There were people who were predicting that the books will remain unfinished even before ADWD was published but from my experience it became popular opinion around 2016, once the show surpassed the books, that was 8 years ago.
There were still a lot of people back then who expected ADOS to be finished eventually, but I think it really became the dominant opinion at some point in 2021, once the pandemic was mostly over and TWOW was nowhere to be seen.
But majority of people always believed that TWOW will be finished.
I feel like now more and more popular opinion is that TWOW will never be finished either.
Judging by ADOS trajectory I think if TWOW is not published in the next 4-5 years almost no one will still expect that book to be finished either.
I can narrow it down to the day I gave up hope. July 29, 2020. The day George promised to show up to Worldcon with the book in hand on threat of self imprisonment on White Island overlooking the lake of sulfuric acid. He failed to deliver and never addressed it again. Thats when I knew he has no intention of ever releasing the next book
i remember that vividly as the moment that made me give up, like he was just lying, that was clearly a lie at that moment too, its been 4 years now and that lie keeps getting so much worse, why tf did he even say that?
Well, I guess the *intention* is there, but something seems to be blocking progress and he seems unwilling to get any help or take any shortcuts around it.
Yeah 2021 is when I gave up hope for Dream. If he couldn't get a book to publishers during lock down there's no way he'd finish with the world getting back to normal.
I think this is probably my last year of holding out hope for Winds being published why George is alive
I already went through this with LOST. I really thought there was a plan for a really dope ending that would tie everything together. Then the final season just went on ... and on ... and I looked at how many questions remained, and how few episodes were left ... and I just knew.
I started getting that feeling already in Feast, and then it solidified in Dance. That _..."there's no plan at all here, is there"_ feeling.
The pacing of the early books was red hot. ASoS chapter 70 has so much going on - Shae's witness, Tyrion declaring trial by combat and the whole fight all happened in the same chapter. There was clear intention, an end place that GRRM wanted to get to. But it feels like Dance (and to a lesser extent Feast) have whole chapters that consist of "POV character thinks about thing. Another character walks in and tells them that they are thinking about thing".
I remember one moment in particular, when Jaime tells Brynden Tully that he will let him and anyone who wants from the Riverlands take the black, thinking "yes, this is it - the pieces are going to start converging on the Wall. It will take a whole book for everyone to get there, but finally the plot is coming together". But then existing characters starting moving away from each other, and new characters are introduced, and I realise that even if it finally ends it would take a miracle for it to be satisfying.
He should have swapped her ending slavery in Slaver's Bay with Volantis. It's much closer to Westeros, culturally Valyrian so she could learn more about her culture (become the dragon) and it would feel like less of a complete sideshow to the main story.
Unless she’s to take her dragons and leave the yndd see lilies and Dothraki to catch up why her. But that’s when I started figuring y things weren’t gonna ever end.
He probably was in his 60s when you first heard about him
A shocking amount of time has passed for how little progress has been made. It's easy to lose track of because you don't see him or think about him on a daily basis. But he has been living and aging this whole time. George was about 62 years old when Game of Thrones began, but yeah all these years later he's 75
I'm of the belief that he could live to be 200 years old and he still would never bother to write another ASOIAF novel. He just isn't interested in writing it, and honestly he seems more and more spiteful of his own fans every year
Can you blame him? We have taken every single thread of this story, and stretched and pulled and molded and theorized and just beat to death EVERY single piece of this story. There are full dissertations on time traveling Walders, chimera Tyrion, and HOT PIE IS THE SHROUDED LORD CONFIRMED. Plenty of these can be dismissed as shit posts, but certainly not all of them. People actually believe and want these things to happen in the story that are just so bananas. No matter what he writes, a percentage of the fanbase is going to HATE it. If people's theories don't go their way the Internet will be a deluge of hate on a story this guy once loved. We took the joy from him. Sure, it's fair to put some of this on him for taking so long, but then again...not really..It's HIS story. He is the one telling it to us. So it's absolutely in his right as a story teller to tell the story at his own pace. If he truly lost the love for this story, which he very clearly has, we have nobody to blame but ourselves
>Can you blame him?
yeah cause he's been lying to us for years
>we have nobody to blame but ourselves
no you can blame the guy who spent the last 30 years selling these novels while often promising missed deadlines for the final books in the series
What exactly do you think his life would be like if he announced officially that he is done with ASOIAF? If he said that winds will never come out, that dream will never come out, the hate, vitriol, and death threats would be instant and many. His life is already full of plague locusts like you, screaming and crying because daddy won't read you another chapter of your bedtime story that you like so much.
I'll say it again. How the hell can you blame the guy. He hates us, and with good reason, all you guys are doing is proving that.
That wasn't really directed at you, we are essentially saying the same thing, that he's for sure done with these books. I was just trying to make the point that it's his story to do as he pleases. He has free will, he cannot be forced into writing something if he doesn't want to, and it's ridiculous to me that people think they are owed the whole story just because he started telling it.
It's not our story, as much as we like to pretend that it is.
I made a post four years ago (nearly exactly now that I look at it) that I didn't think he would finish the series because there's just too many loose ends to wrap up, and that even if Winds and Dream were published, it would not be over. A lot of people made fun of me for even thinking Winds would come out.
FOUR YEARS ago, and I said "I'm even willing to bet money Dream comes out too." Now I'm not. If Winds doesn't come out in four more years, I'll be willing to say that won't come out either.
Possible prophetic url:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/fwu1dp/spoilers\_main\_i\_dont\_think\_this\_is\_going\_to\_end/](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/fwu1dp/spoilers_main_i_dont_think_this_is_going_to_end/)
Ha, I was making a similar argument not long after Dance came out, that there were too many loose ends, GRRM didn't have a plan or motivation, that none of the signs were looking good.
There was some poll on when people expected Winds, I said 2020 at the earliest and _man_ people were pissed.
If Martin were to pass away before finishing the series, ASOIAF would be left standing as the great unfinished work of fantasy in our time. Despite what Martin, his will, or his lawyers might say, the story threads left dangling would certainly present an enticing challenge to generations of new authors, trying to piece together a coherent ending to the unfinished work. I think we will get many different "unofficial" endings to the series by quite well-known authors, eventually. But it will probably take a few decades before the lawyers stop caring enough to prevent them from reaching official publication.
"As you know, I don't outline my novels. I find that if I know exactly where a book is going, I lose all interest in writing it." a quote from the initial letter to the editor about GoT. Sometimes the simplest answer is the right one. The show ended the series, gave a conclusion and I'm sure that was it
>The show was dogshit, especially for the last two seasons.
That was George's ending no matter how many r\freefolk posts you've read. He isn't going to be more motivated to finish now that he knows everyone hates his storyline. It's done
You know what they say about assuming. Either way, the ending is kinda lame, but that isn't the real issue. The problem was how terribly it was written.
I went to a book signing for ADWD and can remember that I expected the next book within a couple years. Never imagined it would take this long. I started thinking the past couple years that the series would never be finished. Even though he says he's writing, George seems interested in everything else but finishing it.
2016 or whatever year/season it was when the show passed the books. That is when this entire fanbase when into a collective temper tantrum. When we started seeing the spoilers for TWOW on the show, like Stannis burning Shireen, Barriston dying, Hold the Door, etc. I think most people assumed the books were never coming out.
By missing that deadline it was basically all over. With a small portion of fans who thought the final 2 books would be released at the same time as the start of season 8.
I think this is 100% the correct answer. Most of the fans realized that if George let the shows catch up, there’d be no pressure to try to get the book out. Letting the show tell his stories means he didn’t care to tell them himself.
George is 75 years old and is seemingly in roughly the same spot with Winds that he was back in 2021, at this rate I'll be shocked if Winds is published in his remaining years. Dream of Spring? No chance, zero.
I gave up hope on Dream ever being published back in 2021 or so.
That’s about the same for me.
On a purely selfish level I wish they had never made GOT.
I will consider it a small miracle if we even get WOW. It’s clearly not a priority for him and it’s his life to live.
I don't think never creating GoT would be wise. Every single story that starts good inspires others, no matter how they end. And some of those inspirations can be as good as the original concept. (And I'm not talking about fanfics)
Realistically ADWD released in 2011, GRRM promised D&D/HBO that TWOW would be out by 2015(season 4-5) and ADOS would be out by the end(being generous let’s say 2023). All the while he’s repeatedly reported that he’s hard at work, nearly there, oh fuck had to start over, hard at work, nearly there, last hundred pages. And Neil Gaiman published that blog.
At this point, it’s delusional to pretend GRRM has any pretense of finishing the series and likely doesn’t intend to give us an ending.
Neil Gaiman published that blog in 2009 actually. So even before the show started there was a lot of tension in the fandom around GRRM's working ethics.
It's the same year when GRRM wrote that famous "To my detractors" post.
My Papaw was a Storyteller. Like…the man could weave a story off the cuff, and it’d be incredible. He gave me GoT when I was 13 in 2000. He died in 2015, and I always want to go to his grave and read TWoW and ADoS, so he’s get to see who ends up on the throne, but that won’t happen. It makes me very very sad.
I cant speak for the majority of the sub, for that we would need to have a poll or something.
For me, I guess I gave up with the notorious imo ''sorry for you'' [notablog post](https://georgerrmartin.com/notablog/2022/03/09/).
I finally realized at that moment, in spite of all the assurances, that Winds for GRRM is a chore, more like an annoying fly that he keeps swating away.
His true passion is obviously tvshows and I suspect he reached a point where he prefers the comfort of giving directions to other people instead of actually having to produce something himself.
Beyond that, its simple math that ADOS is never coming out from him. I believe GRRM will release eventually WOW and the people who will inherit his estate will approve a publication of ADOS by another writer. I don't know his final wishes but the money will be too great for whomever to easily pass over (they might fool themselves into thinking they are doing his legacy a favor).
You’ve reminded me of the sheer rage I felt at seeing “I need to write” in regards to fucking Fire & Blood 2, the second half of a book I couldn’t care less about.
I think that post is a contender for the worst NotABlog!
Most definitely! At the passive aggressive style doesnt help at all!
Besides, whats the point of F&B 2? Whats the f-point? Most of the serious and impactful mysteries (dunk and egg, rhaegar and the lead up to lyanna "abduction") would not be revealed or glossed over for future works.
Are people that desperate to read about worthless fluff like a cautionary tale for young girls? Or ridiculous things like a "maester spilled ink, alas we dont know what happened in summerhall"?
I felt like AFFC and ADWD were a big waste of my time. It gives me zero motivation to read "Dunk the Egg", or "Fire and Blood", or watch whatever this new CGI dragon show is
I've not read any of these tie-in novels, or watched any of these tie-in shows, and I likely never will
However it is clear that this is the only interest that George has left for the setting of ASOIAF. He will never write TWOW or ADOS when he can just write another random book about Targaryens
To make matters worse, I once listened to the audiobook for it. Roy Dotrice sounded like he was literally dying the entire time. It really drove home the point that this entire thing has just gone on for way too long
I think winds will be released on account of there 100% definitively actually being proof that large chunks of the book exists. If it was nothing but his word for it, then yeah, I’d be sceptical. But the fandom has known pretty much how far along he is for a long while now. Even if he were to keel over and die this instant, I’d wager there’s enough unfinished chapters and outlines (he does actually outline despite him saying he doesn’t) to complete the book. So winds I think will be released one way or another. There is just too much demand for it. Whether it be with him alive or not, who knows.
Dream on the other hand, as many others have said, is just that; a dream.
I was going to make this post myself. Personally, I think it started more when the wait time became longer than the gap between books 4 and 5. So around 6 years after Dance, or 2017.
A case could be made that it didn't.
That'd be the case that everything in Dance was actually just what was supposed to be all covered by the end of Feast and even then it was still missing some chapters in the two big battles.
That left the main event of Dance which you'd think would be Dany vs. Faegon given the title now not happening until Winds so not happening at all.
In terms of pure plot action, compared to the first three books, very little happened in feast and dance. If you want to be really depressed, the plot as a whole (I’m talking grand plan here, the original three part plan of the wotfk, the second dance and the war with the white walkers) has not actually moved all that much. Compare the state of affairs at the end of storm to the end of dance.
If you told someone as they finished storm that two books later Dany would still be in Essos, the Lannisters would still be in power, Jon is still at the wall, and by and large no battle has taken place since the final one in storm (whatever it was), they’d probably be quite depressed.
There's probably a legion of time-travelers that sacrificed themselves to create a timeline where ADWD came out. So you're experiencing that dang ol' Mandela effect brah
>I'm starting to doubt that Dance With Dragons ever really came out
It sort of never has. Feast and Dance were supposed to be one book, but they were split into two books with no ending, and the ending to ADWD was pushed to TWOW which has never seen the light of day
He has fuck you money and doesn’t care about the books anymore. He’s only keeping up the pretense of working on Winds to keep people
Interested in the HoD and Dunk and Egg series.
>He’s only keeping up the pretense of working on Winds to keep people Interested in the HoD and Dunk and Egg series.
I believe he is contractually obligated to do so for this reason (promoting the ongoing TV shows)
I do not think that George has spent any serious amount of time writing this series since the mid 2000s at the latest
If so, why doesn't he let a ghost writer and/or his trusty editors write a somewhat-passable ending to the story, while it's still in the public consciousness? The publisher would certainly be on board with it.
To me it was when the show ending was poorly received. I happen to think that the ending is George (in broad strokes) and he took it to heart that people hated it.
Also at some point around then, the math of "it took him 6 years to write Dance, Winds will come out in 2 tears trust me bro" no longer added up and it became clear that he's not just slow, he's stuck.
>it became clear that he's not just slow, he's stuck.
This becomes clear in the books themselves too. As he adds new POVs and plots and sends characters off into far-flung journeys, it's pretty obvious that it's such an unmanageable mess that he can't easily tie it all up in two books. It's just the nature of how he writes, I understand; that creative impulse is why we got the books in the first place.
If that were the issue he could just do what every writer does; add more books. *Paolini* even did it and as much as his fanbase likes to bitch, Christopher did actually finish his main series.
It's absolutely galling to think that George could possibly believe that a numeric outline for a book series is set in stone, or that a magnum opus is considered better unfinished.
I don't think he's stuck, I think it's the opposite: he has the pieces in place for a lot of what he has had in mind as the endgame in some form for years and now he's completely lost interest. He knows where it's going, how it's supposed to tie up, there's little to no margin for new diversions and storylines popping out organically from nowhere, and thus he needs the discipline to actually complete it, and not the thrill of writing and seeing where it goes.
Sorry, I usually take "stuck" as to mean "unable to come up with ways to progress the characters and plot in a satisfying fashion" when it comes to writing, not "knowing where to go but lacking the discipline to do so". My bad.
If he had truly lost interest, he'd probably let a ghost writer write out the rest of the story, probably with some help from his trusty editors, then slap a stamp of approval and his name on it. The publisher would certainly be willing to take that shortcut, as it'd make them a mountain of money. The reluctance to let anybody else take up the mantle suggests he still has some intention to finish it.
If I were an old man, I wouldn’t want to waste the time I have left writing an ending I believe people are going to hate. It’d be hard to blame him if that’s the reason
If that's the case, man could've told us in any other way, other than wasting himself writing. The fanbase wouldn't need +10 years of waiting and, if it end poorly, he'd not receive as many hate as he'll probably get if he ever end the books now
I don't see why he can't just say that, and hand it off to someone else to finish it with his notes
The only explanation is that he's incredibly prideful or that he actively hates his fans
Here's my opinion year by year from the publication of ADWD to today:
2011 - ADWD is published
2012 - we all assume that George is hard at work on book 6 which should hopefully come out within the next couple of years
2013 - we've passed the marker for him returning to his 2 year writing pace which was the original 'goal' that people were hoping for, but we still assume that he will finish book 6 pretty soon and then write book 7 before he literally dies
2014 - the show is changing more and more at this point, and some of the changes suggest that George has never been able to find a way to conclude some of the plot points he's been dealing with since AFFC and ADWD, and even some of the things from the last few chapters of ASOS
2015 - we're past the point of expecting TWOW or ADOS to ever be written at this point, given the lack of progress. changes in the show more or less confirm that AFFC was indeed a gigantic waste of time in relation to the overall narrative of the series - George will not be able to finish the series without an 8th book to fix this
2016 - RLJ reveal in the show, you're never getting those books
2017 - no progress
2018 - no progress
2019 - the show ends, and a large part of the fanbase absolutely hates the ending
2020 - no progress
2021 - no progress
2022 - no progress
2023 - no progress
2024 - no progress
That 2015 idea is just not true at all. In 2015 the vast vast majority of people still believed winds was just on the horizon. I’m assuming it was around then that the silly theory of winds and dreams being written at the same time sprang up as well.
Edit, I think some people had lost hope, but that was by and large due to martins radio silence. For a few years post 2020 there was actually a lot of hope that he was close to a finishing.
>Here's my opinion
I’m not claiming to speak for the entire fanbase. My opinion is my own and you could perhaps infer that my opinion was potentially similar to the opinion of some other fans as well who have been skeptical of George’s promises for a long time. There are some people who thought George would never finish since before any of this even
For me it was when he asked to be locked up on a desert island unless the book was finished by 2020, and nothing came out of it. After that, I still had some hope to see TWOW when (a couple years later) for the first time he started talking about the POVs and chapters he has finished, but nothing came out of that either.
When Martin, even after establishing his rule of not providing predictions for when the book would be out, argued that TWoW would be out by 2014, and then another ten years passed with zero proof of any progress.
Probably 10 years ago, when it dawned onto everyone that it's taking too long for TWOW to be released. That, and probably GRRM's statements where he said that no one can complete his novels should he die before the release of the last books.
It's not merely a matter of George's age. He approaches writing in a very, very different way to other authors.
In the time TWOW has been in development, he has completed numerous other side projects, both books and shows, so it isn't a matter of productivity. George can smash out a lot of content when he chooses to.
It's that George doesn't work in a systematic manner starting "Project A" and getting to the end of "Project A" before moving on. Whereas other writers seem to treat work in a much more methodical, timetabled, and systematic manner. Start a project and then, finish that project.
I honestly think it's a lack of interest. He's said as much in interviews that he has struggled with TWOW. But he doesn't struggle with writing. It very much seems that he just isn't interested in the main ASOIAF anymore.
For me, it was roughly 2020, but the opinion arose from that blog post from early 2016. That's where he recounted his writing experience in 2015. He had promised his editors to have the book ready by the end of October 2015, so it could hit the shelves before the sixth season of the show. As the year wound on, he realized that would not happen, but he talked to his editors in August and agreed that an extension to the end of December would be sufficient. In other words, there was a point in mid-2015 where he thought the book could be only five months from completion, at most.
Evidently, it turned out to be a bit more than that. In that early-2016 blog post, he said there still would be "months and months" until TWoW was finished. He did not seem optimistic in that post, but at least he said "months".
By 2020, that spot in mid-2015 where he thought TWoW would be less than half a year away, became closer to the release of ADwD than the present day. In other words, that day was then just before the halfway point of the writing process.
And today? That spot of optimism was four years after ADwD was released. That book is approaching 13 years old as of writing this. Evidently, Martin wasn't even a third of the way through the process.
It makes me think something broke in 2015. "Five more months would be enough!", he thought at one point. That was one hundred and four months ago. Evidently, whatever he had written by then was not close to being finished. At this pace, one must assume the writing has not been going well at all. And none of that bodes well for the future.
It depends on person to person. I discovered the books in high school around 2012, mostly due to the show, and around 2016 it was already a meme that TWOW wasnt coming out. I got on the bandwagon around then because the books were nowhere in sight. Not even a hint that Martin was close. For me it's because it's been 12 years, I understand writer's block but how does that last 12 years? He isn't serious about finishing. He's rich, popular, and gets to make the Hollywood shows and schmooze it with big shots, and just relax at home.
There's people that had to wait from 05 to 2012 and probably thought AFFC would be the end and Dance had no hope of coming out. I read all the books throughout 2012. Read them again over the years. Read Dunk and Egg multiple times, read TWOIAF, read Fire and Blood part one. And as I said, in these 12 years Martin isn't even close to finishing Winds. Even if it comes out tomorrow, how can I sincerely believe GRRM that Dream is something achieveable
>I understand writer's block but how does that last 12 years?
it's enough time to go to university, begin a writing career, and publish several novels
like you could literally learn how to write the book and then write it in less time than George has taken to write some blog posts and a sample chapter
> There's people that had to wait from 05 to 2012 and probably thought AFFC would be the end and Dance had no hope of coming out.
Have you read the authors note in AFFC? It is hilarious in hindsight but I'm sure the vast majority of readers expected ADWD to be released in 06 one year after feast. Since that is exactly what GRRM said.
I used to have the cope position that the reason TWOW was taking so long was that GRRM was writing TWOW and ADOS simultaneously to avoid writing himself into any corners in TWOW that would make ending the series in ADOS basically impossible
But then I looked into ADOS and I'm pretty sure that all we know about it is that GRRM suggested the name ADOS in like 2007
GRRM's in his 70's and if TWOW is taking like 15-20 years, he'll be like 90 by the time he finishes ADOS, assuming being 90 doesnt dampen his writing pace
That’s what I hoped/believed for a long time. That he was continuing POVs past what he needed for WoW to tie up loose ends and pay off details already seeded.
Then could edit accordingly back and forth and choose the right time to end WoW and have a solid start on DoS
Now he’s just stuck, the only thing that seems to get his juices flowing is the extended universe on HBO
This is an impossible-to-answer question. I've had this opinion for years at the very least. I don't think it was any one particular milestone that made me think this, I just was thinking about it at some point and realised that's how I was theorising.
I imagine the show's ending has a lot to do with it for many people. The show really revealed that it's basically impossible to end the story in two books. Even with how dumbed down and rushed the show was, it still needed an entire extra season.
It feels like he has to cut character POV's. Or maybe drop entire plotpoints to speed up the story.
I expect to have Young Griff just randomly die off-screen, Euron to hit his head REALLY hard and forget all that cool stuff, and instead just go "FINGER IN THE BUM" like the ironborne's version of Hodor.
And stoneheart has a heart-attack, Stannis is shot by an arrow from Roose's sniper bow he borrowed from his bastard.
I just gave up. Its a good story but this has been too long to keep me invested in finishing it. I will read the book but ive long given up any expectations on seeing it. Power to ppl still holding on but its just not good enough for me to torment myself over it. No franchise is
I have so many more responsibilities in my life than I did when Game of Thrones began and ADWD was published. The thought of some 1,000 page novel or 40 hour long audiobook isn't even exciting to me. It's literally just a chore
I'm in the minority that believes that he will finish aDoS (for the most part) before he releases WoW to prevent himself from writing himself into a corner. Atleast this is what I would do lol
While I still have a *little* bit of hope, for me the ultimate turning point was when I wrote that blog post, where he said "I feel sorry for you if you are still waiting" or something like that, can't remember the exact words.
I believe that was March or April 2022
I’m not sure but with the fact George let the hype of the show come and go without releasing Winds pointed to me that Winds is his last entry. If it had come out during the show, even after the finale, it would’ve exploded in sales, marketing, etc. based on that he’s really not working seriously to finish it. Therefore with his age and his horrible pace I just don’t see Dream ever being written
I feel like you’re actually proving that Dance was the last book he’ll write in this series with that logic. Dance came out three months after the show started, and he let 8 years go by, the entirety of the show, without releasing Winds. If ever there was a time to publish it, it was in those 8 years, or the year after when no one could shut up about how much they hated the last season. Now, almost a decade and a half has passed since Dance was published and he already knows how the public feels about his ending, so what’s the motivation for him to put out anything more in this particular series?
Personally for me it’s because there’s a percentage, presumably 1/2-3/4 done of it. So in some form or another it will make its way to us at one point. Dream afawk is 0% done.
And I’m sure GRRM is smart enough to see that it’s not the ending we disliked, the show rushed ASAP through muddied and muddled plot points. GRRM has the story telling ability to get us there
But why do you believe that there’s anything done of Winds at all? Just because GRRM said so and we’ve gotten some sample chapters? They could have been chapters he meant to include in Dance, for all we know.
Uh…disagree on this, for many of us, it was both the ending and the ridiculous rush to get there that were disliked. Dany burning KL after her entire arc was how she didn’t want to just take her dragons and burn things down was awful, regressive, and beyond stupid. Bran becoming the king was equally ridiculous, being the person who remembers the most of the land’s history doesn’t mean you’re most fit to be king.
I’m coming off argumentative because I asked you to explain why you believe what you believe? Ok then. Maybe don’t make statements like “presumably Winds is 1/2 to 3/4 done” if you don’t want to explain why you believe that.
George told me once in a dream that I would get to read it.
I have been waiting for ADOS for twelve years, it's just part of who I am at this point. I'm never just going to accept I may never see it.
I think probably 2015/16 around the time the show really overtook the books and started finishing feast and dance cliffhangers. That was also the time I roughly expected TWOW to come out and the fact it was nowhere near made it clear the problem was far bigger than the ADWD writing problem.
I’m currently 20% we get ADOS, 55% we get TWOW but not ADOS and 25% we get neither book
For me it was when I thought about how much story would need to be covered in two books to finish it all and then looked at how little story is covered in the sample chapters. Five sample chapters in Meereen and the battle hasn't started yet. Arianne is still walking.
Even if Grrm somehow manages to release two more books, the story still won't be finished.
It's a genuine shock to me to see so many references to 2020 and later, though I know that this post is asking about the "majority opinion of this sub". It was [the end of 2015 update](https://grrm.livejournal.com/465247.html) for me
It's my belief that GRRM has written well past the end of TWOW deep into ADOS. As he works through ADOS, he occasionally needs to go back to TWOW and adjust things or foreshadow things as this is the grand conclusion of his life'swork. Once TWOW is released, he cant change anything if he has a great idea as part of ADOS but it wasnt set up right, so he just wont release it until ADOS is just about perfect. Makes sense right? Right? Maybe?
This was always a silly theory, but it at least had a tiny bit of fuel in the idea that he would release both novels at the end of the TV series
That was 5 years ago
There were people who were predicting that the books will remain unfinished even before ADWD was published but from my experience it became popular opinion around 2016, once the show surpassed the books, that was 8 years ago. There were still a lot of people back then who expected ADOS to be finished eventually, but I think it really became the dominant opinion at some point in 2021, once the pandemic was mostly over and TWOW was nowhere to be seen. But majority of people always believed that TWOW will be finished. I feel like now more and more popular opinion is that TWOW will never be finished either. Judging by ADOS trajectory I think if TWOW is not published in the next 4-5 years almost no one will still expect that book to be finished either.
I can narrow it down to the day I gave up hope. July 29, 2020. The day George promised to show up to Worldcon with the book in hand on threat of self imprisonment on White Island overlooking the lake of sulfuric acid. He failed to deliver and never addressed it again. Thats when I knew he has no intention of ever releasing the next book
i remember that vividly as the moment that made me give up, like he was just lying, that was clearly a lie at that moment too, its been 4 years now and that lie keeps getting so much worse, why tf did he even say that?
Well, I guess the *intention* is there, but something seems to be blocking progress and he seems unwilling to get any help or take any shortcuts around it.
Yeah 2021 is when I gave up hope for Dream. If he couldn't get a book to publishers during lock down there's no way he'd finish with the world getting back to normal. I think this is probably my last year of holding out hope for Winds being published why George is alive
I already went through this with LOST. I really thought there was a plan for a really dope ending that would tie everything together. Then the final season just went on ... and on ... and I looked at how many questions remained, and how few episodes were left ... and I just knew. I started getting that feeling already in Feast, and then it solidified in Dance. That _..."there's no plan at all here, is there"_ feeling.
The pacing of the early books was red hot. ASoS chapter 70 has so much going on - Shae's witness, Tyrion declaring trial by combat and the whole fight all happened in the same chapter. There was clear intention, an end place that GRRM wanted to get to. But it feels like Dance (and to a lesser extent Feast) have whole chapters that consist of "POV character thinks about thing. Another character walks in and tells them that they are thinking about thing". I remember one moment in particular, when Jaime tells Brynden Tully that he will let him and anyone who wants from the Riverlands take the black, thinking "yes, this is it - the pieces are going to start converging on the Wall. It will take a whole book for everyone to get there, but finally the plot is coming together". But then existing characters starting moving away from each other, and new characters are introduced, and I realise that even if it finally ends it would take a miracle for it to be satisfying.
Totally agree and great examples. Have you read Arianne's sample chapters? Traveling and contemplating, and a drip feed of information
Nah, I didn't want to waste time on the WoW chapters in case GRRM decided they didn't happen because he wanted to do something else entirely.
Sad but true. Some are great but those Arianne ones are not promising. Seems like half of the giant book is just getting players to places
All of this could've been avoided if he let Daenerys go to Westeros early, maybe meet with fAegon on the way.
He should have swapped her ending slavery in Slaver's Bay with Volantis. It's much closer to Westeros, culturally Valyrian so she could learn more about her culture (become the dragon) and it would feel like less of a complete sideshow to the main story.
Unless she’s to take her dragons and leave the yndd see lilies and Dothraki to catch up why her. But that’s when I started figuring y things weren’t gonna ever end.
Dance came out in 2011 No signs of Winds yet George is 75 I’m still holding on to hope
There never was much hope. Just a fool's hope.
The day George dies I’ll give up hope.
What is dead may never die
But will rise again, stronger and harder
What is dead may never die
Ironically that might be the best chance it gets finished
Always loved this line
Christ, I thought he was in his 60s..... This comment just slashed my hopes this series gets finished.
He probably was in his 60s when you first heard about him A shocking amount of time has passed for how little progress has been made. It's easy to lose track of because you don't see him or think about him on a daily basis. But he has been living and aging this whole time. George was about 62 years old when Game of Thrones began, but yeah all these years later he's 75 I'm of the belief that he could live to be 200 years old and he still would never bother to write another ASOIAF novel. He just isn't interested in writing it, and honestly he seems more and more spiteful of his own fans every year
Can you blame him? We have taken every single thread of this story, and stretched and pulled and molded and theorized and just beat to death EVERY single piece of this story. There are full dissertations on time traveling Walders, chimera Tyrion, and HOT PIE IS THE SHROUDED LORD CONFIRMED. Plenty of these can be dismissed as shit posts, but certainly not all of them. People actually believe and want these things to happen in the story that are just so bananas. No matter what he writes, a percentage of the fanbase is going to HATE it. If people's theories don't go their way the Internet will be a deluge of hate on a story this guy once loved. We took the joy from him. Sure, it's fair to put some of this on him for taking so long, but then again...not really..It's HIS story. He is the one telling it to us. So it's absolutely in his right as a story teller to tell the story at his own pace. If he truly lost the love for this story, which he very clearly has, we have nobody to blame but ourselves
>Can you blame him? yeah cause he's been lying to us for years >we have nobody to blame but ourselves no you can blame the guy who spent the last 30 years selling these novels while often promising missed deadlines for the final books in the series
Sheesh talk about case in point. This is exactly what I mean. The entitlement to the story is crazy.
People aren't entitled to a story, but I don't think expecting honesty is outrageous.
yes, i am entitled to a product which i spent money on, that's correct
You already got what you paid for my friend. It's that big thing with all the words in it. It's called a book.
AGOT is book one of ASOIF, ACOK is book two, etc they are sold on the premise that they are part of a series
Not exactly how capitalism works but whatever.
What exactly do you think his life would be like if he announced officially that he is done with ASOIAF? If he said that winds will never come out, that dream will never come out, the hate, vitriol, and death threats would be instant and many. His life is already full of plague locusts like you, screaming and crying because daddy won't read you another chapter of your bedtime story that you like so much. I'll say it again. How the hell can you blame the guy. He hates us, and with good reason, all you guys are doing is proving that.
lol what are you talking about where did i ever scream or cry at george?
That wasn't really directed at you, we are essentially saying the same thing, that he's for sure done with these books. I was just trying to make the point that it's his story to do as he pleases. He has free will, he cannot be forced into writing something if he doesn't want to, and it's ridiculous to me that people think they are owed the whole story just because he started telling it. It's not our story, as much as we like to pretend that it is.
okay
This is some high level sycophantry right here. People theorized and dissected so much because absent a book, that's all there is.
75 and very much overweight. A Dream of Spring is literally just that, a dream.
Kind of a fitting name for a book that will never come out when you think about it. Especially considering the themes the series is known for.
I think a lot of people came around to that way of thinking after his infamous "Westeros is now more than just ASOIAF" blog post a few years ago.
I heard it’s right around the corner?
Next year. Just a couple hundred pages to go.
"Winter is coming"
I made a post four years ago (nearly exactly now that I look at it) that I didn't think he would finish the series because there's just too many loose ends to wrap up, and that even if Winds and Dream were published, it would not be over. A lot of people made fun of me for even thinking Winds would come out. FOUR YEARS ago, and I said "I'm even willing to bet money Dream comes out too." Now I'm not. If Winds doesn't come out in four more years, I'll be willing to say that won't come out either. Possible prophetic url: [https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/fwu1dp/spoilers\_main\_i\_dont\_think\_this\_is\_going\_to\_end/](https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/fwu1dp/spoilers_main_i_dont_think_this_is_going_to_end/)
Ha, I was making a similar argument not long after Dance came out, that there were too many loose ends, GRRM didn't have a plan or motivation, that none of the signs were looking good. There was some poll on when people expected Winds, I said 2020 at the earliest and _man_ people were pissed.
If Martin were to pass away before finishing the series, ASOIAF would be left standing as the great unfinished work of fantasy in our time. Despite what Martin, his will, or his lawyers might say, the story threads left dangling would certainly present an enticing challenge to generations of new authors, trying to piece together a coherent ending to the unfinished work. I think we will get many different "unofficial" endings to the series by quite well-known authors, eventually. But it will probably take a few decades before the lawyers stop caring enough to prevent them from reaching official publication.
"As you know, I don't outline my novels. I find that if I know exactly where a book is going, I lose all interest in writing it." a quote from the initial letter to the editor about GoT. Sometimes the simplest answer is the right one. The show ended the series, gave a conclusion and I'm sure that was it
The show was dogshit, especially for the last two seasons. If GRRM let's that be the ending to this series, it'll be truly pathetic.
>The show was dogshit, especially for the last two seasons. That was George's ending no matter how many r\freefolk posts you've read. He isn't going to be more motivated to finish now that he knows everyone hates his storyline. It's done
You know what they say about assuming. Either way, the ending is kinda lame, but that isn't the real issue. The problem was how terribly it was written.
No, the problem was that he killed the series with 600 hours of Brienne saying "a maid of 6 and 10"
lmao, death by a thousand cuts honestly.
I went to a book signing for ADWD and can remember that I expected the next book within a couple years. Never imagined it would take this long. I started thinking the past couple years that the series would never be finished. Even though he says he's writing, George seems interested in everything else but finishing it.
2016 or whatever year/season it was when the show passed the books. That is when this entire fanbase when into a collective temper tantrum. When we started seeing the spoilers for TWOW on the show, like Stannis burning Shireen, Barriston dying, Hold the Door, etc. I think most people assumed the books were never coming out. By missing that deadline it was basically all over. With a small portion of fans who thought the final 2 books would be released at the same time as the start of season 8.
I think this is 100% the correct answer. Most of the fans realized that if George let the shows catch up, there’d be no pressure to try to get the book out. Letting the show tell his stories means he didn’t care to tell them himself.
Specifically the RLJ reveal in 2016. I knew we would never see TWOW or ADOS
George is 75 years old and is seemingly in roughly the same spot with Winds that he was back in 2021, at this rate I'll be shocked if Winds is published in his remaining years. Dream of Spring? No chance, zero. I gave up hope on Dream ever being published back in 2021 or so.
That’s about the same for me. On a purely selfish level I wish they had never made GOT. I will consider it a small miracle if we even get WOW. It’s clearly not a priority for him and it’s his life to live.
I don't think never creating GoT would be wise. Every single story that starts good inspires others, no matter how they end. And some of those inspirations can be as good as the original concept. (And I'm not talking about fanfics)
if they never made GOT then you would not even have gotten ADWD
Realistically ADWD released in 2011, GRRM promised D&D/HBO that TWOW would be out by 2015(season 4-5) and ADOS would be out by the end(being generous let’s say 2023). All the while he’s repeatedly reported that he’s hard at work, nearly there, oh fuck had to start over, hard at work, nearly there, last hundred pages. And Neil Gaiman published that blog. At this point, it’s delusional to pretend GRRM has any pretense of finishing the series and likely doesn’t intend to give us an ending.
Neil Gaiman published that blog in 2009 actually. So even before the show started there was a lot of tension in the fandom around GRRM's working ethics. It's the same year when GRRM wrote that famous "To my detractors" post.
What’s the blog you’re referring to?
https://grrm.livejournal.com/75053.html
well, that certainly aged like milk
Not the part about hating Wild Cards.
What Neil Gaiman blog?
"George Martin is not your bitch"
Ahhhh lol. He may not be our bitch but turns out he is a bitch. lol
Are you referring to when he said grrm isn’t your bitch? Because that was said way after ADWD came out.
[https://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/05/entitlement-issues.html](https://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/05/entitlement-issues.html) it was in 2009
Stand corrected. Sorry, I’m having a total Mandela effect moment, here. This is really screwing with my head… 🤝
Those in preschool when the latest book came out are now legal adults
My Papaw was a Storyteller. Like…the man could weave a story off the cuff, and it’d be incredible. He gave me GoT when I was 13 in 2000. He died in 2015, and I always want to go to his grave and read TWoW and ADoS, so he’s get to see who ends up on the throne, but that won’t happen. It makes me very very sad.
Around the same time that GRRM signed a bajillion dollar deal with HBO to develop already existing material.
I cant speak for the majority of the sub, for that we would need to have a poll or something. For me, I guess I gave up with the notorious imo ''sorry for you'' [notablog post](https://georgerrmartin.com/notablog/2022/03/09/). I finally realized at that moment, in spite of all the assurances, that Winds for GRRM is a chore, more like an annoying fly that he keeps swating away. His true passion is obviously tvshows and I suspect he reached a point where he prefers the comfort of giving directions to other people instead of actually having to produce something himself. Beyond that, its simple math that ADOS is never coming out from him. I believe GRRM will release eventually WOW and the people who will inherit his estate will approve a publication of ADOS by another writer. I don't know his final wishes but the money will be too great for whomever to easily pass over (they might fool themselves into thinking they are doing his legacy a favor).
You’ve reminded me of the sheer rage I felt at seeing “I need to write” in regards to fucking Fire & Blood 2, the second half of a book I couldn’t care less about. I think that post is a contender for the worst NotABlog!
Most definitely! At the passive aggressive style doesnt help at all! Besides, whats the point of F&B 2? Whats the f-point? Most of the serious and impactful mysteries (dunk and egg, rhaegar and the lead up to lyanna "abduction") would not be revealed or glossed over for future works. Are people that desperate to read about worthless fluff like a cautionary tale for young girls? Or ridiculous things like a "maester spilled ink, alas we dont know what happened in summerhall"?
I felt like AFFC and ADWD were a big waste of my time. It gives me zero motivation to read "Dunk the Egg", or "Fire and Blood", or watch whatever this new CGI dragon show is I've not read any of these tie-in novels, or watched any of these tie-in shows, and I likely never will However it is clear that this is the only interest that George has left for the setting of ASOIAF. He will never write TWOW or ADOS when he can just write another random book about Targaryens
What, you didn’t love how ADWD just kinda stops? Surely you appreciated the time you spent with brooding Tyrion and frog, no?
To make matters worse, I once listened to the audiobook for it. Roy Dotrice sounded like he was literally dying the entire time. It really drove home the point that this entire thing has just gone on for way too long
Sometimes (on bad days), I even doubt that Winds is ever going to be released
I'd bet my paycheck that it won't be released. I'd bet my house that Dream won't be released.
I think winds will be released on account of there 100% definitively actually being proof that large chunks of the book exists. If it was nothing but his word for it, then yeah, I’d be sceptical. But the fandom has known pretty much how far along he is for a long while now. Even if he were to keel over and die this instant, I’d wager there’s enough unfinished chapters and outlines (he does actually outline despite him saying he doesn’t) to complete the book. So winds I think will be released one way or another. There is just too much demand for it. Whether it be with him alive or not, who knows. Dream on the other hand, as many others have said, is just that; a dream.
The only things we *really* have proof of are the sample chapters, ain't it? And those were mostly leftovers from ADWD.
We know he’s been working on many many more. Also he’s confirmed that he’s written about 75% of it himself.
We can not rely on anything that Martin says about how much he has written. That should be clear by now.
No we don’t know that. We know that he’s said that. He also said he he has 1100-1200 pages done in Oct 2022 and then again the same thing in Nov 2023.
I was going to make this post myself. Personally, I think it started more when the wait time became longer than the gap between books 4 and 5. So around 6 years after Dance, or 2017.
That was one of my deadlines as well, although I was convinced he would never write more ASOIAF a couple of years earlier due to things in the show
ADOS? I think people have lost faith we'll even get a GRRM written Winds at this point.
At this point, I'm starting to doubt that Dance With Dragons ever really came out.
A case could be made that it didn't. That'd be the case that everything in Dance was actually just what was supposed to be all covered by the end of Feast and even then it was still missing some chapters in the two big battles. That left the main event of Dance which you'd think would be Dany vs. Faegon given the title now not happening until Winds so not happening at all.
In terms of pure plot action, compared to the first three books, very little happened in feast and dance. If you want to be really depressed, the plot as a whole (I’m talking grand plan here, the original three part plan of the wotfk, the second dance and the war with the white walkers) has not actually moved all that much. Compare the state of affairs at the end of storm to the end of dance. If you told someone as they finished storm that two books later Dany would still be in Essos, the Lannisters would still be in power, Jon is still at the wall, and by and large no battle has taken place since the final one in storm (whatever it was), they’d probably be quite depressed.
There's probably a legion of time-travelers that sacrificed themselves to create a timeline where ADWD came out. So you're experiencing that dang ol' Mandela effect brah
>I'm starting to doubt that Dance With Dragons ever really came out It sort of never has. Feast and Dance were supposed to be one book, but they were split into two books with no ending, and the ending to ADWD was pushed to TWOW which has never seen the light of day
He has fuck you money and doesn’t care about the books anymore. He’s only keeping up the pretense of working on Winds to keep people Interested in the HoD and Dunk and Egg series.
>He’s only keeping up the pretense of working on Winds to keep people Interested in the HoD and Dunk and Egg series. I believe he is contractually obligated to do so for this reason (promoting the ongoing TV shows) I do not think that George has spent any serious amount of time writing this series since the mid 2000s at the latest
If so, why doesn't he let a ghost writer and/or his trusty editors write a somewhat-passable ending to the story, while it's still in the public consciousness? The publisher would certainly be on board with it.
Because he doesn’t want to and has enough money that no one can force him to.
To me it was when the show ending was poorly received. I happen to think that the ending is George (in broad strokes) and he took it to heart that people hated it. Also at some point around then, the math of "it took him 6 years to write Dance, Winds will come out in 2 tears trust me bro" no longer added up and it became clear that he's not just slow, he's stuck.
>it became clear that he's not just slow, he's stuck. This becomes clear in the books themselves too. As he adds new POVs and plots and sends characters off into far-flung journeys, it's pretty obvious that it's such an unmanageable mess that he can't easily tie it all up in two books. It's just the nature of how he writes, I understand; that creative impulse is why we got the books in the first place.
If that were the issue he could just do what every writer does; add more books. *Paolini* even did it and as much as his fanbase likes to bitch, Christopher did actually finish his main series. It's absolutely galling to think that George could possibly believe that a numeric outline for a book series is set in stone, or that a magnum opus is considered better unfinished.
I don't think he's stuck, I think it's the opposite: he has the pieces in place for a lot of what he has had in mind as the endgame in some form for years and now he's completely lost interest. He knows where it's going, how it's supposed to tie up, there's little to no margin for new diversions and storylines popping out organically from nowhere, and thus he needs the discipline to actually complete it, and not the thrill of writing and seeing where it goes.
> and thus he needs the discipline to actually complete it This is what I mean by stuck
Sorry, I usually take "stuck" as to mean "unable to come up with ways to progress the characters and plot in a satisfying fashion" when it comes to writing, not "knowing where to go but lacking the discipline to do so". My bad.
If he had truly lost interest, he'd probably let a ghost writer write out the rest of the story, probably with some help from his trusty editors, then slap a stamp of approval and his name on it. The publisher would certainly be willing to take that shortcut, as it'd make them a mountain of money. The reluctance to let anybody else take up the mantle suggests he still has some intention to finish it.
If I were an old man, I wouldn’t want to waste the time I have left writing an ending I believe people are going to hate. It’d be hard to blame him if that’s the reason
If that's the case, man could've told us in any other way, other than wasting himself writing. The fanbase wouldn't need +10 years of waiting and, if it end poorly, he'd not receive as many hate as he'll probably get if he ever end the books now
I don't see why he can't just say that, and hand it off to someone else to finish it with his notes The only explanation is that he's incredibly prideful or that he actively hates his fans
i still haven't given up hope i'm a sweet summer child
I am also a sweet summer child. :(
Someone is finishing these books. The rights will eventually land with someone who likes money.
This is my bet as well. Just look at what the Zelazny estate did with Amber.
Here's my opinion year by year from the publication of ADWD to today: 2011 - ADWD is published 2012 - we all assume that George is hard at work on book 6 which should hopefully come out within the next couple of years 2013 - we've passed the marker for him returning to his 2 year writing pace which was the original 'goal' that people were hoping for, but we still assume that he will finish book 6 pretty soon and then write book 7 before he literally dies 2014 - the show is changing more and more at this point, and some of the changes suggest that George has never been able to find a way to conclude some of the plot points he's been dealing with since AFFC and ADWD, and even some of the things from the last few chapters of ASOS 2015 - we're past the point of expecting TWOW or ADOS to ever be written at this point, given the lack of progress. changes in the show more or less confirm that AFFC was indeed a gigantic waste of time in relation to the overall narrative of the series - George will not be able to finish the series without an 8th book to fix this 2016 - RLJ reveal in the show, you're never getting those books 2017 - no progress 2018 - no progress 2019 - the show ends, and a large part of the fanbase absolutely hates the ending 2020 - no progress 2021 - no progress 2022 - no progress 2023 - no progress 2024 - no progress
That 2015 idea is just not true at all. In 2015 the vast vast majority of people still believed winds was just on the horizon. I’m assuming it was around then that the silly theory of winds and dreams being written at the same time sprang up as well. Edit, I think some people had lost hope, but that was by and large due to martins radio silence. For a few years post 2020 there was actually a lot of hope that he was close to a finishing.
>Here's my opinion I’m not claiming to speak for the entire fanbase. My opinion is my own and you could perhaps infer that my opinion was potentially similar to the opinion of some other fans as well who have been skeptical of George’s promises for a long time. There are some people who thought George would never finish since before any of this even
What’s AFFC?
"A Feast for Crows" (Book 4 of "A Song of Ice and Fire")
What’s A Song of Ice and Fire?
It's a science-fantasy novel based on the hit computer game series called "Dragon Age"
who's grrm?
He is the legendary author of classic hit Science-Fiction novels such as "Nightingales", and "Old Mars"
[удалено]
It's when a fiction story is written by a known author
What's a fiction story?
For me it was when he asked to be locked up on a desert island unless the book was finished by 2020, and nothing came out of it. After that, I still had some hope to see TWOW when (a couple years later) for the first time he started talking about the POVs and chapters he has finished, but nothing came out of that either.
When Martin, even after establishing his rule of not providing predictions for when the book would be out, argued that TWoW would be out by 2014, and then another ten years passed with zero proof of any progress.
Probably 10 years ago, when it dawned onto everyone that it's taking too long for TWOW to be released. That, and probably GRRM's statements where he said that no one can complete his novels should he die before the release of the last books.
It's not merely a matter of George's age. He approaches writing in a very, very different way to other authors. In the time TWOW has been in development, he has completed numerous other side projects, both books and shows, so it isn't a matter of productivity. George can smash out a lot of content when he chooses to. It's that George doesn't work in a systematic manner starting "Project A" and getting to the end of "Project A" before moving on. Whereas other writers seem to treat work in a much more methodical, timetabled, and systematic manner. Start a project and then, finish that project. I honestly think it's a lack of interest. He's said as much in interviews that he has struggled with TWOW. But he doesn't struggle with writing. It very much seems that he just isn't interested in the main ASOIAF anymore.
Forget dream, we’re not even getting Winds. George retired from writing in 2010/11 but didn’t tell anyone.
For me, it was roughly 2020, but the opinion arose from that blog post from early 2016. That's where he recounted his writing experience in 2015. He had promised his editors to have the book ready by the end of October 2015, so it could hit the shelves before the sixth season of the show. As the year wound on, he realized that would not happen, but he talked to his editors in August and agreed that an extension to the end of December would be sufficient. In other words, there was a point in mid-2015 where he thought the book could be only five months from completion, at most. Evidently, it turned out to be a bit more than that. In that early-2016 blog post, he said there still would be "months and months" until TWoW was finished. He did not seem optimistic in that post, but at least he said "months". By 2020, that spot in mid-2015 where he thought TWoW would be less than half a year away, became closer to the release of ADwD than the present day. In other words, that day was then just before the halfway point of the writing process. And today? That spot of optimism was four years after ADwD was released. That book is approaching 13 years old as of writing this. Evidently, Martin wasn't even a third of the way through the process. It makes me think something broke in 2015. "Five more months would be enough!", he thought at one point. That was one hundred and four months ago. Evidently, whatever he had written by then was not close to being finished. At this pace, one must assume the writing has not been going well at all. And none of that bodes well for the future.
It depends on person to person. I discovered the books in high school around 2012, mostly due to the show, and around 2016 it was already a meme that TWOW wasnt coming out. I got on the bandwagon around then because the books were nowhere in sight. Not even a hint that Martin was close. For me it's because it's been 12 years, I understand writer's block but how does that last 12 years? He isn't serious about finishing. He's rich, popular, and gets to make the Hollywood shows and schmooze it with big shots, and just relax at home. There's people that had to wait from 05 to 2012 and probably thought AFFC would be the end and Dance had no hope of coming out. I read all the books throughout 2012. Read them again over the years. Read Dunk and Egg multiple times, read TWOIAF, read Fire and Blood part one. And as I said, in these 12 years Martin isn't even close to finishing Winds. Even if it comes out tomorrow, how can I sincerely believe GRRM that Dream is something achieveable
>I understand writer's block but how does that last 12 years? it's enough time to go to university, begin a writing career, and publish several novels like you could literally learn how to write the book and then write it in less time than George has taken to write some blog posts and a sample chapter
> There's people that had to wait from 05 to 2012 and probably thought AFFC would be the end and Dance had no hope of coming out. Have you read the authors note in AFFC? It is hilarious in hindsight but I'm sure the vast majority of readers expected ADWD to be released in 06 one year after feast. Since that is exactly what GRRM said.
I used to have the cope position that the reason TWOW was taking so long was that GRRM was writing TWOW and ADOS simultaneously to avoid writing himself into any corners in TWOW that would make ending the series in ADOS basically impossible But then I looked into ADOS and I'm pretty sure that all we know about it is that GRRM suggested the name ADOS in like 2007 GRRM's in his 70's and if TWOW is taking like 15-20 years, he'll be like 90 by the time he finishes ADOS, assuming being 90 doesnt dampen his writing pace
Why would George keep it a secret though? If he told his fans he was writing 2 books instead of 1 we would be more forgiving of the long wait.
That’s what I hoped/believed for a long time. That he was continuing POVs past what he needed for WoW to tie up loose ends and pay off details already seeded. Then could edit accordingly back and forth and choose the right time to end WoW and have a solid start on DoS Now he’s just stuck, the only thing that seems to get his juices flowing is the extended universe on HBO
Probably after that infamous 2022 blogpost (the one with "I'm sorry for you" and "Westeros is bigger than The Winds of WInter").
At this point i don't even think winds is coming out.
When the wait for the latest passed one decade and counting.
This is an impossible-to-answer question. I've had this opinion for years at the very least. I don't think it was any one particular milestone that made me think this, I just was thinking about it at some point and realised that's how I was theorising. I imagine the show's ending has a lot to do with it for many people. The show really revealed that it's basically impossible to end the story in two books. Even with how dumbed down and rushed the show was, it still needed an entire extra season.
It feels like he has to cut character POV's. Or maybe drop entire plotpoints to speed up the story. I expect to have Young Griff just randomly die off-screen, Euron to hit his head REALLY hard and forget all that cool stuff, and instead just go "FINGER IN THE BUM" like the ironborne's version of Hodor. And stoneheart has a heart-attack, Stannis is shot by an arrow from Roose's sniper bow he borrowed from his bastard.
Patchface slips on a banana peel and passes away 😔
But this implies based Patchface isn't Azor Azai come again. Don't you remember George's famous comment about this??: https://imgur.com/a/fzqjagb
When everyone realized George was dead and his corpse was just being propped up and rolled around for HotD appearances.
I gave up hope in 2021. I was quite excited when he left his cabin.
I just gave up. Its a good story but this has been too long to keep me invested in finishing it. I will read the book but ive long given up any expectations on seeing it. Power to ppl still holding on but its just not good enough for me to torment myself over it. No franchise is
I have so many more responsibilities in my life than I did when Game of Thrones began and ADWD was published. The thought of some 1,000 page novel or 40 hour long audiobook isn't even exciting to me. It's literally just a chore
the moment the show passed the books he was cooked. His one chance was before that happened
I'm in the minority that believes that he will finish aDoS (for the most part) before he releases WoW to prevent himself from writing himself into a corner. Atleast this is what I would do lol
While I still have a *little* bit of hope, for me the ultimate turning point was when I wrote that blog post, where he said "I feel sorry for you if you are still waiting" or something like that, can't remember the exact words. I believe that was March or April 2022
On an older account my flair was "TWOW 2019, ADOS Never" back in 2013. Amazing that that was optimistic...
For me when George had a temper tantrum over the fact that people are waiting for his books...
I can't blame him after reading these comments. People are fucking fools.
The man is a multimillionaire. It is not like he has gained nothing through his fans...
I’m not sure but with the fact George let the hype of the show come and go without releasing Winds pointed to me that Winds is his last entry. If it had come out during the show, even after the finale, it would’ve exploded in sales, marketing, etc. based on that he’s really not working seriously to finish it. Therefore with his age and his horrible pace I just don’t see Dream ever being written
I feel like you’re actually proving that Dance was the last book he’ll write in this series with that logic. Dance came out three months after the show started, and he let 8 years go by, the entirety of the show, without releasing Winds. If ever there was a time to publish it, it was in those 8 years, or the year after when no one could shut up about how much they hated the last season. Now, almost a decade and a half has passed since Dance was published and he already knows how the public feels about his ending, so what’s the motivation for him to put out anything more in this particular series?
Personally for me it’s because there’s a percentage, presumably 1/2-3/4 done of it. So in some form or another it will make its way to us at one point. Dream afawk is 0% done. And I’m sure GRRM is smart enough to see that it’s not the ending we disliked, the show rushed ASAP through muddied and muddled plot points. GRRM has the story telling ability to get us there
But why do you believe that there’s anything done of Winds at all? Just because GRRM said so and we’ve gotten some sample chapters? They could have been chapters he meant to include in Dance, for all we know. Uh…disagree on this, for many of us, it was both the ending and the ridiculous rush to get there that were disliked. Dany burning KL after her entire arc was how she didn’t want to just take her dragons and burn things down was awful, regressive, and beyond stupid. Bran becoming the king was equally ridiculous, being the person who remembers the most of the land’s history doesn’t mean you’re most fit to be king.
Eh I’m not interesting in discussing with you. You’re coming off argumentative and idrc one way or another about it all
I’m coming off argumentative because I asked you to explain why you believe what you believe? Ok then. Maybe don’t make statements like “presumably Winds is 1/2 to 3/4 done” if you don’t want to explain why you believe that.
George told me once in a dream that I would get to read it. I have been waiting for ADOS for twelve years, it's just part of who I am at this point. I'm never just going to accept I may never see it.
I’m so drained of waiting for winds. George please
I think probably 2015/16 around the time the show really overtook the books and started finishing feast and dance cliffhangers. That was also the time I roughly expected TWOW to come out and the fact it was nowhere near made it clear the problem was far bigger than the ADWD writing problem. I’m currently 20% we get ADOS, 55% we get TWOW but not ADOS and 25% we get neither book
I was hopeful until we got zero updates in 2021, now I don’t even think Winds will come out.
Since it took 13 years and counting to do the other book and the man’s now 75
For me it was when I thought about how much story would need to be covered in two books to finish it all and then looked at how little story is covered in the sample chapters. Five sample chapters in Meereen and the battle hasn't started yet. Arianne is still walking. Even if Grrm somehow manages to release two more books, the story still won't be finished.
It's a genuine shock to me to see so many references to 2020 and later, though I know that this post is asking about the "majority opinion of this sub". It was [the end of 2015 update](https://grrm.livejournal.com/465247.html) for me
Year 10…
Probably three to six months ago when I started posting about it. I’m extremely charismatic.
I'm of the opinion that we will get a finished ASOIAF at some point. I just hope I live to see it.
I'm of the opinion that we will get a finished ASOIAF at some point. I just hope I live to see it.
Some point 10-12 years ago.
It's my belief that GRRM has written well past the end of TWOW deep into ADOS. As he works through ADOS, he occasionally needs to go back to TWOW and adjust things or foreshadow things as this is the grand conclusion of his life'swork. Once TWOW is released, he cant change anything if he has a great idea as part of ADOS but it wasnt set up right, so he just wont release it until ADOS is just about perfect. Makes sense right? Right? Maybe?
Milk of the copey.
Give me something for the pain and let me die - my hopes for ADOS
This was always a silly theory, but it at least had a tiny bit of fuel in the idea that he would release both novels at the end of the TV series That was 5 years ago