Winds of Winter Release Date News: Game of Thrones Season 6 Premiere to Go Ahead Before Novel Launch, Confirms George RR Martin
In a New Year's Day blog post that crushed the hearts of many "A Song of Ice and Fire" fans, "Game of Thrones" author George R.R. Martin revealed that "The Winds of Winter," the sixth novel in the epic fantasy novel series on which HBO's top-rated TV show is based, will not be published before the sixth season of "Thrones" premieres in April.
"You wanted an update. Here's the update. You won't like it," Martin began, before announcing, "'The Winds Of Winter' is not finished."
The 67-year-old novelist, who also serves as co-executive producer on "Game of Thrones," expressed his sadness and disappointment, saying, "Believe me, it gave me no pleasure to type those words." The author went on to express his regret over letting his editors, publishers, agents, and fans down and revealed that he had been looking forward to completing the book and delivering it for publication before 2015 came to a close.
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Martin also opened up about missing the first deadline for the novel, which was on Halloween 2015, and said that he had been "immensely relieved" when the deadline was moved to the end of the year. He said that he had "always had problems with deadlines" but that he was not making excuses nor blaming anyone for the delay of the novel's publication.
Martin also revealed that there are still a lot of pages and chapters to write for "Winds of Winter," as well as plenty of rewriting, polishing, and restructuring of what has already been written.
The author, who refused to set another deadline for the book said, "I am going back to my stance from last March, before all this." He added: "It will be done when it's done. And it will be as good as I can possibly make it."
In his blog post, Martin also addressed the issue of whether or not seeing the sixth season of HBO's "Game of Thrones" will ruin "The Winds of Winter" and the seventh novel in the "A Song of Ice and Fire" series for readers of the forthcoming installments.
The acclaimed novelist said that he read Andy Weir's "The Martian" before seeing the 2015 film adaptation, and saw BBC One's "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell" before reading the Susanna Clarke novel on which it was based.
"In both cases, I loved the book and I loved the adaptation," Martin reported, adding, "It does not need to be one or the other." "You might prefer one over the other, but you can still enjoy the hell out of both."
"Game of Thrones" Season 6 premieres in April on HBO.
