Jump to content

"Only 500 pages to go" for Winds of Winter


Aebram
 Share

Recommended Posts

I’ve come around on the theory that AFFC/ADWD was George  procrastinating from writing the story that he’s (presumably) starting in TWOW. The only reason I can think of for this is intimidation. It reminds me of how I’d feel whenever I’d have to do a massive research project for school. I technically knew how to do it, but the enormity of it all was just overwhelming.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
On 3/25/2023 at 8:37 PM, The Bard of Banefort said:

I’ve come around on the theory that AFFC/ADWD was George  procrastinating from writing the story that he’s (presumably) starting in TWOW. The only reason I can think of for this is intimidation. It reminds me of how I’d feel whenever I’d have to do a massive research project for school. I technically knew how to do it, but the enormity of it all was just overwhelming.

Procrastinating? Why that? Have you forgotten about the "five-year gap" issue?

It's not a procrastination issue, it's a storytelling issue. Jumping from Cersei sitting pretty as Queen Regent of the Seven Kingdoms to being paraded around in the streets naked by religious zealots is a bad idea.

The time jump works for characters like Bran, Arya, Sansa, Sam, Dany and maybe Brienne. Not for Jaime, the Greyjoys, the Martells, Cersei, Jon, Brienne, Tyrion, Stannis, etc.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Even in the Abomination, Dany just didn’t burn down Meereen and leave, after returning from Vaes Dothrak.  The Slavers were crushed, some kind of ruling council established, and (unlike Astapor) she left them with an army.

I could see her burning Yunkai to the ground, and slaughtering its elite, in TWOW, so it won’t be a thorn in the side of free Meereen, when she goes.  But, she’s established a standing army for Meereen, so its leadership should be able to defend it.

Almost certainly, revolution will come to Volantis, removing the biggest threat to Meereen.

I don’t consider the fate of Kings Landing very important, in the scheme of things.  What matters is the defeat of the Others.

Edited by SeanF
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, BlackLightning said:

Procrastinating? Why that? Have you forgotten about the "five-year gap" issue?

It's not a procrastination issue, it's a storytelling issue. Jumping from Cersei sitting pretty as Queen Regent of the Seven Kingdoms to being paraded around in the streets naked by religious zealots is a bad idea.

The time jump works for characters like Bran, Arya, Sansa, Sam, Dany and maybe Brienne. Not for Jaime, the Greyjoys, the Martells, Cersei, Jon, Brienne, Tyrion, Stannis, etc.

 

The Cersei and Jamie stuff was a lot of fun, but it really doesn't seem very important in the grand scheme of things. Same with the Dorne and Greyjoy story, at least as of now; a lot of fun, but just doesn't seem very important. If anything, GRRM should have went with his original idea and just wrote the Dorn and Grejoy stuff as a short side story novella.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/25/2023 at 8:37 PM, The Bard of Banefort said:

I’ve come around on the theory that AFFC/ADWD was George  procrastinating from writing the story that he’s (presumably) starting in TWOW. The only reason I can think of for this is intimidation. It reminds me of how I’d feel whenever I’d have to do a massive research project for school. I technically knew how to do it, but the enormity of it all was just overwhelming.

You know what, I gave this some more thought and what you're saying is on point for the most part

I don't think GRRM was procrastinating but I have to admit that the story is really supposed to pick up in Winds for a reason. In a way, having the first post-time jump Jaime chapter take place when he is trying to negotiate the surrender of the Blackwoods and the first post-jump Cersei chapter take place when she is imprisoned within the Sept of Baelor is both ballsy and natural.

But that's just the Riverlands and King's Landing.

I still can't see any way to make the stories of the Wall, Dorne, the Iron Islands and the North work with a time jump of five years

General audiences complain about time jumps

16 hours ago, sifth said:

The Cersei and Jamie stuff was a lot of fun, but it really doesn't seem very important in the grand scheme of things. Same with the Dorne and Greyjoy story, at least as of now; a lot of fun, but just doesn't seem very important. If anything, GRRM should have went with his original idea and just wrote the Dorn and Grejoy stuff as a short side story novella.

Even if he wrote the Martell and Greyjoy stuff as a short side story novella, they would still need to be incorporated into the main story.

Which leads us right where we left off. But instead of just having one small book and one giant book, we would have had three books: the small Martell/Greyjoy novella, the Feast book and the Dance book. The only difference is that we might've seen the battles of Meereen and Winterfell in the Dance book.

The Cersei stuff is definitely important in the grand scheme of things. She is based in the capital and controls both the Iron Throne and the victorious Lannister faction. The fall of the Lannisters in the original outline was a lot quicker than the more gradual, self-destructive one we are seeing in the books, but we were always going to get front row seats to the action. If Cersei's stuff is the A-plot of an episode called "Fall of the Lannisters" episode, then Jaime stuff and the Brienne stuff is really just the B-plot of the same episode. Jaime and Brienne tell us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the people and the land while Cersei tells us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the government. Important to remember that Cersei and Jaime were originally supposed to be one singular character.

The Martell and Greyjoy stuff is unimportant? Meh, not really. I think the readership got itself so carried away with the classic fantasy trope of the Stark/Lannister/Baratheon feud, the rise of the Targaryens and the coming of magical ice apocalypse that they became blind to the fact that the Martells and Greyjoys had been there since the beginning.

And with the elder half of the Starks dead and defeated and the other younger half lost and unskilled, what else is there to do but to observe how Lannister overreach and incompetence causes everyone to turn against them. Yes, the Greyjoys and the Martells are a part of that but so are the Faith Militant, the Iron Bank, the Golden Company, etc. While the Lannisters are busy making enemies out of literally everyone, the Stark kids can grow up and get the skills they need to avenge their family and reclaim their home. Meanwhile, no one apart from a few isolated monastic orders knows that the eponymous forces of nature (i.e., Daenerys Targaryen and the Others) are closing in.

Don't believe me: watch what happened to the show when they tried to streamline and cut those storylines out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, BlackLightning said:

You know what, I gave this some more thought and what you're saying is on point for the most part

I don't think GRRM was procrastinating but I have to admit that the story is really supposed to pick up in Winds for a reason. In a way, having the first post-time jump Jaime chapter take place when he is trying to negotiate the surrender of the Blackwoods and the first post-jump Cersei chapter take place when she is imprisoned within the Sept of Baelor is both ballsy and natural.

But that's just the Riverlands and King's Landing.

I still can't see any way to make the stories of the Wall, Dorne, the Iron Islands and the North work with a time jump of five years

General audiences complain about time jumps

Even if he wrote the Martell and Greyjoy stuff as a short side story novella, they would still need to be incorporated into the main story.

Which leads us right where we left off. But instead of just having one small book and one giant book, we would have had three books: the small Martell/Greyjoy novella, the Feast book and the Dance book. The only difference is that we might've seen the battles of Meereen and Winterfell in the Dance book.

The Cersei stuff is definitely important in the grand scheme of things. She is based in the capital and controls both the Iron Throne and the victorious Lannister faction. The fall of the Lannisters in the original outline was a lot quicker than the more gradual, self-destructive one we are seeing in the books, but we were always going to get front row seats to the action. If Cersei's stuff is the A-plot of an episode called "Fall of the Lannisters" episode, then Jaime stuff and the Brienne stuff is really just the B-plot of the same episode. Jaime and Brienne tell us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the people and the land while Cersei tells us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the government. Important to remember that Cersei and Jaime were originally supposed to be one singular character.

The Martell and Greyjoy stuff is unimportant? Meh, not really. I think the readership got itself so carried away with the classic fantasy trope of the Stark/Lannister/Baratheon feud, the rise of the Targaryens and the coming of magical ice apocalypse that they became blind to the fact that the Martells and Greyjoys had been there since the beginning.

And with the elder half of the Starks dead and defeated and the other younger half lost and unskilled, what else is there to do but to observe how Lannister overreach and incompetence causes everyone to turn against them. Yes, the Greyjoys and the Martells are a part of that but so are the Faith Militant, the Iron Bank, the Golden Company, etc. While the Lannisters are busy making enemies out of literally everyone, the Stark kids can grow up and get the skills they need to avenge their family and reclaim their home. Meanwhile, no one apart from a few isolated monastic orders knows that the eponymous forces of nature (i.e., Daenerys Targaryen and the Others) are closing in.

Don't believe me: watch what happened to the show when they tried to streamline and cut those storylines out.

I really don't agree. All the Jamie/Cersei and Martell/Greyjoy stuff really tells us, are the finer details of stuff that would have been covered during the time skip and it gives us these finer details by spending a lot of time ignoring the main protagonists of the series; the Stark children, Dany and Tyrion.

Listen, I don't want to be the "no fun police", because I really like those chapters, but in the grand scheme of things, they feel less and less important each time I reread them. Like for example The Kingsmoot chapters, were insanely fun, but they seem rather unimportant because all they really tell us are the details on how Euron gained his power, when all that's really important is that Euron was in power.

Edited by sifth
Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, sifth said:

The Kingsmoot chapters, were insanely fun, but they seem rather unimportant because all they really tell us are the details on how Euron gained his power, when all that's really important is that Euron was in power.

I mean they could have just had an in medias res (?) with Aeron after Euron already won interspersed with brief flashbacks to the Kingsmoot and so cut a lot out. Might not have had quite the same impact but would have helped maintain the punchy pacing a bit better.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/23/2023 at 7:16 PM, sifth said:

I often wonder why GRRM wants to show us so much of Essos. It's cool world building, but it all feels so disconnected from the rest of the story.

This

 

Initially he had only a few mentions of the east but as it expanded it got more and more convoluted to the point it is now every bit as complicated as Westeros

I mean he has made countless passing references to this (even in Westeros to his "time skip") but instead of fleshing out stuff in additional novels after main story he is now cramming too much in

It is the utter opposite of say how Tolkien used to write back in the day (over view of plot then flesh out sections as needed). GRRM had a basic overview, then started changing it, then (after show tanked using many of his future arcs very poorly) I suspect that caused him grief to even further flesh things out (and change some more things)

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/3/2023 at 8:34 PM, BlackLightning said:

Procrastinating? Why that? Have you forgotten about the "five-year gap" issue?

It's not a procrastination issue, it's a storytelling issue. Jumping from Cersei sitting pretty as Queen Regent of the Seven Kingdoms to being paraded around in the streets naked by religious zealots is a bad idea.

The time jump works for characters like Bran, Arya, Sansa, Sam, Dany and maybe Brienne. Not for Jaime, the Greyjoys, the Martells, Cersei, Jon, Brienne, Tyrion, Stannis, etc.

 

Some of what you say is true but Sam in particular is the most boring character in the series who's only point is to go to Old Town to learn something (or meet someone impersonating someone). Really beyond that his entire plot could be reduced to 2 chapters. Conflict at the Wall. Shipped off to Old Town. Done.

Sansa also works well with a time skip (flee after Joff killed, meet Littlefinger, then ???). Way too much side politics for the Vale alot of it seems like a red herring. Since we have no idea what is true / fake / revised from show version its hard to comment on but so far she seems about as important as Rickon. At least Bran + Arya are doing something.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/4/2023 at 8:34 PM, BlackLightning said:

The Cersei stuff is definitely important in the grand scheme of things. She is based in the capital and controls both the Iron Throne and the victorious Lannister faction. The fall of the Lannisters in the original outline was a lot quicker than the more gradual, self-destructive one we are seeing in the books, but we were always going to get front row seats to the action. If Cersei's stuff is the A-plot of an episode called "Fall of the Lannisters" episode, then Jaime stuff and the Brienne stuff is really just the B-plot of the same episode. Jaime and Brienne tell us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the people and the land while Cersei tells us how and why the Lannisters lose control of the government. Important to remember that Cersei and Jaime were originally supposed to be one singular character.

The Martell and Greyjoy stuff is unimportant? Meh, not really. I think the readership got itself so carried away with the classic fantasy trope of the Stark/Lannister/Baratheon feud, the rise of the Targaryens and the coming of magical ice apocalypse that they became blind to the fact that the Martells and Greyjoys had been there since the beginning.

And with the elder half of the Starks dead and defeated and the other younger half lost and unskilled, what else is there to do but to observe how Lannister overreach and incompetence causes everyone to turn against them. Yes, the Greyjoys and the Martells are a part of that but so are the Faith Militant, the Iron Bank, the Golden Company, etc. While the Lannisters are busy making enemies out of literally everyone, the Stark kids can grow up and get the skills they need to avenge their family and reclaim their home. Meanwhile, no one apart from a few isolated monastic orders knows that the eponymous forces of nature (i.e., Daenerys Targaryen and the Others) are closing in.

Don't believe me: watch what happened to the show when they tried to streamline and cut those storylines out.

The problem is not the "importance" of plotlines, the problem is too many characters in too many locations which makes it a nightmare for a gardener to parse. 

The Cersei/Jaime A-plot B-plot is great and important, but it's two entirely new stories.

The Martell and Greyjoy stuff is great and important, but it adds another two entirely new stories, and 7 new POV characters that have to be written for. 

The "what else is there to do" is get to the endgame. It is absolutely true that you can't have an untrained Arya, an untrained Bran, an untrained Jon, an untrained Sansa, and an untested Dany go endgame super quickly from Storm to Winds. But you also can't spend an entire book just training and testing them: so go deeper into the Martells, and the Greyjoys, and the Lannisters, and the Aegon stuff over the course of two books. 

19 hours ago, sifth said:

Listen, I don't want to be the "no fun police", because I really like those chapters, but in the grand scheme of things, they feel less and less important each time I reread them. Like for example The Kingsmoot chapters, were insanely fun, but they seem rather unimportant because all they really tell us are the details on how Euron gained his power, when all that's really important is that Euron was in power.

It's not that they aren't "important," it's that they are just more. We have an arguably necessary amount of more which complicates the writing process and the reading process.

On 4/3/2023 at 5:34 PM, BlackLightning said:

Procrastinating? Why that? Have you forgotten about the "five-year gap" issue?

A 5 year jump where the characters are trained and ready to go with some clunky exposition for the past five years for the minor sideplots would have been better than getting three books over the course of 25 years and maybe not getting the last one ever. 

1 hour ago, kav2001c said:

Initially he had only a few mentions of the east but as it expanded it got more and more convoluted to the point it is now every bit as complicated as Westeros

It's part of the larger problem which is that his world overtook his story. It happens to the best of us. "Ooo Braavos, let's explore that for 3 books" "Meereen, we're staying here for four books, and now half the characters are coming to say hi" "What's Illyrio and Varys up to, let's go to the Rhoyne." But I do understand the temptation, the world is fascinating and there are hundreds of interesting characters to explore and tons of interesting Essosi locations and I would love for him to explore them if it didn't, evidently, slow his writing speed down to a halt.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The funny thing with me is, I usually hate time skips. I view them as very lazy, especially in tv shows, but I can see the writing on the wall when it comes to the ending of ASoS; the next time we were suppose to see these kids again, they were suppose to be much older and better trained.

In many ways I view AFFC/ADWD as I do the film Pulp Fiction; "Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife" and "The Golden Watch" were both very fun and interesting stories, but they stop the narrative dead in it's track to tell their stories and it's only "The Bonnie Situation" that movies the narrative along again, at the very end of the film. I honestly feel AFFC/ADWD have the same issue; the main characters take a break to train, while all of the supporting characters tell their more interesting stories.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've said for years, he should have made the time jump work, even if it would have worked less well for some characters than others.  It would have been immeasurably preferable to the running in place we got in the zlast two books, that caused the author to become so caught up in the weeds that at the end of Dance he didn't progress the story up to the 5th year.  Two books and the children are still children

 

Edited by Cas Stark
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/6/2023 at 3:44 PM, Cas Stark said:

I've said for years, he should have made the time jump work, even if it would have worked less well for some characters than others.  It would have been immeasurably preferable to the running in place we got in the zlast two books, that caused the author to become so caught up in the weeds that at the end of Dance he didn't progress the story up to the 5th year.  Two books and the children are still children

 

probably he should have released a novella about what happened north of the neck during the time jump and then released the book he wanted. Because the big problem here is the north and that 5 years is just too much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, divica said:

probably he should have released a novella about what happened north of the neck during the time jump and then released the book he wanted. Because the big problem here is the north and that 5 years is just too much.

I'm not sure.  Five years time:  Stannis goes to Essos, gets money and mercenaries, comes back North, works to establish ties, keeps fighting the Others, plots about going South.  Jon is lord commander, dies, comes back, works with Stannis to protect the North.  Cersei will have been pre occupied with her own enemies.  Maybe she's engaged in some diplomacy or sent some soldiers at one time or the other.  It doesn't work as well as some of the other stories, but it has been TWENTY THREE years since Swords came out.  At the end of Dance Arya is still only 11.  Bran is 10 I think.  

**I have confidence that GRRM could have come up with something better than the above paragraph for the 5 year gap if he had put his mind to it.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

41 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

I'm not sure.  Five years time:  Stannis goes to Essos, gets money and mercenaries, comes back North, works to establish ties, keeps fighting the Others, plots about going South.  Jon is lord commander, dies, comes back, works with Stannis to protect the North. 

I think the more pressing problem is that of the Others, as they have emerged as an urgent threat as early as the Great Ranging, and they are the main force driving the Wildlings south toward the Wall, practically snapping at their heels as they move. Once the Others have been set in motion with that show of force, it'd be a bit awkward for them to go back into hibernation for five years and wait for the rest of the plot to happen before they move again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

54 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

I'm not sure.  Five years time:  Stannis goes to Essos, gets money and mercenaries, comes back North, works to establish ties, keeps fighting the Others, plots about going South.  Jon is lord commander, dies, comes back, works with Stannis to protect the North.  Cersei will have been pre occupied with her own enemies.  Maybe she's engaged in some diplomacy or sent some soldiers at one time or the other.  It doesn't work as well as some of the other stories, but it has been TWENTY THREE years since Swords came out.  At the end of Dance Arya is still only 11.  Bran is 10 I think.  

**I have confidence that GRRM could have come up with something better than the above paragraph for the 5 year gap if he had put his mind to it.

 

 

5 minutes ago, Kyll.Ing. said:

I think the more pressing problem is that of the Others, as they have emerged as an urgent threat as early as the Great Ranging, and they are the main force driving the Wildlings south toward the Wall, practically snapping at their heels as they move. Once the Others have been set in motion with that show of force, it'd be a bit awkward for them to go back into hibernation for five years and wait for the rest of the plot to happen before they move again.

The problem is that grrm drove himself into a hole with the north. That place needs time to heal, to build defenses and weapons against the others, deal with food problems, build glass gardens, unite itself... 

If the others attack anytime soon the north will fall pretty fast. On the other hand, grrm can easily create a plot where the others need to find the horn of joramund in order to pass through the wall or something else and therefore their atack could  still be far away.

And yes, certain characters need time to train and adquire new skills. But the really big problem here is that the north is just really behind where it needs to be because there was no time jump. Even a time jump of 1 or 2 year would solve a lot of problems.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the problem is that GRRM simply didn't write proper travel distances into the narrative. Westeros is a big continent. It ought to, for example, take Catelyn months to travel from Riverrun to Storm's End and back. If he'd made the time jumps between chapters longer then the characters would be old enough without having to change the overall sequence of events. That or just age everyone up by extending Robert's reign by two years and having AGOT start in 300 AC. (The idea that Westerosi years don't entirely align to RL years was floated around at some point but thoroughly shot down if I recall correctly.) 

Edited by The Grey Wolf Strikes Back
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, The Grey Wolf Strikes Back said:

It ought to, for example, take Catelyn months to travel from Riverrun to Storm's End and back

It did take her months. The best fan-made timeline puts the round trip at over 5 months.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/6/2023 at 5:30 AM, kav2001c said:

It is the utter opposite of say how Tolkien used to write back in the day (over view of plot then flesh out sections as needed). GRRM had a basic overview, then started changing it, then (after show tanked using many of his future arcs very poorly) I suspect that caused him grief to even further flesh things out (and change some more things)

Tolkien never wrote like this. He completely winged it and only had a vague idea what was going to happen in the next chapter, to the point of telling his publishers he had 3 or 4 chapters left when he was less than halfway through Lord of the Rings.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...