George R. R. Martin

I'm really bad about starting a new fantasy series, because I always think "Ugh great now I have to learn a bunch of weird names and stupid maps and ugh wtf is this language" but they're never as bad as I make them out to be and the funniest part is I havent yet met a fantasy series I didn't love. I just wait 5 years between reading a new series, lol

http://img2.timeinc.net/ew/dynamic/imgs/110302/a-dance-with-dragons_240.jpg

A Dance With Dragons will be published on July 12. The manuscript is huge — the publisher estimates the hardcover edition will run more than 900 pages, putting it about the same length as the longest book in the series, A Storm of Swords. Schedule your summer vacation accordingly.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: What took so long?
GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: I’m not sure I have a good answer. If I did, I would have taken less time. It’s enormous. It’s as long as A Storm of Swords. It’s very complicated. I have a lot of characters and points of view. And I’ve been doing a ton of rewriting, trying to get it where I wanted it to be. Some of these chapters I’ve rewritten more times than I can count before I’m satisfied with them.

Can you tease something from the book?
I don’t want to spoil any surprises. I can say all the characters people have been waiting for are there: Daenerys, Jon Snow, and Tyrion. There’s also new characters, and viewpoints from characters who did not have viewpoints before.

Finally!

the red wedding actually ranks as one of the most genuinely shocking plot turns I have encountered as a reader, I was like daaaaaaaamn

oh god, yes

I remember actually spluttering at the book when that happened because I just KNEW someone was going to escape

also it seems like the show might already be laying the groundwork for the Improved Jaime Lannister, which was took me a while to buy into in the books

(which I'm guessing is because Martin didn't have that plotted from the outset, so it was natural to make early Jaime more str8 villainous)

I hope the show lasts that long. I genuinely can't see it going the distance though. How many seasons has HBO's longest running drama had i wonder?

that video, from the other thread? that is how i felt

i thought the jamie rehabilitation was so well done that is had to be p well planned but maybe my recollection is generous

I actually cackled a bit once I realized that dude was all in---like "oh shiiiiiiit you are really going for it"

plot thing I keep getting faked out on: arya reuniting with nymeria. he's feinted at it a couple times (mostly around Harenhall), but I'm beginning to wonder if it's all a red herring

jamie rehabilitation makes me sad that him and tyrion are going to have to kill each other, i wish they could just go on road trips together, the brothers one-hand and shorty

that video, from the other thread? that is how i felt

p much

that shit makes ned dying feel like a happy effing ending

maybe i am giving way way too much credit, but i thought that having the starks and the lannisters starting off as the too-obvious good and evil sides of the series and then massacring them and turning two of the remaining lannister adults into 'good guys' was genius.

w/r/t jaimes rehab: it was done well, but I sensed a...break between how he was rendered in the first book and how he was later developed, is all. like all the stuff about aerys' cruelty and w/e seemed like it was conceived after the first book

Well we only see Jamie through other people's eyes at first, and mainly from a distance

jamie doesnt get a p.o.v. in the first book though

maybe i am giving way way too much credit, but i thought that having the starks and the lannisters starting off as the too-obvious good and evil sides of the series and then massacring them and turning two of the remaining lannister adults into 'good guys' was genius.

Agreed! Just think the decision to do this hadn't been made at the outset is all.

Anyway how will Joffrey die is what I want to know

jamie doesnt get a p.o.v. in the first book though

ahhhhhh that's it

like duh of course

hey gbx, out of interest, where are you up to. are you just past the red wedding?

arya becomes a faceless man, travels to westeros to do the deed, pipped to the post by....littlefinger? loras? a tragic and lolzy riding accident? ~dragons?

I'm all the way through it

wait, all the way thru the 4?

y

and you're asking how Joffrey will die...?

i was trying to think of an oblique, non-spoilery way of saying that.

god I am dumb

like I actually had to think for a second

ANYWAY

pretend i meant cersei

loll

i actually dont really want cersei to die, i just want her to be thrown out of power and disgraced and humiliated.

the freys, i want to die. all of them. slowly.

I dunno, i kind of feel bad for Fat Walda

btw is coldhands actually benjen stark y/n

walder dying would be too inconsequential because he is thereabouts already. would rather see him humiliated. all of his heirs dying would be p hilarious, the continuation of his line being probably the one certainty he has in life. the gods should tear down the twins. surprise volcano.

xp almost feels too obvious, but probably. did they burn thorin?

Coldhands = Benjen is certainly the most common theory. I have no idea though really

uh, qhorin

Had Sam never seen Benjen?

Don't think so

yeah he was gone when sam showed up

is theon the most pitiable character, y/n

I've said this before on here but for some reason i'm still clinging to the notion that Theon will redeem himself

if it were any other series id say that theon will kill the bastard bolton but martin doesnt like neat tie-ups like that

kinda worried about rickon. wonder if after the ultimate happy ending someone will stumble upon the skeleton of a little boy and a direwolf in a ditch to sour it.

would serve him right, hes a bad lil kid

i think theon will do something that ~ought~ to redeem him, but it will be anonymous or mistaken as someone else's work or something

xp rickon's gonna turn into a gollum like little dude

what are the odds Theon is somehow going to end up getting tossed out of the Eyrie

Thinking along the same lines gbx

maybe instead of seeing things through his wolf, Rickon's wolf is seeing things through him

rickon and his wolf being assholes are kind of a counterpoint to the whole lannisters-becoming-good thing. maybe by the end of the book there will have been a full volte-face.

dany + jon fight back the others, reunite and secure the kingdom, then shaggydog fucks them up. fin.

maybe the book series ends with Daenerys reclaiming the throne and proclaiming a new age of peace, offering amnesty to all of the other noble families and marrying Jamie to bolster her coffers, only to be assassinated by a vengeful Arya

haha how many martin threadz are there on ilx?

fuck the freys tho, srsly, hang them all

I am almost done w/ the first book and so far it seems like the book is divided so:

25% descriptions of food
25% descriptions of what people are wearing
25% of how women are useless
25% hodgepodge of cursing, sex, and what the spirit animal of each house is

i clicked on this so quickly thinking 'did he die c'mon c'mon dead george martin c'mon'