Julia Reads A Game of Thrones: Chapter 4 - Eddard

Full disclosure: I read this chapter sometime last week and kept forgetting to blog about it, so this may be kind of  a rush job because I really want to keep reading this already.

So let's just bullet point this thing, shall we?

• First note here: I'll be really interested to see if every single chapter in this book takes the viewpoint of a different character.  The naming scheme for these chapters so far seems to indicate it, and the huge cast of characters I've seen in just these first fifty pages seems like it could support it, but these chapters are so short!  
• I just cottoned on to why this series might be called A Game of Thrones.  Why didn't I realize it earlier when I just spent part of the last review complementing the way this multiple-claims-to-the-throne storyline is being handled?  
• Totally called that the king was going to ask Lord Stark to do something he didn't really want to do.  *psychic*
• Loveless royal marriage?  Poor king who lost his young love.  Poor queen who has to fill her shoes. (There has been no definitive proof presented that she is evil and manipulative yet, only hints, so I will give her the benefit of the doubt for now)
• Of course Catelyn just gets passed from dead brother to younger brother.  I really, really hope that it was because Eddard cared for her and not just her being tossed around as the basis for a peace treaty between two noble houses or something.
• The king says this: "Jon had no brothers, no other sons.  Was I supposed to leave [his son] to be raised by women?"  Hold up, buddy.  This is a society where women pretty clearly have little say over what happens to them.  In societies like this, aren't women usually in charge of raising children?  Do you think they are totally incompetent?  What are they trusted/allowed to do, if not even the most stereotypical of women's "duties"?  (To reiterate from my last post, this is not an an attack on the author or the story, but the character.)
• The "Mad King Aerys Targaryen".  I like that this chapter starts to reveal the Stark/current royal perspective on the usurpation story.  I don't think I've mentioned this before, but one major reason that I love Battlestar Galactica is that there is no character that you can love or hate without reservation - different actions and different perspectives paint them in very complex lights.  The hints in this book towards this same kind of complexity is the primary reason why I am really excited for this story.