The books are brilliantly written. But not for everyone. Persistent gruesome unhappy endings for the characters one grows to care about during the reading. I came to believe the author has a nasty cruel streak and must enjoy inflicting pain on his readers. Tolkien was creating myth. Martin creates a world of pain, overseeing it like a cruel god.
Death is often cruel, and in Westeros it is not always permanent or as it seems.
I would list the few that do seem permanent, but I don’t want to spoil.
He seems to bring some of them back.