“Look, I have always had problems with deadlines.”
George R.R. Martin
The quote above could very well be the understatement of the century. A Dance with Dragons, the 5th installment in George R.R. Martin’s fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, was published in July 2011. For those not counting, that was 11 years ago. Since then, fans have eagerly awaited the 6th book in the series, The Winds of Winter.
We did get to wet our beaks with the television phenomenon known as Game of Thrones which aired just before Dance was published in April 2011. Indeed, we thought, Winds would be out before the HBO series caught up. Oh, how wrong we were.
Since Dance was published, Game of Thrones ran for eight years and ended in 2019 (with multiple seasons not sourced from any published book), three novellas and two reference books were published, and a new HBO series, House of the Dragon premiered, but no Winds of Winter.
Martin has been asked numerous times over the past decade when Winds would be released. His answers have been less than honest; some would call them lies. Like the thousand blades of Aegon’s enemies, a story we agree to tell each other over and over until we forget that it’s a lie. Here’s every time George R.R. Martin has lied about the Winds of Winter release date.
| June 2010 | The first mention Martin makes of Winds of Winter was in his Livejournal while working on Dance. “And hey, it’s even good news for Winds of Winter, since I now have four chapters done for that one.” |
| April 2011 | After publishing Dance, Martin tells The Guardian, “Hopefully, the last two books will go a little quicker than this one has, but that doesn’t mean they’re going to be quick. Realistically, it’s going to take me three years to finish the next one at a good pace.” |
| December 2011 | First sample chapter on Martin’s Livejournal of Winds. “I’ve just replaced the (long published) sample chapters from a Dance with Dragons on my website with an unpublished sample chapter from the Winds of Winter.” |
| April 2012 | In an interview with SmarterTravel, “There will be another chapter in the paperback of A Dance with Dragons when that comes out in the summer. So, you’ll get two free chapters. After that, it’s going to be a while.” |
| October 2012 | Martin tells Adria’s News that he has completed 400 pages of Winds, but “the sixth volume won’t be released in 2012 or in 2013. I really look forward to publishing it in 2014, but I am really bad for predictions; you may know it.” |
| May 2013 | In an interview with a Brazilian Newspaper, O Globo, Martin says, “Definitely not ready this year, maybe next.” |
| April 2015 | When asked by Entertainment Weekly about Winds releasing before season 6 of Games, Martin says it “has been important to me all along” and “I wish it was out now. Maybe I’m being overly optimistic about how quickly I can finish.” |
| May 2016 | Martin releases another sample chapter on his Livejournal. |
| January 2017 | Martin’s Livejournal states, “I think it will be out this year. (But hey, I thought the same thing last year).” |
| July 2017 | Another Livejournal post, “Whether WINDS or the first volume of Fire and Blood will be the first to hit the bookstores is hard to say at this juncture, but I do think you will have a Westeros book from me in 2018.” |
| April 2018 | Livejournal becomes Not a Blog, but still, no Winds as Martin says, “No, winter is not coming… not in 2018, at least. You’re going to have to keep waiting for the Winds of Winter.” |
| May 2019 | Actor Ian McElhinney sparks a rumor at Epic Con by saying Martin has already finished Winds. Martin claps back in his Not a Blog with, “I will, however, say for the record—no, The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring are not finished.” and “Why would I sit for years on completed novels?” |
| May 2019 | Speaking on his Not a Blog about his upcoming appearance at Worldcon in New Zealand, Martin boldly states, “But I tell you this — if I don’t have THE WINDS OF WINTER in hand when I arrive in New Zealand for Worldcon, you have here my formal written permission to imprison me in a small cabin on White Island, overlooking that lake of sulfuric acid, until I’m done.” |
| October 2019 | Martin boldly blogs, “But… let me make this perfectly clear… I am not taking on any scripts until I have finished and delivered Winds of Winter. Winter is still coming, and WINDS remains my priority, as much as I’d love to write an episode of House. |
| April 2020 | As Covid takes hold, Martin gives hope that quarantine might make it happen when he blogged, “If there is a silver lining in these clouds, this will give me more time to finish WINDS OF WINTER. I continue to write every day, up here in my mountain fastness.” |
| June 2020 | More blogged quarantine news and hopeful progress. “If nothing else, the enforced isolation has helped me write. I am spending long hours every day on the Winds of Winter, and making steady progress.” |
| February 2021 | Another blog update. All that covid quarantine and lots of pages, but no book. “I wrote hundreds and hundreds of pages of the Winds of Winter in 2020. The best year I’ve had on WOW since I began it.” |
| March 2022 | The last update on Martin’s blog on Winds provides no hope of ever seeing this book. “Yes, of course I am still working on the Winds of Winter. I have stated that a hundred times in a hundred venues, having to restate it endlessly is just wearisome. I made a lot of progress on WINDS in 2020, and less in 2021.” |
| August 2022 | House of the Dragon debuts on HBO. |
Needless to say, Martin is far from reliable when it comes to if and when Winds will ever come out. It is difficult for any observer not to think that Winds keeps getting put on the back burner when all this other content has been created, and Martin’s involvement in creating another show is so much deeper than it was with Game of Thrones.
Does New Zealand require building permits for cabins on White Island?
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