George R.R. Martin offers a brief update on his work on “The Winds of Winter” while teasing that his ending in the books will be much different from the “Game of Thrones” TV series…
Despite an 11 year wait for “The Winds of Winter” to actually hit bookshelves, George R.R. Martin promises he’s still very hard at work on the next sequel in his “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, which served as the source material for the hugely popular HBO show “Game of Thrones.”
While there’s still no word on when that book might be available — it doesn’t appear to be any time soon — Martin recently offered an update on his progress while revealing that many of the events in his novels will be different from what unfolded in the “Game of Thrones” series.
The interesting part is Martin also teased that the ending in his books will definitely be altered from the TV series, which was largely based around conversations the showrunners had with him years earlier when crafting the final seasons of “Game of Thrones.”
“One thing I can say, in general enough terms that I will not be spoiling anything: not all of the characters who survived until the end of GAME OF THRONES will survive until the end of A SONG OF ICE & FIRE, and not all of the characters who died on GAME OF THRONES will die in A SONG OF ICE & FIRE,” Martin wrote in his blog. “(Some will, sure. Of course. Maybe most. But definitely not all) ((Of course, I could change my mind again next week, with the next chapter I write. That’s gardening)).
“And the ending? You will need to wait until I get there. Some things will be the same. A lot will not.”
Now Martin’s books have already been different from the TV show considering “Game of Thrones’ didn’t introduce many of the characters decorating his novels, which already makes the two versions separate from each other but this new wrinkle about the ending is definitely interesting.
“Game of Thrones” creators David Benioff and Dan Weiss said they specifically sat down with Martin to detail how he intended on ending the books so they could follow suit for the show once it became clear the TV series was going to finish long before his novels.
There has seen been a ton of debate about the choices made in that final season of “Game of Thrones” and obviously now Martin has confirmed his books will at least offer a different ending in some form or fashion.
“What I have noticed more and more of late, however, is my gardening is taking me further and further away from the television series,” Martin said about his work on the books. “Yes, some of the things you saw on HBO in GAME OF THRONES you will also see in THE WINDS OF WINTER (though maybe not in quite the same ways)… but much of the rest will be quite different.
“And really, when you think about it, this was inevitable. The novels are much bigger and much much more complex than the series. Certain things that happened on HBO will not happen in the books. And vice versa. I have viewpoint characters in the books never seen on the show: Victarion Greyjoy, Arianne Martell, Areo Hotah, Jon Connington, Aeron Damphair. They will all have chapters, and the things they do and say will impact the story and the major characters who were on the show. I have legions of secondary characters, not POVs but nonetheless important to the plot, who also figure in the story: Lady Stoneheart, Young Griff, the Tattered Prince, Penny, Brown Ben Plumm, the Shavepate, Marwyn the Mage, Darkstar, Jeyne Westerling. Some characters you saw in the show are quite different than the versions in the novels. Yarra Greyjoy is not Asha Greyjoy, and HBO’s Euron Greyjoy is way, way, way, way different from mine. Quaithe still has a part to play. So does Rickon Stark. And poor Jeyne Poole. And… well, the list is long. (And all this is part of why WINDS is taking so long. This is hard, guys).”
As far as when the book will be available, Martin still isn’t ready to put a date on that just yet but he remains hard at work on “The Winds of Winter” with at least one more book still to come in the series.
“Most of you know by now that I do not like to give detailed updates on WINDS,” Martin wrote. “I am working on it, I have been working on it, I will continue to work on it. (Yes, I work on other things as well). I love nothing more than to surprise my readers with twists and turns they did not see coming, and I risk losing those moments if I go into too much detail. Spoilers, you know. Even saying that I am working on a Tyrion chapter, as I did last week, gives away the fact that Tyrion is not dead. Reading sample chapters at cons, or posting them on line, which I did for years, gives away even more. I actually quite enjoyed doing that, until the day came that I realized I had read and/or posted the first couple of hundred pages of WINDS, or thereabouts. If I had kept on with the readings, half the book might be out by now.
“So I am not going to give you all any kind of detailed report on the book, but…I will say this. I have been at work in my winter garden. Things are growing… and changing, as does happen with us gardeners. Things twist, things change, new ideas come to me (thank you, muse), old ideas prove unworkable, I write, I rewrite, I restructure, I rip everything apart and rewrite again, I go through doors that lead nowhere, and doors that open on marvels. Sounds mad, I know. But it’s how I write. Always has been. Always will be. For good or ill.”
For now know that “The Winds of Winter” and eventually “A Dream of Spring” will end up as a much different story from “Game of Thrones” for better or worse when those books finally arrive.
