Wind's Points of View.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

He might go in that direction, actually. As in: We know there are major things going on there, but do not get to see them. All in order up the tension and curiosity. (Am I making myself clear?)

Erm ... yes? :P Pretty straightforward to me.

[PatrickStormborn]

Tyrion - 8

Daenerys - 7

Cersei - 6

Arya - 5

Arianne - 5

Sansa - 5

Sam - 5

Jon - 4

Jaime - 4

Victarion - 4

Theon - 4

Davos - 3/4

Jon Connington - 3

Barristan - 3

Asha - 3

Bran - 2/3

Damphair - 2/3

Melisandre - 2

Brienne - 2

Areo Hotah - 1/2

That comes to around 80-ish chapters, which is about the same as A Storm of Swords.

[Arkash]

Jon's probably the biggest question mark — is he going to have a ton of chapters, only a few (maybe at the end?), or none? If he has none, or none until almost the very end, will Melisandre's POV at the Wall pick up the slack, or will the Wall be on a narrative blackout?

I honestly hope we wont get any, or at least, wont get Many chapters... would leave much more room for other storylines that deserves some space: Sansa, Sam, Arya, Arianne, Jaime, Cersei...

Tyrion - 8

Daenerys - 7

I doubt that, if they meet together soon enough, I think we'll have less of them !

[PatrickStormborn]

I doubt that, if they meet together soon enough, I think we'll have less of them !

Maybe... But I think we're going to need a lot of Tyrion and Dany chapters if we want to see them reach Westeros in this book. I'm assuming that Tyrion will have around 3 chapters before meeting Dany, and Dany will have 2 before meeting Tyrion. After that I think their journey will be split between them, with occasional chapters from Victarion/Barristan.

[protar]

Maybe... But I think we're going to need a lot of Tyrion and Dany chapters if we want to see them reach Westeros in this book. I'm assuming that Tyrion will have around 3 chapters before meeting Dany, and Dany will have 2 before meeting Tyrion. After that I think their journey will be split between them, with occasional chapters from Victarion/Barristan.

I'm not really sure that they'll be staying together for that long. I think that Dany will split her forces, with her going east across the sunset sea with Victarion, and Tyrion going west overland. I think they'll both get like 10 or 11 chapters each, with about half squished into the first 400/500 pages, and the last half being spread more spread out.

As for Jon, I don't think we'll be seeing any more than 5 or 6, with a couple of them being Ghost chapters. And maybe 5 or 6 Mel chapters to tell us what's going on at The Wall while he's dead/warging Ghost.

[Faint]

Jaime is very important. He's not on the same level as the big trio, or the other Stark kids, but he's just below them surely. And I have a feeling he's going to become quite important in TWOW. And aside from his one off in Dance (which really should have gone in Feast.) hasn't he had 7 POV's for both Feast and Storm? So not really very ambitious.

The previous books are not good examples because he spend a good deal of time in POV isolation. Brienne, remember, only became a POV in AFfC. You also have to consider that the trio was not present in AFfC.

If you're guessing at Jaime having 7 chapters in the next book, that is the equivalent to saying roughly 10% of the book will be him. And, really, in a book with 20 POVs, having Jaime Lannister, who is not even one of the top 6 most important characters, occupy so many pages does not seem plausible.

Think of it this way: In the last book, which still had some missing characters (i.e., Sansa, Sam), Theon Greyjoy had the third most chapters after the big three. He had 6, if I remember correctly. And he was in narrative isolation the whole time.

Now it is being proposed that Jaime, who has another POV with him, will have 7 chapters in a book with even more POVs. Does that really sound logical?

[PatrickStormborn]

I'm not really sure that they'll be staying together for that long. I think that Dany will split her forces, with her going east across the sunset sea with Victarion, and Tyrion going west overland. I think they'll both get like 10 or 11 chapters each, with about half squished into the first 400/500 pages, and the last half being spread more spread out.

As for Jon, I don't think we'll be seeing any more than 5 or 6, with a couple of them being Ghost chapters. And maybe 5 or 6 Mel chapters to tell us what's going on at The Wall while he's dead/warging Ghost.

I really don't see them splitting like that. Dany needs to go to Pentos to meet up with Illyrio again, and Barristan has promised that she will help take it for the Tattered Prince. I also think that her first landing will be at Dragonstone.

[Bolivar]

^ To go west, she has to go east :)

Damn this is so crazy, especially since we know Arianne has to be in it. I would just like for it to be as tight ast he first three books, Tyrion, Dany, Jon, Jaime, Sam, Arya, Sansa, Theon, Arianne, Cersei, Davos BOOM. You could skip Bran, he's in the background. I just hate the new format where some characters get 1-4 chapters, it just kills the progression.

[PatrickStormborn]

^ To go west, she has to go east :)

Damn this is so crazy, especially since we know Arianne has to be in it. I would just like for it to be as tight ast he first three books, Tyrion, Dany, Jon, Jaime, Sam, Arya, Sansa, Theon, Arianne, Cersei, Davos BOOM. You could skip Bran, he's in the background. I just hate the new format where some characters get 1-4 chapters, it just kills the progression.

That doesn't mean she needs to circum-navigate the globe. Personally I'd like her to do so, but I don't think it's practical if we want her to reach Westeros before the end of the book.

[protar]

The previous books are not good examples because he spend a good deal of time in POV isolation. Brienne, remember, only became a POV in AFfC. You also have to consider that the trio was not present in AFfC.

If you're guessing at Jaime having 7 chapters in the next book, that is the equivalent to saying roughly 10% of the book will be him. And, really, in a book with 20 POVs, having Jaime Lannister, who is not even one of the top 6 most important characters, occupy so many pages does not seem plausible.

Think of it this way: In the last book, which still had some missing characters (i.e., Sansa, Sam), Theon Greyjoy had the third most chapters after the big three. He had 6, if I remember correctly. And he was in narrative isolation the whole time.

Now it is being proposed that Jaime, who has another POV with him, will have 7 chapters in a book with even more POVs. Does that really sound logical?

Yes it does sound logical, because I don't think Brienne will be getting any more POV's as there is no need for her to continue as one. I don't see how you can think Jaime isn't an important character, so just to clarify: He is. I fully expect TWOW to be huge, as large as SOS so there'll be plenty of space for all the POV's to get a full arc. But only if Martin cuts a few out and quite frankly if he's looking to make the story as good as possible Brienne should be one of the first to go.

[protar]

That doesn't mean she needs to circum-navigate the globe. Personally I'd like her to do so, but I don't think it's practical if we want her to reach Westeros before the end of the book.

I don't really see Dany getting to Westeros by the end of TWOW no matter which way she ends up going. I reckon Martin will have to make this into 8 books, with Dany turning up like a third of the way into book 7. Too much has been made of this to go west you must go east business. Tyrion can easily wrap up the Pentos subplot by himself.

[Faint]

Yes it does sound logical, because I don't think Brienne will be getting any more POV's as there is no need for her to continue as one. I don't see how you can think Jaime isn't an important character, so just to clarify: He is. I fully expect TWOW to be huge, as large as SOS so there'll be plenty of space for all the POV's to get a full arc. But only if Martin cuts a few out and quite frankly if he's looking to make the story as good as possible Brienne should be one of the first to go.

I don't think Jaime is unimportant. But he isn't as important as, say, Sansa or Arya. And both of them are in complete narrative isolation to start the next book. The same can be said of Bran (and he is unlikely to ever escape that isolation).

Cersei, equally as important as Jaime (if not, more so), is the only POV in King's Landing to start the book. And what of Sam? He is the only POV in his locale as well. And Davos?

And that's before accounting for Tyrion/Daenerys/Victarion/Barristan, Theon/Asha, and Melisandre/Jon, which are sure to swallow up a huge portion of the book as well.

Then there's the fact that I don't think Brienne is going to stop being a POV just because you want her to. From what we've seen, POVs rarely simply disappear.

Put that together and I think 7 chapters for Jaime Lannister is beyond generous. That would probably place him third or fourth out of all the characters in what is supposed to be the penultimate book of the entire series. Frankly, I think that's ridiculous.

[CrypticWeirwood]

I don't think Jaime is unimportant. But he isn't as important as, say, Sansa or Arya. And both of them are in complete narrative isolation to start the next book. The same can be said of Bran (and he is unlikely to ever escape that isolation).

You’re too pessimistic. Anyway, Bran already has escaped complete narrative isolation: he made Theon remember his name.

[protar]

I don't think Jaime is unimportant. But he isn't as important as, say, Sansa or Arya. And both of them are in complete narrative isolation to start the next book. The same can be said of Bran (and he is unlikely to ever escape that isolation). Cersei, equally as important as Jaime (if not, more so), is the only POV in King's Landing to start the book. And what of Sam? He is the only POV in his locale as well. And Davos? And that's before accounting for Tyrion/Daenerys/Victarion/Barristan, Theon/Asha, and Melisandre/Jon, which are sure to swallow up a huge portion of the book as well. Then there's the fact that I don't think Brienne is going to stop being a POV just because you want her to. From what we've seen, POVs rarely simply disappear. Put that together and I think 7 chapters for Jaime Lannister is beyond generous. That would probably place him third or fourth out of all the characters in what is supposed to be the penultimate book of the entire series. Frankly, I think that's ridiculous.

No POV's don't usually dissapear when not needed, but the end result of that is that we have over 20 POV's cluttering up the story. The story can be told just as well with 7 Jaime chapters as it can with 4 Jaime chapters and 3 Brienne chapters. It works better in fact, as it gives more focus to Jaime who regardless of where he stands in relation to the Stark kids and the big trio is more important than Brienne.

And this notion that the characters in narrative isolation get the most POV's is wrong. Davos, Arya, Sansa, Bran, all of them have spent the last couple of books isolated from any other POV's and no of them have got more than 4 chapters in the last 2 books. Martin gives characters as many POV's as they need so if Jaime gets a continent spanning journey with Brienne he'll get 7ish chapters. If he's killed of near the beginning then sure 2 or 3 is adequate.

If Martin does the sensible thing and trims down his chapter size to an average of 10 pages (give or take a few.), he could feasibly have 110 chapters covering 1200 pages, so about the size of SOS. This would give him plenty, absolutely plenty of room to give Jaime (and a lot of other characters like Sam and Arianne.) 7 chapters.

[Faint]

No POV's don't usually dissapear when not needed, but the end result of that is that we have over 20 POV's cluttering up the story. The story can be told just as well with 7 Jaime chapters as it can with 4 Jaime chapters and 3 Brienne chapters. It works better in fact, as it gives more focus to Jaime who regardless of where he stands in relation to the Stark kids and the big trio is more important than Brienne.

I'm not going to argue the merits of your suggestion, since that is a wholly separate issue, but I find it unlikely that the author will not rotate between Brienne and Jaime if they remain together. That has been his MO since the beginning. I don't see why he would change it now.

And this notion that the characters in narrative isolation get the most POV's is wrong. Davos, Arya, Sansa, Bran, all of them have spent the last couple of books isolated from any other POV's and no of them have got more than 4 chapters in the last 2 books.

I hardly think past experience factors into the discussion right now because, presumably, these isolated POVs must get entangled with the rest of the story soon or, otherwise, the series will stretch in length considerably. Thus, Arya, Sansa, Davos and so forth must actually get into contact with other POVs and that is not going to be accomplished in a few chapters. Especially since they are so geographically isolated.

As GRRM himself stated, ADwD is supposedly where the story is the most stretched out (i.e., 13 different concurrent storylines), now it has to start coming together.

Martin gives characters as many POV's as they need so if Jaime gets a continent spanning journey with Brienne he'll get 7ish chapters. If he's killed of near the beginning then sure 2 or 3 is adequate.

Only if he wants a repeat of the travel log he already did in ASoS. I think that unlikely. I can see Jaime's story having quite an impact even limited to three or four chapters (see Jon Connington).

If Martin does the sensible thing and trims down his chapter size to an average of 10 pages (give or take a few.), he could feasibly have 110 chapters covering 1200 pages, so about the size of SOS. This would give him plenty, absolutely plenty of room to give Jaime (and a lot of other characters like Sam and Arianne.) 7 chapters.

I think that a bad assumption to make given that his chapters have gone in the opposite direction since the first book. As I'm sure you've noticed, ASoS and ADwD are an equivalent length, yet, the latter has many fewer chapters (i.e., 73 to 82).

That being the case, you should be estimating 75 chapters or so at best (including prologue and epilogue) -- 110 chapters is pure fantasy.

---

You’re too pessimistic. Anyway, Bran already has escaped complete narrative isolation: he made Theon remember his name.

Not so. I'm sure Bran will actively participate in many other POVs besides his own but as to the telling of his own story? That is going to be left up to Bran. Anything happening underground, or even in the past, will have to be told through his own perspective, including, most likely, the fate of his traveling party.

[TheeMikeHoncho]

Here is what i think the most vital POVs will be in tWoW at least at the beginning of the book. I dont want to try to predict what GRRM will do, but for fun here are some basic speculations and questions of what could transpire.

I think that the battle for Mereen is going to be through three POVs.

-Barristan- who will give us info on the dealing within the city- defense, the insurgency, the coming plauge, and the dragons.

-Tyrion- it will be awesome to watch Tyrion work his magic getting the Second Sons to turncloak....again.

-Victarion- along with Tyrion he will give us a look at what happens on the front lines of the sea battle and what will happen when he and Moqorro try to use the horn?

I feel that Dany's POV will have little involvement in the battle, because if she does return riding on the back of Drogon at the head of an army of Dothraki cavalry, you can consider that battle over. The Yunkai, who will already be getting all they can handle with Vic, Barristan, and the Second Sons, will be fleeing as fast as they can at the mere sight of that. I am not sure that she returns that quickly as a quick return is out of character for the "plodding" mother of dragons. Or could GRRM have something totally different planned for her.

The Wall/The North

Jon/Ghost- the biggest cliffhanger in the series imho. Jon could either be healed by Mel, warg into ghost, both or something entirely different. Either way Jon will have multiple POVs in either wolf or human eyes.

Mel- healing Jon should be her top priority along with dealing with the aftermath of the attempted (successful)

assassination of Jon. We know she is starting to see that maybe she has possibly misread her visions. her story will have more depth than this but unfortunally i dont.

Bran- hard to tell with him, he could have an impact on every single noteworthy character with his expanding powers. does he travel the Lands of Always Winter to find more answers on the others and his powers or will this be done through "surrogates"

Davos- traveling to Skagos, as most believe, to find Rickon. Skagos is a mystic land and it will be very cool to see the old smuggler explore the remote location looking for the Wild Stark.

Theon/Asha- both will be together, but i think Theon will get more POVs, if he isnt executed by Stannis. Both will be our eyes and ears for the battle for Winterfell and if what is in the letter is actually true, a rouse by Ramsey, or speculated by others on these board a code for Jon.

The South

Sam- what information will he find at the citadel and how will he react to the news from the North. He will have to tread lightly because he is currently in a nest of vipers with enemies everywhere.

Cersei- has two interesting plot lines- her trial and the death of her uncle. Plus she will give us interesting insight on how Kings Landing is slowing transforming into a full blown theocracy.

JonCon- i am just wondering how long until his greyscale will become public knowlege. if so that could prove

unfortunate for Aegon as he will most likely lose his trusted warlord.

Jaime/Brienne- both are together and this could be done through just one of them or both. I feel it could be done just through Jaime, but depending on how things go if they return to UnCat, it could be interweaving.

Sansa- kind of hard for me to speculate on where the little dove's storyline goes at this point. it does seem she is in a semi safe situation, even with creepy Little Finger lingering about. in all i feel she is in a waiting pattern, and not as important as other POV.

Arya- saved her for last because i am not sure who her tutor will be but i do have some suspects.

Pate- many believe this to be Jaqen, and we know for a fact that it is a FM.

Daario- not sure he is a FM, but he does fit the description of the man Jaqen became after parting ways

with Arya.(thanks Bran Vras, your post on this was great)

Patchface- when Mel saw him in his fires, all she saw was death. it reminds me of when Arya was with the BwB and the Lady of the Leaves yells for Arya to go because all she sees is death in her. The BwB blow her off, but Arya eventually travels to the House of Black and White to train as an assassin.

[protar]

I'm not going to argue the merits of your suggestion, since that is a wholly separate issue, but I find it unlikely that the author will not rotate between Brienne and Jaime if they remain together. That has been his MO since the beginning. I don't see why he would change it now.

This has not been his MO so far. Excluding central locations such as KL, POV's rarely remain together for prolonged periods of time, so if they are it seems likely to me that one will be displaced. If Brienne and Jaime split or are only together for a shorter time period then sure I can see Martin dividing the chapters.

I hardly think past experience factors into the discussion right now because, presumably, these isolated POVs must get entangled with the rest of the story soon or, otherwise, the series will stretch in length considerably. Thus, Arya, Sansa, Davos and so forth must actually get into contact with other POVs and that is not going to be accomplished in a few chapters. Especially since they are so geographically isolated. As GRRM himself stated, ADwD is supposedly where the story is the most stretched out (i.e., 13 different concurrent storylines), now it has to start coming together. Only if he wants a repeat of the travel log he already did in ASoS. I think that unlikely. I can see Jaime's story having quite an impact even limited to three or four chapters (see Jon Connington).

Well you were the one that bought up narrative isolation in the first place else I wouldn't have mentioned it. You just seemed to be saying that characters in narrative isolation tended to get the most chapters which isn't necessarily true.

I think that a bad assumption to make given that his chapters have gone in the opposite direction since the first book. As I'm sure you've noticed, ASoS and ADwD are an equivalent length, yet, the latter has many fewer chapters (i.e., 73 to 82). That being the case, you should be estimating 75 chapters or so at best (including prologue and epilogue) -- 110 chapters is pure fantasy.

Yeah I was just stating the absolute maximum number of chapters that there could potentially be so I don't actually believe we'll get 110 chapters as great as that would be. However I do think the chapters will start to become shorter and more concise. AFFC and ADWD are as you say the transitional books, so things need to be slower paced and more long winded. So if Martin moves back to the older model with shorter, punchier chapters we could easily get a similar chapter count to SOS give or take a few.

So my new, more realistic projection for the chapters is as follows:

.Tyrion - 8 chapters

.Dany - 8 chapters

.Cersei - 7 chapters

.Sansa - 7 chapters

.Theon - 7 chapters

.Jaime - 6 chapters

.Samwell - 6 chapters

.Arianne - 6 chapters

.Melisandre - 5 chapters

.Arya - 5 chapters

.Jon - 4 chapters

.Tyene - 4 chapters

.Davos - 4 chapters

.Aeron - 3 chapters

.Victarion - 3 chapters

.Griff - 2 chapters

.Bran - 1 chapter: Would take the role of the epilogue (though hopefully Bran doesn't die.)

.Obara - prologue

Which is a fairly reasonable reasonable 87 chapters.

[MidnightsFury]

I really want Theon to survive the 7 books and for his brothers to forgive him and make him an official Stark, but thats just a fools wish.

Me too!! I have been waiting for him to release the truth about Bran and Rickon. I know it is eating him alive. He has no love for his father, his father gave him away. He wanted to love his father and he wanted his father to love him, but it didn't and couldn't happen. Theon is a Stark just like Snow is, even if not a a blood born one or a proper one. I don't think he enjoyed any of the things he had to do against the Starks. When he tried to keep Winterfell, I think killing and hurting the servants and staff there was more of venting/frustration than it was as an act of hatred towards Starks. I think,deep, deep down, Theon believes himself to be and wants to be a Stark. I also think he wants to do some sort of penance for the injuries he has caused "his" house. I'm not sure how it will all play out. I really wanted him to be reuinted with Robb before he was killed, but. Wishful thinking. It will be interesting to see what Stannis does with him.

[redxavier]

I hope the Mereen story won't require ~20 chapters. I can't imagine we would need 8 Tyrion chapters in addition to 8 Dany chapters and whatever Barristan and Victarion chapters to tell the story of the 'fire battle' and get them all moving west. Hopefully, GRRM will employ some editorial sense and rotate the POVs around as he used to do in his early books. Still wish some of this story had been in ADWD, as I think thematically what these characters are doing seems better suited to that book rather than one about the winds of Winter (e.g. Victarion's story to me parallels that of Quentyn's).

I'm not expecting to hear much from Samwell in this book, and I'd be surprised if Arya and Davos get more than 2-3 chapters each. I'm thinking (hoping) alot of the POVs will be pulling double duty and sharing the story for their location, so Griff and Arianne's POVs will converge, Theon and Asha (then Davos) will converge, and Tyrion, Victarion and Dany will converge.

Leaving Cersei to cover KL in about 5 chapters, Sansa to cover the Vale with about 3 chapters, Aeron to cover the Iron Islands in about 2 chapters (I'm getting a bit sick of the prominence of these ironborn POVs, they almost have more than the Starks!), and about 3 or 4 chapters from Melisandre covering events at the Wall in the aftermath of Jon's 'death'.

[protar]

I hope the Mereen story won't require ~20 chapters. I can't imagine we would need 8 Tyrion chapters in addition to 8 Dany chapters and whatever Barristan and Victarion chapters to tell the story of the 'fire battle' and get them all moving west. Hopefully, GRRM will employ some editorial sense and rotate the POVs around as he used to do in his early books. Still wish some of this story had been in ADWD, as I think thematically what these characters are doing seems better suited to that book rather than one about the winds of Winter (e.g. Victarion's story to me parallels that of Quentyn's).

I'm not expecting to hear much from Samwell in this book, and I'd be surprised if Arya and Davos get more than 2-3 chapters each. I'm thinking (hoping) alot of the POVs will be pulling double duty and sharing the story for their location, so Griff and Arianne's POVs will converge, Theon and Asha (then Davos) will converge, and Tyrion, Victarion and Dany will converge.

Leaving Cersei to cover KL in about 5 chapters, Sansa to cover the Vale with about 3 chapters, Aeron to cover the Iron Islands in about 2 chapters (I'm getting a bit sick of the prominence of these ironborn POVs, they almost have more than the Starks!), and about 3 or 4 chapters from Melisandre covering events at the Wall in the aftermath of Jon's 'death'.

Well as to the battle of fire that would only take up the first 300/400 pages, so no it wouldn't take 8 Dany and 8 Tyrion chapters to complete it. I'm thinking:

Prelude to battle:

. 3 Tyrion chapters

. 3 Dany chapters

. 1 Victarion chapter

The Battle:

.2 Tyrion chapters

. 2 Victarion chapters

. 1 Dany chapter

Immediate aftermath:

. 1 Dany chapter

. 1 Tyrion chapter

Journey across Essos:

. 2 Tyrion chapters

. 3 Dany chapters

So about 14 chapters in Meereen before they get going to Westeros, squished into the first half of the book, with the remaining 5 or 6 chapters being enough to get them to Pentos I would think, and ready to set sail across the narrow sea towards the start of Book 7.