I follow George Martin on LiveJournal. I thrilled to see the amazing actors that will perform in "A Game of Thrones." (Peter Dinklage!!!!) I have watched the trailers and am anxious to see the finished product in hopes that it will be as great as it appears. I even follow A Game of Thrones on twitter.
Sometimes I see responses to that twitter account by other followers and it reminds me, I'm just not into the story as I once was.
Friends introduced me to the series when A FEAST FOR CROWS first came out, and I bounced on it. I read all four books in a row and was just as enthralled as they were. But now? By the time A DANCE WITH DRAGONS releases, it will have been a minimum of six years since CROWS came out. I say minimum because there's no guarantee the book will actually release in 2011. It was supposed to release every September for the last three years.
There's a lot of "don't judge until you've been there" about this whole thing. How could anyone understand what it takes to...blah blah blah. It's an invitation for fate to smote me with their lightning bolt of humility, but at the moment, I really don't care. Six years for a novel that doesn't even advance the plot from where the previous book ended. It simply parallels it.
I fully expect this series to go unfinished or to follow THE WHEEL OF TIME and require a different author to finish it. This also influences my interest in the TV show. If it's a rave success and they cover a book per season, and (assuming DANCE comes out this year), the next book won't be released by the time the series has run its course.
Two years used to be a standard for fantasy. When I was growing up, an author had two years to put out the next installment of a series. Somewhere in the nineties that started to balloon. In the aughts, turn around time for the major names has become ridiculous. Of the major best sellers, only Williams and Sanderson seem capable of producing content on any type of schedule.
As a fan, this is incredibly frustrating. As an aspiring author, I cannot fathom how a person is managing their time if they write full time and cannot produce a finished book in over half a decade.
I list Martin and his series on my website as a favorite. And he is and it is, but the more time goes by the more this changes. I can't really call myself a fan of a series if the series no longer exists, can I?
What about you? What are your thoughts?
Sometimes I see responses to that twitter account by other followers and it reminds me, I'm just not into the story as I once was.
Friends introduced me to the series when A FEAST FOR CROWS first came out, and I bounced on it. I read all four books in a row and was just as enthralled as they were. But now? By the time A DANCE WITH DRAGONS releases, it will have been a minimum of six years since CROWS came out. I say minimum because there's no guarantee the book will actually release in 2011. It was supposed to release every September for the last three years.
There's a lot of "don't judge until you've been there" about this whole thing. How could anyone understand what it takes to...blah blah blah. It's an invitation for fate to smote me with their lightning bolt of humility, but at the moment, I really don't care. Six years for a novel that doesn't even advance the plot from where the previous book ended. It simply parallels it.
I fully expect this series to go unfinished or to follow THE WHEEL OF TIME and require a different author to finish it. This also influences my interest in the TV show. If it's a rave success and they cover a book per season, and (assuming DANCE comes out this year), the next book won't be released by the time the series has run its course.
Two years used to be a standard for fantasy. When I was growing up, an author had two years to put out the next installment of a series. Somewhere in the nineties that started to balloon. In the aughts, turn around time for the major names has become ridiculous. Of the major best sellers, only Williams and Sanderson seem capable of producing content on any type of schedule.
As a fan, this is incredibly frustrating. As an aspiring author, I cannot fathom how a person is managing their time if they write full time and cannot produce a finished book in over half a decade.
I list Martin and his series on my website as a favorite. And he is and it is, but the more time goes by the more this changes. I can't really call myself a fan of a series if the series no longer exists, can I?
What about you? What are your thoughts?