first POV character dying

Spoiler

again.

The constantly changing perspective rarely feels forced or artificial, you grow to dislike certain characters, and everyone is (more or less) equally screwed over. I highly recommend this to anyone who needs an infusion of low fantasy to stave off withdrawal while they hunker down and wait for Martin's next book.

5/5, currently the best thing in the fandom. Not that there's much competition...


EDIT by Minion, June 21, 2015
The story is complete. Thx to Qgqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq for the info.

 

Kind of surprised that fanfiction.net allows ASOIAF fanfics, especially after G.R.R. Martin said he doesn't like fanfiction written about his stuff.

 

Oh, I remember reading this a while back.

Honestly, I wasn't impressed.

First off, what's with these random POV characters? I don't give a shit about them. Is it that hard to stick to Martin's POVs? Either way, I ended up skimming those chapters. I was only interested how the author handled Sansa and Arya's stories anyways, and oooooh boy.

Spoiler

The author aborted the most interesting storyline and character, Sansa. This is apparently a continuation off of Feast / Dance, but Sansa has been altered back into an uncertain and gentle girl like she was in Clash. She's suddenly not okay with Littlefinger's plans, even though she was really into it in Feast, and now gives a shit about Robert. Enough so that she tells some random preist (how does she know she can trust him?), flees Littlefinger, gets captured by some random guy, kills him (I liked that part), and last time I read this story, is now wandering a forest. Now, I wouldn't have such a big problem with that if the Hound wasn't on his way to rescue Sansa, turning her back into that damsel in distress that she spent four books growing out of. Just arrrghhh.

Arya is handled a bit better, but you can just tell the author is doing their best to get Arya out of Braavos as fast as they can. She ditches her assassination duties and gets caught by Jaqen (I thought he was in Oldtown?), and Arya basically rescinds her decision to be a Faceless Man. I don't have much a problem with Arya's story as I do Sansa's, but still. :/

So, yeah. Sansa's character has been ruined and Arya's being boring. I did read around thirty-forty chapters, and it says something that Sansa and Arya are the only ones I can remember about this fic. Maybe I'm not remembering things right as it's been a couple months, but it's 3.5/5, at best. If you really need some ASoIaF, I suppose it'll be something to pass the time since it's long, but otherwise, you can do better.

lolwut.

 

Nah, this is probably my favourite along with Featherbed - they've both got their pluses and minuses, and writing style is definitely the pluses. Where this fic falters is pretty minor, but it's still enough to get me through the wait to Winds of Winter. Style, character voices and some of the plot turns (Seriously, Jaime's second chapter was up there for me as some damn good almost George-esque awesomeness) make it one of the best, but... the minor things.

The biggest one is the fact there's way too many new POVs. While, again, the character voices are nailed down very well, it's a bit much. It nearly doubles the count of POVs Martin ever had, and while that shouldn't be a bad thing in theory, it serves to make the story faster and yet told over so many POVs the emotions can't be narrowed down properly to the core ones we all know and love. The story really does whiz by - as Vira noted, with the Sansa thing (Though I don't hate the way it's developed for her, except for the blatant SanSan vibes that make me forever :/) - in comparison to Martin, and I suppose that's a good thing for the sake of fanfiction, it's just that... I dunno. The time inconsistencies really get on your nerves after a while too, and it's just a lot more severe and wonky than it was in the few instances in the actual series it occurred. So time inconsistency works against the multiple million POVs thing too, as well as the fact there's a bit more compression in the way of things than it feels like it should (The author murdering two side characters off in nearly identical ways just to push Jeyne and Davos's plots along, for instance; the breakneck speed over like two chapters an entire book worth of plot for several characters are covered - Jaime and Brienne), and so... Yeah.

Bah, really, compared to most in the fandom, this is the one I eagerly await updates for. Bit iffy in places, but no real, "oh god I don't want to read this anymore" complaints, and again, the style and character voices are really, really, good (I doubt I'll ever find a Ramsey Bolton POV so compelling again, lol, but that was intense), so much so that I say this deserves its place in the library. I'm very interested to see it go on and see what the guy thinks the endgame for several characters are, and again, should be a good way to tide me over until Winds comes out. If it can do what it did in Jaime's second chapter again, which was drop the plot hints earlier and make for a big event that shakes things up (Almost Red Wedding-like), then I'll be very happy.

 

This fic is at least 10 times more awesome than featherbed which I couldn't even finish the 2nd chapter of due to it being so boring. Like Syao, I think the chapters at the north are made of pure awesome, and in all honesty this fic reads like it really could be book 6 to me.

 

@mishie, Featherbed is quite slow and takes a fair bit of time to pick up momentum until it starts getting interesting. If you dropped it at chapter 2, I would suggest forcing yourself to get through a few more chapters before dropping it.

As for The North Remembers, been following it for a while and it is also very well written. It'll probably be quite redundant after the next ASOFAI book comes out (just like all those OotP fics that were written after GoF), but for now I think it captures George Martin's writing style and storytelling style quite well. I can see the kind of plot being canon.

In fact, at one point I got so mixed up between what was canon and what was not, that during a conversation with a friend I started talking about some of the events here.

I think the main criticism here can be said of George Martin's style as well. No real central plot to focus your mind on. Too many subplots and characters make it hard to get excited about one thing and also make it feel so slow. How long has it been since we saw Jon's POV of him sounding the Horn, and had zero development from there (apart from other character's reactions of the same event?). Just like GMMR's style, it really could be split up into seperate books of different stories all set in the same time period.

5/5.

 

Updated with a new Arya chapter, right after I finished reading the whole thing. I really enjoyed it, as my post at 7:30 am proves.

At times I got annoyed with the characters chosen as POVs, but the author does a good job of tying them together with various plotlines, and it really did feel like a culmination of a huge amount of buildup. More to say, but I think I'm too incoherent at the moment. Rating this 5/5.

 

POVs need to get the fuck back to the Wall where the real shit is going down, but yeah. This fic is the shit. 5/5.

Also, what's worse than Victarion Greyjoy with Rh'llor or Ramsay Bolton with the North?

Spoiler

Victarion Greyjoy with two dragons and Ramsay Bolton with fucking Lightbringer.

 

Oh man, recently updated with Chapter 57. Prolly just my Connington fanboy coming out, but that was awesome.

Spoiler

Oh man, if Aegon gets taken down by the contaminated wine, that is so very GRRM - unceremonious, a completely human fuck-up on the part of Connington, and just so very awesome. Jon Con manning up and slicing off his fucking hand... gah. Just loved it.

See, it's stuff like this and Ramsay getting Lightbringer that make this fic just plain fun.

 

Shit, I've completely forgotten where canon ends and this fic begins.

 

And yet another chapter out. This time Sansa. I swear, SilverRavenStar must be the Ryuugi Shi of the ASoFaI fandom.

Liking the way Sansa's plot is going. And nice to see her finally starting to be proactive.

 

Marathoned this and Featherbed a couple days ago, and IMO, this is the better of the two. It does have some flaws - the R/L scene was really forced and awkward, and, like Matt, I'm not a big fan of SanSan, but it's just so well-written and "ASoIaF-like" that I can ignore the occasional flaw and just enjoy the story.

4.5/5, rounded up to 5.

 

Twenty-two chapters in and I'm enjoying this fic. I didn't think I'd be able to find any decent ASoIaF fanfiction, but there you go.

The only complaints I have are ones already mentioned in this thread, specifically the lack of Jon, Dany or Cersei chapters. Really the lack of any chapters taking place in Kings Landing so far.

4/5

Edit: The more I read of this the more disappointed I become. The author focuses too much on the most boring POV characters. The story needs less Sansa and Jeyne and more chapters about what's going on at the Wall or Meereen or in the Stormlands. Most of the new POV characters the author added are entirely unnecessary, especially the Ramsay and Sandor chapters. Val was a good addition, though.

There are plenty of interesting things going on, but they take too long to happen. 42 Chapters in and still nothing about Cersei's trial. What, are they waiting for Sandor to show up? And Victraion has just now shown up. I would much rather read about those things than Sansa's adventures with Sandor or Jeyne crying about Robb.

Dany's motivations aren't making any sense to me. She spent all of Dance worrying about the people of Meereen and now she's going to abandon them to fly to Asshai? Although with the way time passes in this fic she'll probably make it to Asshai and back before the fighting in Meereen is over.

I don't like whats been done with Sansa either.

Still probably the best the fandom has to offer, but the more I read the more reason I find to stop reading.

 

New Sansa chapter, and I really enjoyed it.

Spoiler

She really should've seen Littlefinger's next move before she stormed in there alone, to accuse him of murder. She's been with him, and Cersei for long enough to expect a counter like that.

 

I'm reading this now (just about to start the first Bran chapter), and overall it's quite good, but there is one thing that keeps happening again and again that really bothers me.

People keep learning more than they should. One of the things about ASoIaF is that you know more than the characters- they each have their own set of knowledge, and they act in accordance with it. But in this fic, there's always some guy who happens to know everything and happens to explain it to the character.
For some examples:

Spoiler

Arya finds out everything about what's going on at the wall from the guy Stannis sent. Sandor finds out about Robert Strong. Then Sandor finds out about Sansa. Tyrion somehow hears a rumor (among MANY) about where Dany currently is, knows its the truth, and tells Jorah. The Kindly man somehow knows about Arya's warging and wolf dreams.

Aside from that annoying pattern, the story is really good so far.

Edit: Oh hey, just a few paragraphs into this chapter and it happens AGAIN, when apparently

Spoiler

Brynden knows Bran has been warging into Hodor.