Without getting into specifics, I would say that all of the episodes have been in the "spirit" of the novels, consistent with the characters and the storyline, but many scenes have been removed, condensed, or reconfigured. So that means there are some new scenes created for the series. Since the books are books, they let us hear internal dialogues as well as give us lots of expository text. They chose not to have a narrator on the show, which means they need to either show what happens visually or explain what people are feeling through dialogue.
So, for example, although I don't recall a specific scene in which Loras and Renly shave each other, it sums up their relationship in the books.
Another example is Ros, the prostitute who beds Tyrion, then Theon, then travels to King's Landing to work for Littlefinger. I don't think she was a character in the books at all, but she was created for the series in order to give those characters someone to talk to, so we, the audience, could learn more about them. Thus, Littlefinger gets to deliver a monologue that he would never have given to any of the main characters, but which basically encapsulates what we would gradually learn about him over the course of the entire book.
So as I said, through all the new scenes and the stuff that was changed, it still remains generally within the spirit of the books, in that the characters are still consistent with the books and the plot is still proceeding in the same way.
This is a world where the seasons last for years, but are of varying duration. Which means the tilt of the planet's axis changes at random.
In the frozen north, there appear to be zombies. Which means not only the re-animation of dead tissue, but also the movement of said tissue in an environment in which it should be frozen solid.
Dragons once coexisted with human beings, as recorded in written accounts, and evidenced by remaining bones and eggs. Actual flying, fire-breathing dragons, with heads ten feet tall.
But of all the fantastical, incredible elements of this world, the fact that gold melts at a lower temperature (or that their cooking fires are hotter, or both) is the thing you have the most trouble accepting?
:lol
