With George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones TV series only months away from its premiere on HBO, the buzz is ramping up among geek circles. A common occurrence, though, is that many fans of the series have been hesitant to introduce friends to the books for fear that the seven-part series will never be completed. Their fear is not without warrant, since Martin was able to produce the first three entries over the span of 8 years, but later took 5 years to complete the fourth book, and is now over 5 years into writing the oft-delayed fifth book.
However, struggling in the middle of a fiction series is not some unseen phenomenon. In fact, it happens quite regularly (See: Jean M. Auel, Patrick Rothfuss, and Chritopher Priest, among others). These struggles are not a strong reason to dismiss the great works Martin has already produced, but that leads to the inevitable question: where exactly is A Dance with Dragons? In search of that answer, let’s take a (mostly spoiler-free) look at some history:
To truly understand why George R R Martin has struggle so much to write this fifth book, it is necessary to go back to the fourth book, A Feast for Crows. In the original structure of seven books, Feast was supposed to take place after a 5 year jump in the timeline. Several characters had assumed new positions of power and were handed large responsibilities that they would need time to mature into, so this time gap made perfect sense. Martin has also been quoted saying he wishes the Stark children were older at the start of A Game of Thrones, as it would allow him freedom to develop the characters into their 20s (something the 5-year gap device would also enable).
Trouble began when after a year and a half of writing this version of the book, it became apparent to Martin that a good half of the characters were not in need of a 5-year gap. In fact, it would be laughably unrealistic to have their situations hold out in stasis with no resolution for such a long time. On the other hand, it would be extremely unfulfilling to the reader if timely resolutions were explained away in recollections and flashbacks. The only remaining option was to postpone the gap and resolve these character’s plots with a direct sequel to A Storm of Swords, the third novel in the series. After scrapping the initial draft of Feast, Martin began work on this rewrite sometime in 2002.
All was going well until Martin realized that the story was becoming very disjointed with some characters facing problems that needed immediate resolution and others facing no such obstacles. This caused him to split the fourth book in two, into A Feast for Crows as we know it today, and the unreleased A Dance with Dragons. The books were to occur simultaneously, but follow the two separate casts of characters.
This is still the plan, but Dance had one last major revision to come. After publishing Feast in 2005, Martin intended to follow up with the sister-story of Dance just a year later. It turns out the reason for this delay is that there is more to Dance than just the other side of this tale. Martin has revealed that it will only take approximately 800 pages to resolve the partner story of Feast. Following those events, the 5-year gap will be greatly shortened (how much, we do not know), and there will be 600 pages at the end of Dance to reunite all characters on the same timeline.
This brings us to a major fan critique: that Martin has gone off-script from his original plans. Yes, while it is true that an entire novel and a half of unplanned material was written due to an ill-fated jump in time, the fact is that Martin has successfully navigated back on course in the second half of Dance. I would not be quick to judge this decision, as the popularity of this series exploded through the early 2000s, and Martin has been forced to take a step back and make sure his plan forward is still valid. More importantly, as the cast of characters and plots have continued to spiral outwards, it’s important to make sure that such growth stops here. We are at the point in a seven-part series where major resolution will begin occurring. To this effect, it has been confirmed by Martin that no new major characters will be introduced after we meet those appearing in Dance.
What we do know is that Martin is intent on finishing this series. On his blog, he is quotes as saying “Please, have no fear, there was never any danger that I would be so discouraged by the comments of trolls, critics, and detractors that I would stop work on the book. I am still pounding my head against that bloody keyboard daily.” Also, we know that several of the chapters for Dance have already been pushed off into the sixth book, Winds of Winter, due to the following quote from Martin this past summer: “The good news is that I seem to have written more than a hundred pages of THE WINDS OF WINTER already.”
One cannot help but feel that Dance is nearly complete. It’s long been confirmed that Martin’s publishers are holding him to a 1,500 page cut-off point. Shawn Speakman of Bantam Books has confirmed that Dance is quickly approaching this, and Martin himself posted back in March that he had already reached 1311 pages. His publishers were also brave enough to announce at New York Comic-Con that Dance was a mere five chapters away from being finished. With Bantam known to have their sights set on an early 2011 announcement, Martin has revealed he will be attending a press event in LA on January 9th, with one major announcement and a hint at a second. This first is likely the official date and time of the Game of Thrones television premiere, but what better way to make it up Bantam for years of delays than by having A Dance with Dragons out in bookstores in time to cash in on the HBO series hysteria? One can only speculate, but fans have done this dance before.
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