I think it's pretty clear at this point that not only is GRRM not an architect, he's only a gardener if a gardener is a person who throws lots of seeds all over a field, waters some seeds, lets others die, then throws more seeds on top of the growing and dying plants. (That said, there are lots of beautiful and fascinating plants in the garden.)

IMO a major factor in the delay of TWOW is that he is now trying to architect a poorly-tended garden, pulling all the loose threads together and untying all the knots into the perfect ending. That's an incredibly hard thing and it makes sense that he'd rather do almost anything other that work on it.

So, what if he gave up on perfect and just kept delivering what he's been delivering? How would you react to this Not A Blog post:

The Never-ending Song

I have some great news, some more great news, some bad news, and some good news. No it's not about HBO shows, the Jets, or Worldcon. It's all about ASOIAF.

The first piece of great news is that I've finished The Winds of Winter and you'll be seeing it in bookstores before the holidays (yes, this year's holidays!).

The second piece of great news is that I've ALSO finished A Dream of Spring! It needs some editing and maybe a little polishing but I'd be very surprised if it's not in your hands by Summer 2025.

That's pretty great, right? Well as my favorite band Poison once sang, "every rose has it's thorn," and the thorny part of this news is:

A Dream of Spring is not the last book in the "A Song of Ice and Fire" saga. In fact, the following book in the series, (which I've already begun!) "The Marmot's Shadow," is not the end either. Frankly, there's no end in sight and I have no plans or real solid ideas how to end this thing.

The reason I was able to dramatically speed up my writing is that I've decided to just do what I love – write more and more tales of this world, without distracting thoughts like "how does this tie into the larger story" or "should I focus on answering some of the lingering questions before adding more"?

I know this may disappoint some readers, but I think once you read the books, you will be as excited as I am. Not to spoil too much but there are lots of great new characters: Aarone Targaryen and his son, Arodd, Daenerys' second cousins once-removed; Heddon Pyke, bastard son of Balon Greyjoy, who challenges Euron for the Seastone Chair; Varys's twin (non-eunuch) brother Varyl; Crazy Eduard, a street fighter and con artist from Flea Bottom whose journey takes him all the way up to the Kingsguard, and the mysterious warlock Xylo Phoen who promises Tyrion the power to move forward or backward in time.

And I haven't forgotten about some of the existing characters, either: Daenerys heads to the newly-discovered continent of Northeros in search of rumored Ice Dragons; somehow Jon Snow returns; Arya learns of Sansa's fate and tries to save her from Littlefinger but arrives at the Vale of Arryn at the same time as Brienne and Jaime, and in the chaos both Sansa and Littlefinger are slain (see, I even managed to wrap up a storyline!)

Do all of these new storylines fit with what I've already established as canon? I don't know and I don't care! They are good stories (or at least parts of stories) filled with complicated, interesting characters. Perhaps some of them can turn into their own TV shows (Netflix, you listening? Hulu? PlutoTV?) Enjoy them and don't be the kind of person that gets caught up in meaningless details like how many legs an imaginary dragon has!

Finally, the last piece of good news: Now that I've stopped caring about trying to wrap things up, I can push out a new ASOIAF book indefinitely, every two years like I did at the beginning. Yes, someday (hopefully a long, long time from now) I will stop breathing and writing and the series will end without resolution, and your imaginations will have to finish the job. But at least we'll all have a lot of good times along the way!
Current Mood: excited