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Tag: george rr martin

  • Game of Thrones Sequel Excerpt Released [Spoilers … Kind of]

    Game of Thrones is one of the most eagerly-awaited series ever. It has joined the ranks of those shows about which friends fight and avoid each other lest they hear spoilers.

    When novelist George R.R. Martin released an excerpt from his upcoming book The Winds of Winter this week, fans were all a-twitter. Finally they were going to get a glimpse of what is in store for the lands of Westeros and their favorite characters.

    But Game of Thrones fans are divided into two camps: those who have read the books, and those who have not. Those who have not read the books and are only as informed as the latest episode of the HBO series tend to avoid the book-readers. Fortunately, most of the book-readers are also cultured enough to not spoil things for the TV-watchers.

    Not so George R.R. Martin. And this is the trouble with hearing anything at all about the upcoming books. It;’s the little passages that ruin it for you.

    Witness …

    She was reading her little lord a tale of the Winged Knight when Mya Stone came knocking on the door of his bedchamber, clad in boots and riding leathers and smelling strongly of the stable. Mya had straw in her hair and a scowl on her face. That scowl comes of having Mychel Redfort near, Alayne knew.

    The above-referenced “Alayne” is none other than Sansa Stark. So we know she lives, no matter what they throw at her in the HBO series.

    No man can wed me so long as my dwarf husband still lives somewhere in this world. Queen Cersei had collected the head of a dozen dwarfs, Petyr claimed, but none were Tyrion’s.

    Three names are mentioned in this excerpt: Queen Cersei (interestingly called only “queen” and not “Queen Regent”), Petyr (Baelish0, and Tyrion (Lannister). So we can ease our minds about any of those people dying in the HBO series between now and then.

  • Game of Thrones News: Martin Needs To Get Writing

    Writers must write.

    Author and fantasy mastermind George R.R. Martin has decided to dramatically decrease his involvement in the next season of HBO’s Game of Thrones in order to write the next book of his A Song of Ice and Fire series.

    Martin typically serves as executive producer and consultant for the television show. Additionally, the author typically writes one episode every season. However, Martin announced at Comic-Con this past weekend that he needs to concentrate on finishing the next book of the series. “I’m not actually writing an episode for season five,” Martin said. “I have this book I have to finish.”

    “This book” would be the sixth book in the series, its title is The Winds of Winter. The book will serve as the second to last in the A Song of Ice and Fire series, which of course is the source material for the television show. Fans have recently expressed concern that Martin would not finish the books in time.

    The upcoming season five, which is expected to premiere on HBO sometime in 2015, will adapt from Martin’s books A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons (the fourth and fifth novels.) So of course, in order for the show to have a season six, Martin needs to finish The Winds of Winter.

    The 65-year-old author is committed. He is not only giving up writing his one episode for next season, but he also plans to cut his travel to the Game of Thrones set, “I might make it over there early next year, but I’ve got to finish the book…. So I’m making the trips I’m already obligated to make, but I’m not adding any new trips at this time. So I don’t think I’m going to do a set visit this year, sadly.”

    He’s also drastically cutting down his involvement with the process of making the television series, “I’ve been doing a lot of other stuff. In the earlier seasons I was much more involved with casting. I would review tapes and comment, but that’s a time-consuming process. And at this point, we’re five seasons in, we have the best casting director in the business in Nina Gold. David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss] have been running the show, and it’s a well-oiled machine, so it really doesn’t need me down there with the oil can squeaking at the wheels.”

    Here’s hoping that Martin doesn’t get writer’s block.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Game of Thrones New Chapter Released

    Game of Thrones creator, George R.R. Martin, has thrown red meat to the GoT faithful by releasing an excerpt from his upcoming sixth Game of Thrones installment The Winds of Winter.

    The chapter was posted on Martin’s website and is called “Mercy”. The chapter begins:

    She woke with a gasp, not knowing who she was, or where.

    The smell of blood was heavy in her nostrils… or was that her nightmare, lingering? She had dreamed of wolves again, of running through some dark pine forest with a great pack at her hells, hard on the scent of prey.

    Martin has called the chapter an “old” passage. “But not one I’ve published or posted before, and I don’t even think I’ve read it at a con.”

    Earlier this year, Martin released an excerpt that featured Tyrion Lannister. But this newest snip is vintage Martin, with the wordcraft that fans have come to expect.

    The mists seemed to part before her and close up again as she passed. The cobblestones were wet and slick under her feet. She heard a cat yowl plaintively. Braavos was a good city for cats, and they roamed everywhere, especially at night. In the fog all cats are grey, Mercy thought. In the fog all men are killers.

    And, not to reveal more than one might want to know here, but there is this jewel.

    Raff the Sweetling looked up sharply as the long thin blade came sliding from her sleeve. She slipped it through his throat beneath the chin, twisted, and ripped it back out sideways with a single smooth slash. A fine red rain followed, and in his eyes the light went out.

    “Valar morghulis,” Arya whispered, but Raff was dead and did not hear.

    HBO’s Game of Thrones returns on April 6.

    Image via George Martin’s Blog

  • Stevie Nicks Would Love to Write Music for Game of Thrones

    In a recent interview with the UK’s Radio Times, singer-songwriter Stevie Nicks said she’d love to write some music for HBO’s award-winning Game of Thrones series.

    Nicks told Craig McLean that watching the series helped her through a particularly difficult time in her life. Nicks’ mother died in December 2011 and not long after, Nicks came down with pneumonia.

    “I didn’t leave the house for almost five months … with my pneumonia and my mother’s death I watched the entire first season of Game of Thrones. That certainly took my mind off everything,” Nicks said.

    The show is adapted from George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy novel series A Song of Ice and Fire. The series currently consists of five books, the first of which is titled Game of Thrones.

    Season Four premieres on April 6, and the television series is quickly catching up to the novels. Martin says he feels the pressure to finish the sixth novel Winds of Winter.

    “It is great that so many people are eager for the next book and certainly these are the people who are paying my bills and allowing me to have a house across the street from my other house. But at the same time, sometimes I just wish they would stop pressuring me about it. It will be done when it’s done. I’m working on it. I don’t know what else I can say: I’m a slow writer, I’ve always been a slow writer, and these are gigantic books.”

    The skill it takes to create the story behind the HBO series isn’t lost on Nicks:

    ” … how in the world does somebody come up with these 15 or so characters and then everything that’s wrapped around each one of the 15 characters? It blows my mind that he’s able to create this vast, interlinked world. As a songwriter I write little movies. But I can’t imagine sitting down and writing even one small book, a novel. We each have our thing that we’re really good at.”

    Nicks revealed that she’s written a poem for each Game of Thrones character, including her current favorite Khaleesi, who is played by British actress Emilia Clarke.

    In the meantime, Nicks is keeping busy with several projects. She spent much of 2013 touring with Fleetwood Mac, released a documentary DVD titled In Your Dreams, and guest starred in Season Three of American Horror Story: Coven.

    Post by Stevie Nicks.

    Post by Stevie Nicks.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Game of Thrones: Martin Shows Real Iron Throne

    The man behind the books behind the HBO hit series “Game of Thrones”, George R.R. Martin, has pulled back the curtain just a tiny bit on what goes on in his head while writing those books.

    In a recent blog post entitled “The Real Iron Throne”, Martin explains what the famed Iron Throne in the stories actually looks like. The throne, which is a set piece familiar to fans of Martin’s stories, whether the HBO televised versions or the books, is said to be built from the swords of conquered armies. For Martin, seeing something that had heretofore existed only in his mind now being built “in real life”, even just for a soundstage, was conflicting.

    When I write about the Iron Throne, I SEE it in my head… and I try to describe it as best I can. Not being a blacksmith or an ironmonger, however, I hammer it together with words, striving to make all of you, my readers, see what I see.

    Most of the time that works… though, the picture in the reader’s head and the picture in the writer’s head do not always line up perfectly. With the Iron Throne, however, the process has been particularly frustrating. A dozen different artists have done versions of the Iron Throne over the years. Some have been very striking, some less so, but none of them have ever been quite RIGHT. Their versions never quite matched what I saw in my mind’s eye.

    Martin goes on to talk about the set pieces built for the HBO series. He says their throne is iconic, and that it will likely be the “official” look for the throne from now on. But, it is necessarily still not quite right.

    It’s not the Iron Throne I see when I’m working on THE WINDS OF WINTER. It’s not the Iron Throne I want my readers to see. The way the throne is described in the books… HUGE, hulking, black and twisted, with the steep iron stairs in front, the high seat from which the king looks DOWN on everyone in the court… my throne is a hunched beast looming over the throne room, ugly and assymetric…

    The HBO throne is none of those things. It’s big, yes, but not nearly as big as the one described in the novels. And for good reason. We have a huge throne room set in Belfast, but not nearly huge enough to hold the Iron Throne as I painted it. For that we’d need something much bigger, more like the interior of St. Paul’s Cathedral or Westminster Abbey, and no set has that much room. The Book Version of the Iron Throne would not even fit through the doors of the Paint Hall.

    So what does the Real Iron Throne look like, you ask? Glad you asked. It looks kind of like this:

    (image)

  • George R.R. Martin Watches Red Wedding Reaction Vids, Admires His Handiwork

    George R.R. Martin, writer of the A Song of Ice and Fire series and the man responsible for much of the narrative structure behind HBO’s hit series Game of Thrones, knows he just ripped your heart out. Yeah, he knows.

    Here’s Martin on Conan, watching a compilation of YouTube reaction videos to the Red Wedding scene – which he wrote over 13 years ago and which played out on last Sunday’s Game of Thrones. If you haven’t seen the episode, then I won’t spoil it. If you have, well, then you know what I’m talking about.

    You evil, brilliant little man.