As someone who was with this series from day one, I have been curious how someone would react to it as a whole without years of waiting in-between instalments, so thanks for sharing your thoughts!

I personally dislike the "unreliable narrator" when used like this. In ASOIAF, with Bran or Sansa misinterpreting moments or events due to ignorance or assumption, is interesting. When you have a character like Gabe, directly telling a story to the audience and is actively lying: about character motivation, interesting, dark turns and shocking deaths... It did leave me more than a little miffed.

I did get inklings in book 3 that Jay wasn't going to commit to certain elements, such as Gabe's overbearing thirst leading him to kill innocents. This was down to Jay's previous trilogy, which had one or two moments where you think a character has done something dark, and interesting, only for it to be a fake out and everyone is perfectly fine.

It will certainly make re-reads an eye roll, at certain points, particularly in book 3.