We Need to Talk About THAT Winds of Winter Update from George 

as a test on the Ten Thousand Ships idea, i asked my little brother who's seen every episode of the show as it came out and never touched the books, what he thinks of a show about the origins of Dorne. his first question was to remind him which bit was Dorne again.

The beauty of a dream of spring is that we're all dreaming of it.

"I've decided to put Return of the King on the back burner because I'm really into producing a Silmarillion TV mini-series." - Something Tolkien would never say

Looks like the biggest Tolkien trope George broke was finishing the actual story. Bold and innovative I say! Expectations thoroughly subverted.

We will get Winds... when the sun rises in the west and sets in the east, when the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves... we'll get it.

Not only is he not going to be remembered as one of the greats he is going to be a joke, a by word for procrastination, teachers will warn students to finish their work and not pull a George Martin.

Robert Jordan personally made some plans to finish Wheel of Time when he got sick. He left behind notes to make sure the series would finish in the way he wanted. And he was writing a book every 2 - 3 years so if he hadn't gotten sick, he would have been able to finish Wheel of Time.

I think the reason why the Robert Jordan comparison doesn't hold any weight is due to the fact that there isn't anything to suggest Jordan would not have finished his book series had he lived. He was diagnosed with a rare heart condition and died 18 months later at the age of 58, still relatively young. He obviously wanted to finish his magnum opus himself, but when faced with his own mortality he put things in place for his wife to choose a successor. And before his diagnosis he was still putting out a book every 2 years or so, and that was his slower pace compared to one book a year in the early 90's. George hasn't released an ASOIAF book in going on 11 years now with no real excuses left to make.

The fact that he doesn't owe us anything is a deeply unhelpful thing to bring up. When you have a friend who flakes out on you too many times and doesn't do anything you want to do with them, you don't sue them, but you do stop inviting them to things. You move on and find more compatible friends. You go your separate ways and forget about each other. And I think that's the correct reaction to GRRM at this point.

Miura didn’t give many interviews, but when he did, he never had the sneering attitude towards the fans that George does. He was having trouble finishing Berserk, and was doing everything he could in his life to finish it. Because of that, the two aren’t really comparable

Corlys Valerion is like Disney making a show about the cantina band in Star wars as they tour the Mos Eisley gig circuit.

What George and HBO don’t seem to get is that WoW is really the only thing that can win people back. The world-building is great and all but we got invested in those characters and their stories, not what happened to the Targaryens a thousand years ago. Unless we get an ending to the main series that actually satisfies people, no one is gonna give two shits about a fuckin animated Yi Ti series 🤦🏻

This is the first time I'm actually pissed and actually truly feel we're not getting Winds. I've been with ASOIAF since 2001. That's over 20 years...

The whole "George doesn't owe us anything" is a joke because George promised he would do it. Not that we forced him to do it. If he just did a dance of dragons and didn't say anything after that then i would say he didn't need to do another book but George hanged himself with that promise. Not us.

Not only does GRRM not have advocates like Robert Jordan did, GRRM has also flatly stated that he will not allow anyone else to finish his works. Now maybe that will change if he knows he's about to die within months and has years of writing left, but based on his own words you can't count on it. Also, it's worth noting that Jordan died relatively young and simply ran out of time due to his diagnosis. GRRM is doing this by choice, knowing he's 73 years old and morbidly obese.

I really appreciate the occasional switching between good cop and bad cop with Carmine and Preston. Carmine was flowing with bad cop energy and I appreciate it a lot. Great job as always gentleman. 🤣👍🏿👏🏿💯🇺🇸

If George wrote a page a day since ADWD then TWOW would have come out 5 years ago. its been close to 4,000 days Nothing is motivating him

I wish GRRM could at least give an estimated percentage of where he is at in TWOW. 60%? 75%?. I remember when he said he would not write Fire and Blood Vol2 and D&E until Winds was finished but now says "Westeros has become bigger than THE WINDS OF WINTER, or even ASOIAF."

The most believable theory I've heard is that the show ended mostly, if a poorer version, of how he is planning to end the series. Because of that George probably gave up on finishing after seeing the fan reaction.

I’m excited for dunk and egg to get adapted but if it’s going to be a whole season for each novella, I have big doubts.

"He's not going to be remembered as one of the Greats." Indeed. Maybe he'll actually finish before dying, though I severely doubt it. But by writing this "unfinished tale", he will secure his place as one of the "couldabeens"

For Robert Jordan it helps that 1. He work until he physically couldn't any more so no blame can be put on him for not finishing his work 2. His wife was literally just his editor so she would of course be very involved and have the expertise to carry the work on and 3. He was succeeded by an author who is himself on a fast track to putting himself on the mount Rushmore of authors

Unlike Berserk which has a the 'Golden Age' (on its own one of the best mangas in history), which can be consumed as a standalone piece like Frank Herbert's Dune, ASOIAF has no such standalone section. Game of Thrones acts as too much of a set up for later events. People don't like to start incomplete works that will never be finished. A legacy ruined.

I can’t bear the thought that we might never get winds

I disagree with the “George owes you nothing argument”. When he set out to write Ice and Fire and told everyone it would be 7 books. The fans from ‘92 deserve the series to be finished. It doesn’t matter though. He will never finish so you’re better on moving on. Lots of other great fantasy writers out there.

"George doesn't owe you anything!" According to the Author-Reader Contract, he does, and any decent writer ought to be aware of this. GRRM is breaching an implicit agreement with his audience, and he has the gall to then openly complain when they get justifiably upset. He is 100% in the wrong and he's kidding himself if he thinks this won't severely sully his legacy if he doesn't finish ASOIAF.

"80 year old man who weighs 3000 lbs." Lololol, Carmine is a savage.

If George just wants to worldbuild rather than finish the story, he could at least give us some answers about the main mysteries of the series (the others, origin of the valyrians and their magic, etc.). One of the biggest disappointments in the show was how they handled the white walkers, giving zero insight into their true motivations (other than a throwaway comment about them wanting revenge on the children of the forest, relegated to the after episode commentary rather than the show itself). They didn't even use Bran's time travel powers to give us info on the original long night. Possibly to save it for the prequel, which is now canceled. If he could at least deliver this, then we have a lot more material for fan written endings.

The legacy point sounds so true to me, like this George will just be one of the celebrities forgotten in a generation or something.

The question isn't whether or not GRRM owes his fans. (He absolutely does.) The question is whether or not he's a man of his word. The answer will determine his legacy.

You’ll get Winds eventually… when George joins Hodor in the great beyond, his estate will release it.

Don't worry guys, George is just waiting for Game of Thrones Season 8 to finish and then he's going to publish Winds of Winter! I can't wait for season 8, I really loved season 7!!!!!1

Here’s a few stories that could be limited series: 1. Reynes of Castamere 2. The Adventures of Howland Reed (ASOIAF’s Tom Bombadil at this point) 3. Queen of Love and Beauty-A Story of Lyanna (and Rhaegar?)-their love story, or could be just the tourney (and finding out the knight of the laughing tree) or a tie in with the Howland Reed show like Mando and Boba 4.Young Jamie, Cersi at King’s Landing 5. Young Barristan 6. A series about famous Kingsguard 7. Young Ned and Robert 8. Young Littlefinger 9. Literally any House could have their own limited series or multiple and it could be interesting. Not that they play the game of thrones, but there’s plenty of intrigue-ie Blackwoods and Brackens

honestly nothing will convince me that GRRM wouldn't rather break his own hands than finish WINDS. i know he's sick of people asking him about WINDS but... it's been over 11 years. i think it's understandable for fans to be frustrated especially with him putting out OTHER material from the same world.

I would argue that CS Lewis belongs on list of top fantasy writers who will be remembered, if only for Chronicles of Narnia

Robert Jordan was dictating notes on the ending of his story while dying in the hospital. Brandon Sanderson said he had over a thousand pages of notes guiding him. The first two books Sanderson wrote really felt like Robert Jordan books, by the third (final) book it read a lot more like Sanderson.

If GRRM dies before finishing the series, I'd start a GoFundMe to get Preston to finish the books, for real!

We are going to know more about Yi Ti then the ending of Ice and Fire. How did it come to this

The writer: “That Gabe Newell guy was really onto a great grift. I can just do nothing and absorb money hahaa!” The fans: “WRITE THE BOOK!” The publisher: “Write the book, or lawyers. You agreed to this.” The writer: “Aaaaah. Ok ok. I have errr. A coffee table book. Errr.”

Honestly, George has just become the South Park parody of himself at this point; always urging us that pizzas he hasn’t ordered yet are on their way any minute now. 🤣 If you haven’t accepted that this series is never getting finished, then boy do I have a manse in Valyria to sell you lmao.

It’s wild to me that GRRM once requested to write Amber books for Roger Zelazny, who turned him down. Like he of ALL writers should realize the consequences of an unfinished legacy 😞

Of the Expanse guys: Ty Franck is one of his personal assistants, Daniel Abraham *isn't* one, but he's collaborated with him on Wildcards and such. They can both write fantastically, and they have experience writing together, and collaborating with George, *and* they've FINISHED a space epic that was 9 books long, with a good cadence.

I just wish he'd say he's having trouble finishing the story/he's bored of writing it and passing it off to someone else atp.

I told my friends 10 years ago George wouldn't ever finish asoiaf....10 years ago xD

GRRM “owes” us a completion of the story because he sold us his books as a series, if he had written the books as stand alone stories that happened to be linked he would owe nothing, but it is an implicit agreement that we allow each story to be incomplete with the expectation of an eventual ending.

13:03 Preston hits the nail on the head? GRRM will be remembered as the guy who had such great potential and squandered it on the promise of fame and fortune instead of finishing the work he already put so much time and effort into and creating a truly worthy magnum opus... sad

Were finally in this stage where book purists turn on George. I love it!

I love you guys, I listened to all your content when the show was running, and it inspired me to look into the (more interesting IMHO) books so thank you 🙏

If he truly can't finish the series I hope he at least has a dead man's switch set up so that some kind of collection of his notes and intentions will be put into a little book so we can have closure even if it's not an actual novel. I am just so curious what has he been planning this whole time?

It's like Peter Jackson stopped at The Two Towers right before the battle of Helm's Deep, then started working & released the Hobbit trilogy and then announced that Rings of Power & A Gollum video game are coming while the fans are still complaining (surprisingly!) that The Return of the King is nowhere in sight.

George is Viserys, just building his model of Old Valyria while the world around him keeps moving

I'll give GRRM credit for getting me back into fantasy as an adult but unfortunately he's not a closer. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't have discovered some of the other great fantasy out there like Robin Hobb's Realm of the Elderlings (which is finished) and Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere. On the other hand I'm now apprehensive to picking up any unfinished multibook series unless the author is a writing machine like Sanderson.

I think at this point the only way we’re getting TWOW is if house of the dragon fails. If house fails then all the others will be canceled and I think then and only then do we see TWOW.

"They're something else alright" had me reeling haha

GRRM who looked up to people like Stan Lee his entire life is finally getting a Stan Lee position, A cinematic universe and he doesn't want to give that up.

I happen to know a lot about this, because my grandmother was actually called Cooter. A cooter is a large river turtle. She used to eat them. When they retract their heads into their shells, their skin looks triangular and roughly similar to a vagina. That’s why they started calling vaginas cooters. But the animal name came first. So we can’t just take the word from the animal and give it to immature people.

"Let's talk about George R. R. Martin." Everyone: "Oh god..."

Im just so mad that he actually had so many people the “fans” who are pushing him to do the work, yeah he doesn’t have children, but thats why we are kinda here? If he did finish the song of ice and fire i would be telling my kids about this amazing story, they would read it, and then they would tell their kids and so on.. but this is just frustrating. Tbh i picked up GOT book when i was in a dark place, and the whole fantasy world, his and Tolkin’s helped me tru a lot of bs in my life, for that i would always be grateful, but this now just feels like that bad brake-up ya have in high-school where your douche bf just blocks you and idk moves away and u never have real closure..

The last update buried TWOW. If he is working on Blood&Fire and D&E to publish soon (because of televison adaptations), then it makes no sense for him to publish TWOW now (or soon). The stories are related and the revelations in one book series will affect the other series. A song of ice and fire is dead for the foreseeable future if not forever.

To be fair, going off about one person for five pages in the middle of a history book is very Herodotus. George was just imitating the same energy there.

if he doesnt want to finish winds of winter he should just say that and give us what he has, i think its so stupid to leave us waiting for nothing for so long

He doesn’t owe us anything, but in turn we don’t owe him anything either, including giving a shit about his other projects. And what of his legacy? He’s an old man, and an author’s work is his immortality. His legacy will forever be damaged if he doesn’t finish his magnum opus. If he has a legacy at all that is. Maybe he’ll even be forgotten. If he doesn’t care, then so be it.

They should just takes Georges' notes, and give it to Joe Abercrombie. We'd have Winds and Dream in two years, and a spin off trilogy in another three.

*We'll all have 100+ years before WoW releases..*

Oh sweeeeet Summerchild, fear is for the Long Wait the Night that never ends. It’s been ten long years will Dawn ever come?

He never had a proper outline for the series, and describes his writing style as "gardening" i.e. he potters about and lets the story lead him where it will. He's a tinkerer, a noodler, not a craftsman with a vision. If you look back now on Feast and Dance the signs are all there that he was already bored with the main plot. Both books meander off on numerous side tangents and endless travelogues, exploring little nooks of the world and lore he just wanted to spend time on cos he thought it was cool. By the end of Dance he'd written himself into a corner and had no idea how to proceed the story in any coherent manner. So he just gave up and has spent all his time since on things he can happily noodle away on - A World of Ice and Fire, or Fire and Blood, or Dunk and Egg - where he can potter around fleshing out aspects of the world he is interested in this week, but which don't bear the burden of expectation of the main Song plot. We'll never see Winds or Spring in his lifetime - and I doubt there are actual notes of sufficient quality to let anyone else finish it either. It's a shame, but it is what it is.

One day, George will realize that he's salted his own fields.

The situation has become pathetic now. He’s a script, novella writer, he has overreach by trying to write such a big, epic saga. From the start, he has always complained about how difficult it is for him to write those books. He has shown productivity with the first three books because then he was not Bantam Books money cow, so they could fire him if he didn’t respect the deadlines. Now he can delay forever, play us for fools with his blog notes, give his publishers some lame world books to publish (a Who’s who, really?!) and work on things that are less painful and boring for him. Him being pissed as hell that the show concluded the story before the books, revealed a lot of plot twists to come and received such a backlash play a part in this as well. Between 2016 and now he has probably spent his time rewriting stuff, creating ripple effects and plot holes and having to rewrite other things, writing himself into a gigantic corner.

If he never finishes the books, I would consider him to be a scammer. He made tons of promises in the form of thousands of pages of setup, as well as claiming to be working on Winds, while clearly working on anything but Winds. He gets to live the high life because his fans support him, and they support him because of both explicit as well as implicit promises to deliver on all that setup. I support the people who pester and nag him with questions about Winds of Winter. I want him to avoid going to cons because he knows that people will not stop asking about Winds. I don't want him to enjoy the gains of his false promises.

I've wondered if perhaps due to the negative reaction to the show's ending, and the fact that plot points of it shown could be ones he was already writing. Perhaps, makes him less interested in continuing, knowing that people don't like the outcomes? Daenerys as a psycho, Bran as King.... Good feeling these were ideas of his, but now people hate those, and he could be like 'well shit... Now what do I do?' 🤷🏻

Once the HBO series progressed beyond the novels, it left GRRM stuck between a rock and a hard place. I think that he is a “no-win” position. There will always be a segment of the fandom that will compare the novels to the series.

Its clear that he cares more about expanding the TV universe than finishing winds. Thats why he is writing more Fire and blood and dunk and egg: to give HBO more source Material. They dont need winds of Winter, they finished Main Story.

Holy shit, there actually is an Elmo Tully

Here's a hard truth. Book readers are no longer his biggest customers. HBO simply pays better for less work.

George owes you nothing, which is true. You owe George ... nothing. It's almost as if you have no relationship with each other. Which makes it all the easier to simply walk away. One does not simply walk into Mordor, but one can simply wander off.

2037 : GRRM releases TWOW. *crickets*

I wish they would just do a Robert's Rebellion mini-series, that whole story is so interesting to me and would give us a chance to reuse characters who barely got any time or were completely wasted.

I've mentally checked out of a SOIAF.

You're 100% right, the book fans made him as without them, there would have been ZERO interest in GOT, the book fans were the ones spreading the word about the show, and he would have jack shit if it weren't for the book fans (he was modestly successful before ASOIAF), he gets some attention (after letting D&D fuck up GoT too), now he wants to do everything himself because he knows he's mortal. He's going to die before Winds is released or finished, and he's going to be the dickhead that refuses to let someone release it. Let fucking Ty Franck and Daniel Abraham finish it, with his input, nobody would be like "oh it's not the *true* vision if he does it while he's still alive. (The guys who wrote The Expanse series, they can finish a fucking series phenomenally), and frankly, it'd be better than whatever George MIGHT write on the spare hour he gives once a month or whatever.

2 years later, this is all still relevant. I honestly don’t think he knows how to end the story

I used to say "George owes us nothing" just because I didnt like to see some people write or say mean things but yeah no at this point it's ridiculous. We expected George to spend his time working on TWOW and after it came out he'd then work on side projects before getting into ADOS. But no he's doing that stuff with TWOW. It really just comes to a certain point that George shouldn't be surprised if in 5 years when that book does come out, the launch isn't as big because more people moved on. And yeah, I just read other books like the two Avatar Kyoshi novels to forget about ASOIAF for months at a time

Grrm is literally dany being eaten by the undying while fantasizing about all those visions and projects and there's no Drogon in sight to burn them all and put him on the right path...

Frank Herbert didn’t finish Dune (died of cancer) but is still remembered as one of the greats

Yeah, I've been on Georges side through all of this so far, but this doesn't seem like grest news. I mean he can still do what he wants with it. But anyone can do the worldbuilding for him, not anyone can finish the main story in a satisfsctory manner... We've seen that.

I 'll write it at every chance I get: Winter will come eventually, AT SOME FCKING POINT, it will. Worry about Spring, gents. Worry about Spring...

Brandon Sanderson wrote 5 extra books over the last couple of years while GRRM has done shit.

How sad it would be if D&D got the last word on how the series ended.

Thank you for this. GRRM was due for a good dragging. I honestly care more about Preston's thoughts that the actual result.

I think George is obsessed with Westeros and when the story to ASOIAF ends, so does the world. Maybe he just wants to play in the past like Bran. Also this is the most stressed out Preston has ever sounded.

Carmine's so mad he's cursing more than usual.... get the man a "mad" button to slam on repeatedly like Billi :D

To quote a true intellectual: *ahem* “Less is not none, BUT WINDS IS NOT DONE” -glidus

Give me the notes for Winds and I will get it done. I did Preston's FanFic Project chapter in less than 8 hours. 9400 words. And I consider this to be one of the finest things I have ever written and it's only the first draft AND I have written a book. I'm no George, but I would do him justice cause he got me into writing and I feel like I'd owe it to him.

The Dune series for the most part had large time leaps between novels. Also the stories didn't end on cliff hangers. You can read Chapter house and have some sense of conclusion to the story of that novel. Sure there's lose threads, but it's ok. You have read for like over a 10000 years of it's story. The next novel was likely to be a new generation of characters. If winds of winter is never done the series story is all loose threads. All build up no pay off. Completely unsatisfying. The man knows how to add more characters and plots, but not how to end them.

I’ve said it before I’ll say it again, at this point the TV show is going to have a better ending than the books because at least the TV show had an ending.

Another epic hero is Sophia Tolstoy, who copied and edited War & Peace "seven times from beginning to end at home at night by candlelight after the children and servants had gone to bed, using an inkwell pen and sometimes requiring a magnifying glass to read her husband's notes". And also gave birth to 13 children and put up with Tolstoy.

Does anybody seriously still expect him to finish these books? I’m so over it already. Give it up man. It just ain’t gonna happen… 🤣

Man speaking of hunter x Hunter, togashi could have his wife finish the story but he is too stubborn. His wife was the creator of sailer moon, so it’s not like she is some amateur. She could do a great job finishing HxH

23:07 It's not just a good story. It's a good premise. The boy who WILL be (The Unlikely) king learning from the kind of big brother he _should've_ had. Something that never would've been allowed to happen if people understood that he was actually gonna be king one day. It's not exactly a new story, but it's a new angle on an old story. Giving the reader that kind of foreknowledge and then allowing us to be a fly on the wall among characters who don't have that foreknowledge.

what i hear from this podcast is frustration from loyal, humble fans who have waited years for an update. Back then, people didn’t want to question George or argue for why he has not finished the books; however, years go by and we hear that George is working on seven to nine different side projects all at once. And we as fans are suppose to just sit on the sidelines and say “yay, you go George.” It’s mix messages all around. He talks about how he is tired and that he hasn’t been able to put in work on finishing the series, however he feels excited and ready about working on side projects that doesn’t involve The Winds Of Winter. Something that shocked me before was when i heard all the different lands that George RR Martin created. The amount of history and wonder that went into my mind had me convinced that in some way or another, they were all going to be important to the ending of Ice And Fire. However, over 50% of all the lands beyond slave’s bay was actually important to the story. Most of these world building lands and locations serve nothing to the story and will never be referenced ever again. I do believe George loves to world build and loves to create new stories because back then, none of his stories ever made it to the map, but he does have a responsibility to cut all of the bullshit distraction that he is willingly allowing himself to get distracted on and finish the series. It’s like if the creators of Avatar The Last Airbender decided that after season 2, they would be working on other stories about different avatars, and different characters from different timelines. Then years go by and fans ask, “when are they gonna finish season 3?” and their response is “We are working on season 3, no matter how much people tell us, but we are working on other stories that fans will love.” No. A story must be finished first before they are allowed to work on other projects. But I believe George is taking ever advantage to relive a time where he would have liked for all of his books to have become bangers, and were adapted into live action or video games.

Even Steven king finished the gunslinger series so that way his fans had a conclusion. He did it right after his accident because he didn’t wanna die before he could conclude his series. It would be nice if George RR Martin would give us the same consideration