Frey family reunion

I don't think he gave Dany the eggs without a purpose. He gave Dany the eggs with the hope that she might facilitate their hatching. It's why he sent Mormont along with her. Not to keep an eye on her, necessarily, but to keep an eye on the eggs. After all Illyrio never really expected Dany to survive her trip into the Dothraki sea. My guess is he just needed her alive and with the eggs long enough to help facilitate their hatching. Which is probably why Mormont was so insistent on bringing Dany and her eggs to Asshai. That's probably where they intended on hatching the dragons, through a blood mage in Asshai (or perhaps through Marwyn). As for who Illyrio might be working with/for, I would suggest that the most likely answer is an entity in Braavos. Perhaps the Iron Bank. Arya recognizes that Illyrio moves like a water dancer. Which she picks up from her sword trainer, Syrio Forel. The first sword of Braavos. We learn that three dragon eggs made their way from Dragonstone to Braavos a couple hundred years ago. The fact that GRRM highlighted that little tidbit in Fire and Blood makes me think that those are the three eggs that Illyrio winds up with. I don't think it's a coincidence that the two Valyrians that were the guest of the Sealord of Braavos end up in Illyrio's manse, and in addition Illyrio ends up with three dragon eggs that may have previously been with Braavos. If you recall, the Iron Bank is famous for replacing Princes when the prior Prince is no longer able to pay their debts to the Iron Bank. And it just so happens that Illyrio has also been tasked with rasing and training a "prince" in waiting in Young Griff. So I think Illyrio has two jobs for Braavos: put in a new ruler of Westeros, one that will be specially trained by an agent of the Iron Bank, and two, find a way to hatch the dragon eggs in their possession. Finally, if you recall when Dany had her wedding shower, they held it in a manse that Illyrio gifted to Drogo. The wedding shower was held under a mural depicting the doom of Valyria. An odd thing to have for a pro Targaryen/Valyrian sympathizer. But something that fits perfectly well, if this whole cabal has been arranged by the Iron Bank, the entity that may have been behind the Doom in the first place.

It's been my contention for a while that when Jon dreams of the Bran tree opening his third eye, it was Bran actually opening Ghost's eye, while Ghost was in telepathic coneection with Jon. Jon is seeing though Ghost's mind. Bran makes a telepathic connection with Ghost, which Jon observes. Notably nothing seems to change for Jon after this event. Yet when he makes a telepathic connection with Ghost later on, Ghost appears to be communicating telepathically with his entire pack.

When something freezes it actually releases heat energy. My guess is Ser puddles was created by a sudden freezing of the surrounding air, which in turn released heat energy to the area around it, which is why the snow partially melted and slid off the tree.

Why are we sure that Howland wasn't a greenseer? We just know that he doesn't have Jojen's prophetic dreams. But those aren't the typical abilities of a greenseer. I'm not sure what else it could mean to "talk to trees" other than what a greenseer has the potential to do with the weirwoods and the weirnet. For me at least, I'm up in the air with whether Bloodraven is a puppet or the puppeteer. Is he ruling or has he become a thrall of the weirnet? He seems to be plugged into the weirnet, but if I had to guess, I don't think he's a powerful enough telepath to take control over the collective of telepaths that make up the weirnet. My best guess is the weirnet is using his abilities to further it's own agenda. Which I do agree probably has no love for the humankind who have already violated their previous truce.

That's a good observation. My personal thought on Ser Puddles is that the ice form that was destroyed by Sam was only a temporary vessel anyway for whatever provided the consciousness of the ice golem. The fact that they appear out of nowhere (or thin air) is perhaps a clue that their ice forms are only temporary.

Sigh. It's kind of like the lack of imagination that Disney showed when they slavishly repeated the beats of the original Star Wars trilogy for their sequels.

I don't know if this ties into your word association or not, but there is a star named "Mira" and it's located on the neck of the Cetus constellation. Cetus is the sea monster which Andromeda was to be sacrificed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mira

I agree that the Heart of Darkness is GRRM's primary inspiration for Bran's journey north of the Wall but I don't think it's the only one. Bloodraven is a mix of Kurz, Dracula, Odin, Merlin, Nightingale the Robber out of Slavic mythology, and probably a handful of other inspirations. Personally, Coldhands never really struck me as Conrad's Russian. I think the fool Patchface makes a better analog for the Russian with the patched jacket. Coldhands seems more like the Coachman who brought Jonathan Harker to Dracula's castle.

Based on the show runner being one of the writer’s of my favorite Disney Star Wars movie, Rogue One, I’m going to foolishly remain optimistic. The trailer has me very excited (except for the fact that it announced that it won’t start until September 21 as opposed to the end of August).

In the original draft for Rogue One, the character of Orson Krennic was initially supposed to be an Imperial double agent pretending to work with the rebels. I kind of wonder if Skarsgard may be playing a similar part, an Imperial double agent being used to root out dissidents of the Empire.

Maegor’s second marriage was the first sign of trouble between the Faith and the Targaryens (even though undoubtably there were always tensions under the surface). But the uprisings in the streets seemed to take place after Aegon and Rhaena’s wedding.

Actually the spark that seemed to set off the High Septon and the various religious factions was Aenys decision to marry Aegon and Rhaena much moreso than Maegor's decision to take a second wife.

Its' specifically mentioned by the Brotherhood, that her targets are the Freys and the Boltons: Presumably she'll start with the Freys since she's in the Riverlands. But like you stated being a revenant, makes me think she won't leave the Boltons unresolved which should take her to Winterfell. The fact that she still possesses Robb's crown also makes me think that her path will bring her back to Winterfell at some point. The fact that as late as ADWD Jon recalls how Cat told Robb that Jon could never inherit Winterfell, which then leads to Jon's berserker rage, makes me think that their conflict is not resolved.

We don't have any reason to believe that ice magic can do anything other than animate the dead. It seems that fire magic is what allows for an actual resurrection to happen. Which is probably why GRRM brings Melisandre to the Wall, and more importantly leaves her at the Wall even after Stannis departs. She's either going to be the one who resurrects Jon a la Thoros and Beric, or, perhaps more likely, she's going be the sacrifice that allows Jon to be resurrected a la Beric and Lady Stoneheart. Or the other possibility is that GRRM has scrapped his original plans on killing and resurrecting Jon. Jon's storyline may be the one that GRRM had to go back and rewrite because his initial plans for Jon weren't working. ETA: Once again looking to the HBO series as a funhouse mirror for WOW, we have Jon being resurrected and coming to Winterfell from the north. We also have another resurrected character, Beric, taking his brotherhood without banners and coming to Winterfell from the south. My guess is since the show didn't create Lady Stoneheart, they used Beric in her stead. I think in the books we're going to have Lady Stoneheart bring her bandits to Winterfell from the South to further her revenge plans against Roose and the Boltons. Where she'll meet Jon and his Wildlings who will come from the North to have their own reckoning with Ramsay. I think Cat and Jon have a conflict between them concerning Winterfell that they still need to resolve.

I do wonder if Doran and Oberyn's father kept his surname or adopted the Martell name. The only time he is mentioned is when Oberyn discusses their trip to Castle Rock where he only identifies his father (presumably) as his mother's consort.

I would assume that the Targaryens would have taken a cue from the Martells, and no matter the name of the husband, if the children's right to the Iron Throne came from their mother, they would have been given their mother's surname.

I wholeheartedly agree. Here is where I fall on the creatures that Will and Sam encountered in the books. Either: 1) they are formed from the same ice magic that formed the Others of legend or 2) These ice golems are formed to resemble the tales told of the Others of legend. Specifically they are formed from frozen air to resemble the bedtime tales of Westeros' great boogeymen, the White Walkers/Others. I'm leaning towards the latter, since the oral tales include the Others producing half-breed offspring with human women. This implies that the Others of legend were biological creatures who could potentially mate with humans. (If indeed they themselves weren't just another tribe of humans). The ice golem that Sam causes to disappear into a mist would not be capable of this.

In the “real world” Borroq may be inspired by a name in Arabic, Barraq, meaning “shining”. Which in turn may be a nod to one of GRRM’s many inspirations, Stephen King, who referred to his “skinchangers” as having “the shining”.

I’ve heard Loras, I’ve heard Euron or any other little brother people can think of. The problem with this is how the phrase is used in the prophecy. If Maggy was referring to Cersei’s little brother, she would have said “your valonqar”. But she doesn’t. If she were using the term to refer to any random younger brother that she had not previously discussed, then she would have used the term “a valonqar” but she doesn’t. The fact that she said “the valonqar” implies that it was someone she had already referred to in the prophecy and she was using valonqar to further distinguish it. Since Robert had many sons, valonqar does nothing to further distinguish which of Robert’s children could cause her death, so I doubt it’s used to refer to one of Robert’s sons. That leaves us with Cersei’s children whom Maggy had just referenced. Cersei has three children two boys and one girl. Valonqar narrowly defines the cause of Cerseis’ death as the younger brother of her three children. Tommen.

This has to be the prophecy that has led to the most convoluted attempts to interpret it, when the meaning of it should be fairly clear from the context. First off, there is nothing terribly special about the term “valonqar”. It’s a Valyrian term for the younger brother. Maggy simply uses a one word term inherited from her original language. Cersei’s mistake is making an assumption that Maggy was referring to her younger brother. But if you look at how the prophecy is stated by Maggy, it’s clear that she had already supplied the subject matter that the term valonqar is further distinguishing: 16 children for Robert, 3 children for Cersei. Cersei’s 3 children will have crowns of gold and shrouds of gold. While Maggy identifies Cersei’s tears as “your tears” and Cersei’s throat as “your throat” she doesn’t do the same for “valonqar”. In other words she doesn’t say “your valonqar”. So it should be fairly clear at this point that she is using the term valonqar to further narrow down her last subject matter, Cersei’s three children. In other words out of her three children, it’s the younger brother that after his death and his siblings’ deaths will cause her death by wrapping “his hands” about her pale white throat and choking the life from her. After Tommen dies, his “hands” will cause her death. Since I doubt we’ll get a zombie Tommen, I think the trick to the prophecy is the use of the word “hands”. I don’t think it’s a reference to Tommen’s actual hands. I think it’s a reference to Tommen’s Hands. The various men who have served or will serve as Tommen’s Hand to the King. And further Tommen must do an action which allows his Hands to carry this act out. Presumably that’s going to be a reference to one of the many documents that Tommen is enthusiastically applying his stamp.

Fire & Blood, the Sons of the Dragon

In the Winds of Winter Forum someone indicated that on a podcast he’s indicated that he has written chapters for ADOS as a rebuttal to my suggestion that WOW will be his last book. Of course that seems to beg the question as to why he would be writing chapters for ADOS if he hasn’t finished WOW. I still think his plan is to finish the story before sending out WOW. It just may be that the story needs to be divided into two books. I think that there is still an assumption that he’s going to bring all of his storylines together for the end of the series. And I agree if he’s planning on doing that it would probably take longer than two books to finish the story. I just have a feeling that’s not the direction he’s taking. If you think about it, the show had two apocalyptic scenarios in the last season. The “Long” Night in Winterfell and Dany’s burning of King’s Landing. The show however, made the Long Night happen before the burning of King’s Landing. Presumably so they could include Dany and Jon in both storylines. I don’t think that’s how the books will end. I think these two apocalypses are probably going to occur somewhat simultaneously. Jon’s story will stay up North while Dany’s story will probably culminate in King’s Landing. Both scenarios contributing to death by ice and fire that GRRM has repeatedly hinted. Now perhaps both events will have some common link, but I think the series ends shortly after these two events. And the title A Dream of Spring seems to suggest that the series may end during a Long Night but with some glimmer of hope that whoever survives these events can one day resurface and try to restart a civilization.

So… did George accidentally reveal in his “Winter Garden” Not a blog that WOW is going to be the last book in the series? He talks about the ending to the story and once he is done there will be a huge debate comparing his story to HBO’s story. Yet the book that will result in this debate seems to be Winds of Winter, not a Dream of Spring. I remember a gag he played where he was in costume as a zombie and signing copies of a Dream of Spring. I wonder if there was more to that joke then we realize. That he has never planned on writing a Dream of Spring. That the story is going to end with Winds of Winter. If so, it makes sense then as to why it’s taking him so long to finish WOW. He’s trying to tie up the entire story and give it an ending.

I’m probably reading too much into this, but in his “Winter Garden” SSM, does GRRM accidentally reveal that WOW will be his last book? He seems to be implying that once WOW is finished the story is finished and fans will start to debate whether his story or HBO’s story was better.

Wow, perhaps the most explicit GRRM has ever been on the difference between the show and his book: https://georgerrmartin.com/notablog/