Less than 10 hours ago, a good-sized crowd was lined up outside Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing for the midnight release of A Dance with Dragons, the long-awaited fifth book in George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series. (Here’s a picture of the line when I got there; it eventually got to be about twice as long.) I love midnight book openings—it’s rare and awesome to see people who’re so excited about books they’re willing to forgo sleep in order to get/read one—and moreover, A Dance with Dragons feels like a real book, big and heavy and with maps on the endpapers and snazzy foil embossing on the cover. I might’ve spent some time just looking at it before I passed out last night.
BUT ANYWAY. That was early this morning, and already there’s news about the rest of A Song of Ice and Fire—namely, that Martin thinks his epic series might stretch to eight books instead of its projected seven. He tells The Atlantic:
Do you still think you’ll be able to wrap everything up in the remaining two books?
I certainly hope so! That’s my plan, that’s my intent, that’s what I’m going to try to do. But at this point I know better than to promise anything and write it out in blood.I think some fans are hoping we’ll end up with eight books.
Well, it’s grown in the past—I’m not going to say those fans are wrong. When I started out, it was a trilogy. Back in 1994 when I sold this, it was going to be A Game of Thrones, A Dance with Dragons, The Winds of Winter—three books. But that scheme went out the window before I’d even finished the first book. I think it was Tolkien who said when he was writing The Lord of the Rings, “The tale grew in the telling.”Some who follow your work have voiced the idea that you’ve written yourself into a corner—that you’ve started so many narrative threads, and created so many hundreds of characters that it’s become overwhelming to reconcile. You’ve even hinted as much on your blog . If that’s the case, will you let certain story lines ebb, or do you feel obligated to see them all through?
There’s no doubt that I’ve wrestled with this book and the complexity and size of the series, and that may be one reason why my writing has slowed down. But my intent right from the beginning was to do something huge and epic, with a cast of thousands and many different settings….Maybe I did make it too big two books ago. But I’ve thrown the balls in the air and I feel obligated to keep on juggling them as best I can. You can’t just forget about some of the balls, you have to deal with the plot threads that you’ve introduced. If I can pull it all off the way I want hopefully it will be great. And if I don’t, I’m sure the world will let me know.
I’m really hoping book eight is called A Juggling of Thrones or A Panic of Dragons or A War of Winterfell. Or Sansa Dies.
