As pointed out on rasfw

[james_davis_nicoll]

The perils and pleasures of long-running fantasy series

Also as pointed out on rasfw: Poor Gerrold; his grand unfinished series has pretty fallen off people's radar.

Comments

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

Interestingly, Martin's issue about the delays to A Dance with Dragons was, at least in my opinion, due entirely to the fact that he did break a promise--the one he made in the afterword to A Feast for Crows.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

It's not as if he said "HAHAHA YOU FOOLS", though. He was quite open, in the years that followed, about why he was having problems and why the book had turned out -- as much to his own surprise as to the fans' -- to be much more difficult to write than he expected.

People, and that essayist in particular, are acting as if the writers deliberately choose to break some imaginary compact.

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

Maybe; I for one didn't really hear for a long time that, or why, he was having problems. Big difference between what's in interviews or the author's blog, and then what's on the page.

I don't think it was a deliberate choice, but I do think that there was a broken promise. Minor, forgivable, but a lot of the commentary from the other side has been to the tune of "he doesn't owe you anything," to which my answer remains "he did make us a promise..."

[seth ellis (from livejournal.com)]

I haven't read the afterword to A Feast Of Crows. Is it really a broken promise, or more of a mistaken estimate?

I've gotten to the point that even standalone novels over 400 pages mostly irritate me. I read books in series, but multi-volume plots are just not for me these days. So the entitlement on display in the AV Club comments especially, where people feel justified in resentfully speculating on another person's death, is a long way from something I can sympathize with. If you embark on a long series, you just naturally run the risk of not finishing for any number of reasons, whether you're writing it or reading it. It stands to reason to be aware of that going in.

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

*shrug* It certainly felt like a broken promise, especially since it was an apologia for how Feast was half a book. He does say "I devoutly hope," but...

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Even short series: Robert Stallman suffered author existance failure five months after his first novel was published, Orphan, was published. Despite his death, all three volumes of the Book of the Beast did see print. Similarly, Richard C. Meredith died before the publication of the final Timeliners book (although it too saw print).

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

If Stallman is an existence failure, does that make A Dance With Dragons an existence proof?

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

He was an example of *author* existance failure and as his next two books proved, the author can be dead for some time before new books stop appearing. Heck, Mark Twain still manages to get new material out from time to time.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

The rumors of his death really were....?

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

At one point, Louisa May Alcott and I had the same agent, and let me tell you who got faster service...

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

::applause::

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

[List of characters] will be along next year (I devoutly hope) in A Dance With Dragons, which will focus on events along the Wall and across the sea, just as the present book focused on King's Landing.
George R. R. Martin
June 2005

Sounds like a mistaken estimate to me. Don't get me wrong, a six-year gap when you were expecting one year is frustrating as Hell. But I don't perceive "I devoutly hope" as in the same league as "To love and to cherish, until death do us part."

[seth ellis (from livejournal.com)]

Yeah, that sounds like a mistaken estimate to me too. In fact, it sounds like "I am totally intending to almost certainly finish by a nearly determined date at some point, God willing," which is a mental state that artists working to their own deadlines probably recognize.

Granted, I've never been five years off an estimate, but my projects are usually a lot smaller than Martin's.

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

I will start moaning about Game of Thrones delays the week after I get The Universal Pantograph in my in-box (considers my James is a dumbass Panshin story but then saves it for another occasion.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

Damn, I wish I could read that book. It's very high up on my list, together with the third Naga Teot (Bloodstorm) book.

[agharta75.livejournal.com]

I'm too busy with "The Last Dangerous Visions" to get to either of them.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

Haven't most of those stories leaked out by now? I think the Cordwainer Smith one has. Or am I conflating two things?

[le-trombone.livejournal.com]

"Most" is an over-estimate, but a significant number of them have seen print.

[mme-hardy.livejournal.com]

Damn. There are a lot of fine authors still buried there.

[le-trombone.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Without naming names, one of the people involved in the TLDV Bibliography list happened to meet one of the authors over a decade ago, and asked her (I'm willing to mention gender) if she had plans for her story outside of TLDV.

Reading between the diplomatic lines, he believes that she will start submitting the story the week after H.E.'s obituary runs. I don't know if he's still as famously litigious as his reputation has it, but I do wonder if some of the no-shows are because the authors just don't want to bother when they can just write a different short story.

[connactic.livejournal.com]

I saw a GRRM interview. One of the questions was basically "have you ever wrote anything you later regretted?" I don't know what the questioner was interested in, but GRRM's answer was giving a time estimate on ADWD :)