George RR Martin still writing?

[Remus Lupin]

Where I think it's presumptuous is assuming that somehow or another Martin is "shirking" some responsibility he has to you, personally, or to his fandom collectively to finish "your" book.

As I said at the outset, I get impatient too. I had "A Dance with Dragons" on my Amazon.com preorder queue for, like, two years before I realized that I might as well just wait for him to finish the book before I went and ordered it). And, to be frank, I'm not really wild about "Wild Cards."

I've been working on a book in my own field (not Science Fiction or Fantasy, alas!) for about seven years in one way, shape, or form or another. Sometimes, the work on the project is going well. At other times, it slows to a halt. Right now, it's halted. That doesn't mean I'm not working; it just means I'm working on other projects, which are also important.

At the same time, I'm doing background processing on the stalled book. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about conceptual, theoretical, or practical problems that are getting in the way of finishing it. But, for the sake of my sanity as much as for the sake of my other projects, I have to put it aside for now. Once I get back to it, I hope that I'll be ready to crank it out in a relatively short period of time.

In some regards, what separates a successful writer from an unsuccessful one is the ability to actually finish a project (whether you can get it published, and whether it's any good, are also of course important, but can't be judged if you never finish). I can't keep track of the number of failed doctoral dissertations that fell by the wayside simply because the author coulnd't finish.

As for Martin, he does have a very concrete obligation -- to his publisher. And since I suspect he got a nice fat advance on this book, I have now doubt that he's in regular conversation with his editor about when he's going to finish the damn thing. We can only hope that the pressure is increasing daily, and that it will have the desired effect.

 

[Felon]

There are many reasons for why he hasn't finished the next book that don't make him out to be a liar and in breach of his contract.

You feel he still deserves benefit of the doubt. I feel he's used it up. And that's that.

 

[BryonD]

Just because Gaiman said it doesn't mean it's true.

...

He is completely incorrect in implying that there isn't a compelling business reason to deliver on them. Making promises and then dilly-dallying is how you lose customers.

Just because it isn't true doesn't mean that Gaimen said it.

I completely agree with your the point of your statement. But you are straw-manning Gaiman in a serious way to claim he implied anything of the sort.

What he said is completely accurate and completely fair. It is also completely reasonable to expect that a lot of customers will be lost. And that is 100% compatible with every word Gaimen typed.


An aside point.....
Even with that, I bet he doesn't lose many customers at all.
They will bitch and scream and whine and moan.

Then they will beat each other with sticks to be the first in line when it does come out.

 

[Fast Learner]

You feel he still deserves benefit of the doubt. I feel he's used it up. And that's that.

I'm curious why you'd participate in threads about it, then. To complain, I guess?

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Can someone explain how he wrote himself into a corner with the last one? It's been a while since I read it, and I can't find my copy.

Feel free to spoilertext it, of course.

Brad (who insists on waiting for the paperback for this series)

 

[Desdichado]

I completely agree with your the point of your statement. But you are straw-manning Gaiman in a serious way to claim he implied anything of the sort.

Huh? No I'm not. I'm responding to exactly what he said.

Are you sure you followed the right link?

 

[Felon]

I'm curious why you'd participate in threads about it, then. To complain, I guess?

Same reason anyone does. To express myself--including through complaining--and win people over to my way of thinking.

Silly question, really.

 

[Felon]

An aside point.....
Even with that, I bet he doesn't lose many customers at all.
They will bitch and scream and whine and moan.

Then they will beat each other with sticks to be the first in line when it does come out.

Ha. Probably.

 

[JediSoth]

Can someone explain how he wrote himself into a corner with the last one? It's been a while since I read it, and I can't find my copy.

Feel free to spoilertext it, of course.

Brad (who insists on waiting for the paperback for this series)

I believe what people are referring to is GRRM's belief that he wrote himself into a corner in the current book he is writing and needs to fix it before it can go into editing and then get released.

Depending on how early in the text he wrote himself into a corner, and how much of the text wrote before he realized it, that could mean a LOT of re-writing to fix it.

 

[Klaus]

Can someone explain how he wrote himself into a corner with the last one? It's been a while since I read it, and I can't find my copy.

Feel free to spoilertext it, of course.

Brad (who insists on waiting for the paperback for this series)

GRRM had written Feast For Crows to encompass all the major characters, including the ones at the Wall and in the East. Then he saw that the book was getting too big. Instead of trimming out unnecessary details or ancillary characters that didn't add to the major storyline, he took out all scenes from the Wall and the East and pumped in even more microdetailing for the Westeros chapters.

This might have had the side effect of invalidating a few plot points of his Wall/East chapters, or he may be trying to find a way to reflect events from Westeros in the other regions, or he simply can't find as many microdetails to add.