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Winds of June- Not a Blog Post


TyrionsFlagon

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I think there will always be people reading these books in the future, given their popularity. I don't think the series being unifinished would change that, except that it wouldn't be seen as something like LOTR.

I also think people will keep watching the show as the years go by. Of course, its popularity will never reach the heights it had once but there will always be somebody curious enough to watch a once very popular TV show. I guess the same goes for the books.

 

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1 hour ago, three-eyed monkey said:

To be fair, he writes 1000-page novels, therefore people who will read 1000-page novels are his target market, and so far it is estimated that he sold 90 million copies.

I'm not comparing it to television figures. I think the show did about 20 million viewers a week at it's peak, and I fully accept that most viewers don't read the books. The show did great for book sales though, moving GRRM form around 10 or 15 million copies before the show, which are numbers 99.9% of writers can only dream of, to 90 million by the time the show was done. That's what happens though, whenever there is a television or cinema adaptation. I bet a lot of copies of Dune have been sold in the last couple of years.

In 1999, LotR had sold an estimated 150 million copies. Since then, largely due to the Peter Jackson's movies in the early 2000's, it is estimated that LotR sales have grown to around 400 million. These books were published in the 1950's, and JRRT died in the 1970's. Yet more copies have been sold in the first 20 years of this century than the last 50 years of the last century. I doubt JRRT could ever have envisaged Amazon paying his estate a reported $250 million to adapt his work all these years later, and that's not to mention the bounce in book sales that is almost inevitable as a result of the show bringing his story to the attention of a new generation of potential readers, who do exist if growing book sales over the last number of years is anything to go by.

So I would say there is always room for growth. There are people still buying copies of Don Quixote 400 years later, with estimated total sales for that book running close to half a billion now.

However, Don Quixote and Lord of the Rings are complete. If GRRM doesn't finish ASoIaF then it is unlikely to stand the test of time, because readers like an ending and are less likely to start a series that has no ending, so that will have a big bearing on any potential future growth. In fact I would be fearful that the story could fade into obscurity over time if it remains unfinished, and that would be a pity because I think it's a great story, but great stories need great satisfying endings, or at least an ending.

Eventually HBO will reboot the show (or they’ll sell the rights to someone else who will). It probably won’t be until the books are finished or George passes or both, but it was such a hit, and left so many people feeling unsatisfied, that they could easily market it with the unspoken promise to “fix” what went wrong.

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1 hour ago, Lady Anna said:

I think there will always be people reading these books in the future, given their popularity. I don't think the series being unifinished would change that, except that it wouldn't be seen as something like LOTR.

I also think people will keep watching the show as the years go by. Of course, its popularity will never reach the heights it had once but there will always be somebody curious enough to watch a once very popular TV show. I guess the same goes for the books.

 

I'm not sure, the books have a lot of problematic material that has and will age terribly, certainly more than LOTR. If the books are finished, that might get people to read them for what they are. Their popularity would probably overshadow the controversial parts. But with them being unfinished, there is very little reward to gain from reading them outside of academic study of the fantasy genre. I personally would not start reading the books today if I hadn't started reading them earlier. The show, as terribly as it ended, has an ending, which would probably make it more popular than the books in the future if the series remains unfinished.

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5 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

If George manages to finish Dunk and Egg (which could happen if he goes into one of psycho-inspired phases, like he apparently was with FnB) then that story will live on. I know people who couldn’t get into ASOIAF but loved A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. They can be enjoyed on their own. In this instance, ASOIAF would just be the supplementary material.

I mean, I like D&E, but when you put it like that, it sounds really depressing. :bawl:

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1 hour ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

Wow, you picked a tough book but a great one for a first foreign language read. Was it in English? His work is like some of the classic books, best read in the original language.

yes , in English . thankfully , George's talent made me interested in that god damn big book ... well , to be perfectly honest , it was D&D and their season 8 that made me interested in a book I had put down after a few chapters on account of constant need of dictionary a couple of years back ! but George's writing did keep me hooked

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3 hours ago, Lady Anna said:

I think there will always be people reading these books in the future, given their popularity. I don't think the series being unifinished would change that, except that it wouldn't be seen as something like LOTR.

I also think people will keep watching the show as the years go by. Of course, its popularity will never reach the heights it had once but there will always be somebody curious enough to watch a once very popular TV show. I guess the same goes for the books.

 

I stopped reading Wheel of Time the second I found out the author had died before completing it. 

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4 hours ago, James Arryn said:

I stopped reading Wheel of Time the second I found out the author had died before completing it. 

I could never get past the first 100 pages. I’ve tried several times. That intro man….I get it, no need to inform me that time is a wheel, I’m alive and have eyes. let me see the cogs turn and grind in this world before explaining the plot.

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7 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

I could never get past the first 100 pages. I’ve tried several times. That intro man….I get it, no need to inform me that time is a wheel, I’m alive and have eyes. let me see the cogs turn and grind in this world before explaining the plot.

I read the first book in 2020.....................and I was finished with the series from that point onward. So many things in that book just feel like the characters are just spinning wheels and it was driving me nuts.

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7 hours ago, Fool Stands On Giant’s Toe said:

Thank you. I thought I was the only one. It’s always a series recommended to me. I really tried several times but I just can’t pick the book back up after a while 

One character in particular ruined the entire book for me. I've never run into this issue before while reading a novel, but it drove me nuts how much this one character destroyed any sense of realism I could find in the novel.

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On 4/23/2022 at 11:30 PM, Apoplexy said:

I'm not sure, the books have a lot of problematic material that has and will age terribly, certainly more than LOTR. If the books are finished, that might get people to read them for what they are. Their popularity would probably overshadow the controversial parts. But with them being unfinished, there is very little reward to gain from reading them outside of academic study of the fantasy genre. I personally would not start reading the books today if I hadn't started reading them earlier. The show, as terribly as it ended, has an ending, which would probably make it more popular than the books in the future if the series remains unfinished.

In my view, once your books reach this level of popularity and acclaim (including being favorably compared to LOTR, being considered a staple of the genre, with millions and millions of copies sold), there will always be people curious to read it, even if there's no ending (which, if it remains that way, will always be part of its "legend").

I agree with you on the show and its ending, though.

As a personal aside, I would have still read this series even if I knew it was going to remain unfinished. By this point it really doesn't bother me, maybe because I watched the show (which, despite not being a big fan of, I'm not particularly disappointed with).

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On 4/24/2022 at 2:00 AM, James Arryn said:

I stopped reading Wheel of Time the second I found out the author had died before completing it. 

He wrote 11 books before he passed away.  Brandon Sanderson finished the story based on copious notes and did a really good job imo (I've just re-read the series so it's fresh in mind).

Of course, depending on how deep in you got, reading a 14 book series (average length of book 800 pages) is no small decision to make.

Tolkien, Jordan and Martin are the three fantasy authors whose works make the most impression on me and I came to their works in that order.  Each to their own in terms of writing style, pacing and characterisation but each has a vision for storytelling that is staggering in scope, depth and richness.

The irony is that I started reading ASOIAF in about 2000 because I was twiddling my thumbs waiting for the next WOT novel and wanted something to read.  Times don't change  :)

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2 hours ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

It's often said that the middle part of WoT is really slow.

I mean I found most of book one to be really slow. It was filled with too many "your and your friends are destined for greatness", moments for my taste.

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5 hours ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

It's often said that the middle part of WoT is really slow.

It's referred to as the slog.  1 - 6 develop our characters and set things up nicely but then things kind of drift 7 - 10.  11 - 14 pick things back up and finish in resounding fashion.

2 hours ago, sifth said:

I mean I found most of book one to be really slow. It was filled with too many "your and your friends are destined for greatness", moments for my taste.

Book One has to take completely ordinary and innocent, uneducated village folk and begin setting their feet on the road to greatness.  Things do develop slowly but watching how characters develop from scratch to how they act mid- and then end- series is quite beautifully constructed.  It is a long and detailed story so not to everyone's taste.

The role of prophecy and Fate is more pronounced than in ASOIAF for sure.

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45 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

It's referred to as the slog.  1 - 6 develop our characters and set things up nicely but then things kind of drift 7 - 10.  11 - 14 pick things back up and finish in resounding fashion.

Book One has to take completely ordinary and innocent, uneducated village folk and begin setting their feet on the road to greatness.  Things do develop slowly but watching how characters develop from scratch to how they act mid- and then end- series is quite beautifully constructed.  It is a long and detailed story so not to everyone's taste.

The role of prophecy and Fate is more pronounced than in ASOIAF for sure.

I sort of hate, the trope of the "farm boy becoming the chosen one". I mean heck, the series even had it's own evil dark lord, because why not.

Spoiler

I recall one chapter having two main characters going to an inn, one or more of the dark lords servants showing up, and the good guys escaping by the skin of their teeth..............3 times back to back, to back and a 4th one was just about to start, before it was interrupted. I've never seen wheel spinning like that before and it ruined the book for me.

 

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