It’s been a long time since the last book in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series by George R. R. Martin came out, and while fans were initially quite patient and willing to wait “as long as it takes” to get their hands on the next installment in the story, many have been growing increasingly displeased with the author’s attitude to his work. Recent reports have made things even more challenging for Martin, as there are rumors that the book will have to go through yet another delay before it’s ready.
Previously, it was assumed that we will get the new book sometime in 2017. And considering that even that plan was a serious delay, fans were disappointed enough already. But now, new rumors have surfaced indicating that the book might not even be finished for next year, and fans will have to wait until 2018.
What could be going so wrong behind the scenes that has caused such a significant delay? George R. R. Martin is known for his traditionally slow working pace, but this is on another level even for him. One minor rumor that has appeared recently claims that the author has actually lost the manuscript for the book.
Many fans jumped in to say that this claim is ridiculous, but still we have no reasonable explanation for why the book could be taking so long. Some fans seem to suspect health issues that Martin is hiding from the audience, but hopefully there isn’t anything like that going on behind the scenes.
However, this suggestion does highlight an important, but sad truth – that George R. R. Martin is getting older and older, and he’s not exactly young anymore. It would be unfortunate if we got an announcement that the author has passed away, and we suspect that many of his fans will be more angry than sad over the news if that did happen.
There is a lot of time until 2018 too – especially if the book actually comes towards the end of the year and not in the first months. All in all, things have been getting a bit scary for Martin’s fans, and a few months ago we actually saw a brief scare craze when another famous person named George Martin passed away.
Some suspect that Martin might have actually given up on the book, but that’s most likely not the case for many reasons. The author should be well aware of the importance of his work, not just for his own fans but also for the production of the iconic show “Game of Thrones”.
That could be the problem, according to some – that Martin has gone too deep in writing the new book, and now he feels worried to show it to the world in any form. The author is known for having a somewhat perfectionist attitude to his work, so we can easily see him being stuck in an infinite loop of never being satisfied enough with what he’s managed to write so far, and scrapping parts of the book.
It’s actually a common problem with many types of creative works, and Martin definitely wouldn’t be the first to fall in such a trap. But as we’ve seen before, this ultimately leads to one thing, and that’s the disappointment of fans. It’s true that the longer we go without “Winds of Winter”, the more fans will expect from the book once it does come out, but that’s no excuse to delay it forever.