George R.R. Martin Gives Quick Update on Winds of Winter Progress

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by issybird

You should always read the book first! And stop after the third, because GRRM loses the plot, both figuratively and literally, with book four. Then you can watch the series which at least will tidy up some of the mess of the fourth and fifth books and achieve closure.

[P.S. If you’re squeamish, the HBO series might be too hard to take.]

I agree with Issybird on this.

[Quoth]

I liked the big book of GRR Martin short stories well enough. "Dreamsongs".
So I was bought the Book 1 of the series as a present, before it was put on TV. I finished it and resolved to never read another in the series. Perhaps I'm squeamish, but I thought too much gratuitous violence, sex and sadism, especially against women.

The TV series sounds worse.

[DiapDealer]

I actually think one of the few things GRRM succeeded at was making sure men and women were pretty fairly represented as being both victims AND inflicters of gratuitous violence, sex and sadism.

I also think people tend to remember the books as being a lot more graphic than they really were after they watched the show. The books only hinted at many of the things that the show made ridiculously explicit. I hated the show for that. The books were definitely not the Game of Gore and Boobs that the show turned out to be. I quit watching sometime in season 2.

I stopped reading after book four. The one that left out nearly every single character a reader might actually give a crap about. I wish I'd stopped after three.

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by issybird

I think whether or not the series gets completed is irrelevant. The first three books are well worth reading, but then walk, rather run, away. The subsequent books detract from the experience. I don’t like epic fantasy, but I thought the first three books were compulsive reading. Why miss out on that?

My Mom read all 5 books and she also said the first 3 were really excellent and there was no real reason to finish the next two. I really liked the first but never got to the next two. Eventually.....

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I actually think one of the few things GRRM succeeded at was making sure men and women were pretty fairly represented as both victims and inflicters of gratuitous violence, sex and sadism.

Yeah. I think he was pretty realistic in this aspect. The real-world news are usually no better, and it hardly was different in medieval times.

As to the show, it could have toned down on sex and violence. It bothered me a little bit, but not so much I stopped watching. I'm not a particularly squeamish gal, unless it's violence toward other beings than humans. That I can't stand even in small amounts, I feel immediately sick.

[DiapDealer]

I'm not really squeamish at all. Gore and gratuitous sex/nudity just aren't my cup of tea. I find them pointless and sophomoric.

The curb stomp scene in American History X is one of the most harrowing and effective displays of violence I have ever seen on a screen. And it was done without a single bit of gore. Millions of people looked away in horror and cringed because they didn't want to see something that was never actually shown.

[Gandulf]

I would really love to know why it's taken soooooo long to finish this series, he's had chapters of book 6 published for years already.

The shear scope and complexity of the series ( what I loves about it) I think is also his downfall, with so many threads to tie up, I think he is batteling to make it work.

Selling out to the tv producers has probably made his task even more difficult.
I don't have a problem with books 4 and 5, it adds to the part of the 3 theme in the series.

You don't need an English degree to read it and he doesn't keep on repeating things like some other authors. Yes it is a series for adults. If he can finish and tie everything up it would make one amazing and unequalled series ever written.

I offer a challenge, name a fantasy series that comes close to this. Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.
And no, I am not a GRRM Fanatic I think he's a bit of a dick.

[hildea]

Originally Posted by Tarana

My Mom read all 5 books and she also said the first 3 were really excellent and there was no real reason to finish the next two.

I also liked the first three. The fourth was missing several of my favourite characters, and the fifth introduced a lot of new characters and side stories which were less interesting. I expected him to start to tighten up the various story threads, preparing to tie them up in some kind of satisfying finale, but instead the story seems to be unraveling and running away from him.

I'll probably buy and read the next one, if it comes, but I'm not holding my breath.

Originally Posted by Gandulf

I offer a challenge, name a fantasy series that comes close to this. Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.

Fantasy series with a huge, complex, many-faceted world, which develops and changes in the course of the novels, and with a rich gallery of characters? I can think of a few. I prefer the ones which have completed story arcs in one book or a few books, instead of having a single huge mastodon of a series where you don't get a satisfying resolution to the story until the final book.

• Terry Pratchett's Discworld
• Robin Hobb's Realm of the Elderlings
• Lois McMaster Bujold's World of the Five Gods
• Trudi Canavan's novels (I don't know if she has an overarching name for the universe her books take place in)
• Steven Brust's Dragaera

If we're also willing to go to other genres, I'd say:

• Steve Miller and Sharon Lee's Liaden series (science fiction)
• Bujold's Vorkosigan series (science fiction)
• Colleeen McCullough's First Man in Rome (historical fiction)

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Gandulf

Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.
And no, I am not a GRRM Fanatic I think he's a bit of a dick.

I fell asleep reading the Gardens of the Moon. Not my cup of tea at all. The characters were cardboard cutouts, imho.

The WoT is far from perfect and not on the ASOIAF level (at least the first 3 books of the ASOIAF), but its characters, childish as they often are, are certainly better written and more sympathetic than Erikson's. Note I say characters, not the world-building (even though I like Jordan's world and writing far more than Erikson's). Erikson just doesn't know how to write interesting characters, with a few exceptions. Again, imho.

Of course GRRM's characters and writing skill are head and shoulders above Jordan and Erikson's. Pity that he lost his momentum after the third book and never regained it.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Gandulf

I offer a challenge, name a fantasy series that comes close to this. Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.

Nearly any fantasy series whose final book has been released.

I'm not really going to acknowledge "adult" (as it's being used in this thread) as a particularly positive attribute of ASoIaF. It's extremely subjective to the point of near meaningless in my opinion. Nor do I choose to conflate word-count with scope, or character-count with complexity.

But still, I found the first three books in this series to be very compelling reading. So how many fantasy series have I read that I found equally compelling? Quite a few actually. Off the top of my head:

Robin Hobb's Realm of the Elderlings
Daniel Abraham's Long Price Quartet
Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle
Jaqueline Carey's Kushiel's Legacy
Greg Keyes' Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone
Greg Keyes' Age of Unreason
Paul Kearney's Monarchies of God
N. K. Jemisin's Inheritance Trilogy

I'm sure I'll think of more later.

EDIT - later:

Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy
KJ Parker's Fencer trilogy
Brian Ruckley's Godless Word trilogy
R.F. Kuang's Poppy War trilogy (what I've read of it so far).
Peter V Brett's Demon Cycle

[John F]

Originally Posted by Gandulf

...

I offer a challenge, name a fantasy series that comes close to this. Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.
And no, I am not a GRRM Fanatic I think he's a bit of a dick.

It's been a while since I've read it, but as I recall, Lord of the Rings comes close.

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm not really squeamish at all. Gore and gratuitous sex/nudity just aren't my cup of tea. I find them pointless and sophomoric.

The curb stomp scene in American History X is one of the most harrowing and effective displays of violence I have ever seen on a screen. And it was done without a single bit of gore. Millions of people looked away in horror and cringed because they didn't want to see something that was never actually shown.

Horror that is hinted at on film is always better than the alternative. That's why Spielberg's Duel and Jaws are great and Jaws 4 is a comedy. Same for the Jurassic Park franchise. More special effects don't mean more value or more shivers.

[Dazrin]

It sometimes feels like people take the "gritty realism" of GRR Martin or Joe Abercrombie or Steven Erikson and say "adult books need to have these elements" when really they don't. That's a style choice by the author.

Originally Posted by Gandulf

I offer a challenge, name a fantasy series that comes close to this. Malazan book of the fallen come close and please don't name WOT, it's a children's book compared.

Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere should be in that discussion. It's not done yet (and won't be for a while) but his world, or universe really, has the scope and complexity. It's not "adult" in that he doesn't have the graphic sex and violence but it's not children's literature either; especially the Stormlight Archive.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

It sometimes feels like people take the "gritty realism" of GRR Martin or Joe Abercrombie or Steven Erikson and say "adult books need to have these elements" when really they don't. That's a style choice by the author.

Agreed. I like a lot of that "grit" in my books (some, but not all), but I don't mistake it for being any more "adult" than the output of any other author who chooses to forego profanity and/or decides not to dwell on every nuance of their character's baser instincts. My mention of Daniel Abraham's Long Price Quartet is an example of fantasy that I consider written with adults in mind. Just not necessarily adults looking to get their cussy killy smut fix. Not that there's anything necessarily wrong with that, mind you.

[sun surfer]

Originally Posted by issybird

You should always read the book first! And stop after the third, because GRRM loses the plot, both figuratively and literally, with book four. Then you can watch the series which at least will tidy up some of the mess of the fourth and fifth books and achieve closure.

[P.S. If you’re squeamish, the HBO series might be too hard to take.]

I have a bone to pick!

I would rather never have an ending than to have endure the agony of the television show's eighth (and seventh) season again. That was, I think, the biggest downfall of a tv show that I've ever seen.

The showrunners proved that while they're superb adapters of dense and complex material (the books, which correlates up to around the fifth/sixth season of the show for those unaware), they're atrocious at writing their own material based on a very vague outline (the last two seasons, which were entirely based on the very broadest of beats of what Martin had told them of his idea of an ending and everything else made up by the showrunners). It went from more of a Da Vinci or Michelangelo sort of complex quality to a child's paint-by-numbers, colour-in-the-outlines blunt force trauma. Like, do you guys know the old lady in Spain who thought she was improving that church fresco of Jesus and instead turned it into a cartoonish horror? That's what happened to the show. She swooped in for the last couple of seasons and did her magic.

I don't think Martin lost the plot in the fourth and fifth books per se; the world and story aren't chaotic or disorganised, they've just grown so large and complex. He can't even figure out how to get you-know-who out of you-know-where (the 'knot')! It's a testament to how much he cares about wanting the characters and story to develop naturally and realistically (despite the fantasy elements). I think he still knows where he wants to go but he's just set himself up about a thousand detours to write through them all, and his plan is to do just that (whether he will succeed is another matter entirely). He may have lost the plot in real life since who knows when he'll ever publish the next book, let alone the last book, but I don't think he has in the story itself.

Books 4 and 5 were really one book split in two, and I think they're on par with the quality of book 2. Books 1 and 3 were a bit better, but I think that's because they both had some excellent earned twists. I think, based on what happens in the tv show, he has another big twist coming in book 6 that will start to end some of the detours and coalesce things more.

Spoiler:

Cersei blowing up the cathedral along with Margaery, the sparrow, et al; her son committing suicide; and her becoming queen

I'm actually not a huge fan of the books - they can be a bit wooden and plodding - but I respect Martin's ridiculous imagination, his commitment to natural progression and his ambition with the series, and the series does have some great characters and especially some great twists, which work so well because he does make sure they're earned and not just randomly thrown in or deus ex machinas. I do plan on reading the last books if they ever come out. I was a fan of the television series though... at least the first six seasons.