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A Song of Ice and Fire / Other Topics / Too Many Books?

Next 20 Messages

Susan
User ID: 7615523 Mar 26th 4:01 PM
I'm worried by the news that the series is now going to fill 6 books. I got really bored with that other infamous long series, and had difficulty keeping track of all the characters and events. I'm afraid George R.R. Martin is going to
lose control of his material, and pad it out to fill all these volumes. It's certainly a way to make more money, now that the first volume is a success, but I'm not sure it will make for good books or engaging reading. I stopped reading the Robert Jordan series with the third book. I don't want that to happen for me with this series, but I am concerned that the quality will drop as GRRM
has to fill more and more pages. What do others think about this?

Fourthman
User ID: 0923684 Mar 26th 4:19 PM
1.) Don't look a gift horse in the mouth.
2.) Adress the quality when it suffers. As far as I can tell, Martin isn't Jordan. WoT was RJ's first novel and series, right? GRRM is a seasoned writer with the experience of a 15 book series under his belt. Yes it had it's slow moments, but I never lost interest.
3.) Six books isn't that long, not at the rate most of us are reading GRRM.
4.) Are you confused by any of the characters yet?
5.) Do you think a(n unlikely) drop in quality in the 3rd book will be enough to make you stop reading?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Mar 26th 4:21 PM
I'm not concerned. Martin has too-often shown himself to be a meticulous craftsman in the past, something which I cannot really say for Robert Jordan prior to his WoT series.

I trust that, if he feels the various sub-plots can't just be handled lightly and really need to be drawn forward into some limelight, he does it knowing that doing so will please his audience.

It may turn out this trust is wrong, but until that happens I'm fully supportive. I've tried to second guess the author, and it seems to me that one can very well fill six books with the reams of potential stories he seems to have.

Certainly he has enough material for five. Maybe the sixth will be a stretch, but a lot of things can happen in the intervening three books to make that fit.

labor Mar 26th 6:16 PM
Susan, Jordan's books N� 4,5 and 6 are IMO much better than N�2 and 3, so you stopped too early. Ergo, I don't have any aprehension about Martin who is a much more experienced writer, as long as he stays by six and not a book further.

Revanshe
User ID: 1404584 Mar 26th 8:06 PM
Well, I think One and Two were Jordan's best, and three and four were good reads. Couldnt read after five.

Although Martin may pull a Jordan, I doubt it...he seemed quite firm on the stance that it would not go past 6 books...thus, I think he has things much better planned than Jordan did.

haaruk Mar 26th 8:29 PM
I thought I recognized some artificially extended story lines in a ACOK. It was not as tightly knit as a game of thrones. Hopefully it is not a harbinger of things to come.

Ser Gary
User ID: 9279843 Mar 27th 2:07 PM
I have no doubt Martin will maintain the quality of this series. He has a clear vision about where the story should go, and it's not open ended. I think the only reason he extended to six books was so that he could do further justice to the story as a whole. Incidentally, I thought both AGOT and ACOK were fantastic reads....definitely among the best books I have ever read. If subsequent books are of that same level of quality, I have no problem with however many books it takes to tell the complete story.

Zer0hour
User ID: 9356783 Mar 27th 3:20 PM
Martin definately has a plan and NEEDS to fill six books. Let's look at the Titles:

1)A Game of Thrones -- Different houses play under the king's feet to gain control of the realm.

2)A Clash of Kings -- Four kings claim the throne and "clash" against each other.

*3)A Storm of Swords -- The Houses engage in bloody battle that began at the end of A Clash of Kings.

*4)A Dance with Dragons -- Daenerys triumphant return with her dragons (if you've read around, you know that I think there are many other dragons).

*5)The Winds of Winter -- One of three things: 1.The people of the Westeros try to recover from the battles in ASoS and ADwD and try to survive the winter; or 2.The Others sweep down upon the the Seven Kingdoms using the "Winds of Winter" to their advantage; or 3.All of the Above.

*6)A Time for Wolves -- The Starks triumphant (I love that word) return to glory, setting the lands of the Seven Kingdoms back to order.

*Very rough yet educated predictions.

Min
User ID: 9433023 Apr 1st 4:28 PM
Right about Jordan. But what is right about Jordan need not be right about GRRM. Jordan seems to write as it comes to him. I still liked the fifth book, but then he completely lost the thread.
But GRRM has not only finished several series. He also produced TV series. And, believe me, nothing is as good a treining for keeping a tight plot than that is!
I also believe that Martin already knows what he will write about in the following books. And these charcters will definitely never loose life and blood and colour.
So do not fear.

maerith Apr 13th 1:55 PM
>And these charcters will definitely >never loose life and blood and colour.

Well, we know which signs to look out for (sniff, braid-tug...good that Dany's hair is short :)

Curious Reader
User ID: 1662364 Apr 14th 12:55 PM
I think Haaruk's right. There seemed to be some strain to extend the storyline in the second book. I was really disappointed when I heard the series would extend to six--it seems unnecessary. Unlike TV series, which move toward a single resolution at the end of each episode (except in the rare case of two-parters), these books are moving toward a single resolution at the end of the series: who's going to take the throne and/or expel the Others. I don't want to have to wait four more books to find out!

Omer
User ID: 0485244 Jun 8th 5:58 PM
I think Martin, unlike Jordan, is a good writer. I think he's a great writer. I've been reading his stuff for only 3 months, and already he's one of my favorite writers. Unlike Jordan, he CAN write. Just look at the stories in Legends - Martin's tale is shorter then Jordan's ( although not by much) and is nothing short of brilliant! Jordan drags for 60 pages wbefore giving us some relative exitment.

I liked WoT 6, but A crown of sword was SO bad that I'm stopping to uy them. If my friends will buy them, I'll take a look. But I'm not gonna give this guy a reward for destroying half of the rain forests.

I have complete confidence in Martin's ability and good senses to give us high quality entertainment till the year 2006(?). Think about it as something like the Star Trek or James Bond movies, only Martin's work is LIGHT YEARS better!

Ser Gary
User ID: 9279843 Jun 8th 6:04 PM
Omer, if you want to read more comments about WOT, we have a topic to that effect floating around here somewhere.

haaruk Jun 14th 10:33 AM
I am quite worried about the extension of the series to six books. It is because I so admired the effort that is a " A GAME OF THRONES ". I even debated, in a formal venue, the strength of Martin's "minor" characters when compared to those of Dicken's and Tolstoy. What a stimulating battle that was and I did very well.

The technical precision necessary to make midstream corrections in a series can lead to a meandering and sloppy performance. I hope it does not happen to Martin's masterpiece.

Ser Gary
User ID: 8068153 Jun 14th 1:59 PM
I agree with you, Haaruk. But Martin extended to six books early in the process when he decided he could not do justice to the telling of the story in four. I don't think it will now extend from six. Quality is always a concern, but I don't think GRRM will compromise quality for anything.

WOT remains open-ended. To the best of my knowledge, RJ has not come forward with a formal announcement that the story has, say, only 38 books left to go!

KAH
User ID: 9209903 Jun 14th 2:13 PM
I think RJ said something to the effect of 'being more than half-way through' after finishing book 7.

Whether this should be taken seriously, I'll leave as a mental exersice for the reader - while asking said reader to keep in mind the 'progress' of the first 200 pages of PoD.

Doc
User ID: 0770504 Aug 18th 10:38 PM
I'm afraid I'm an ignorant back-water farmboy who's never read any of RJ's works.
However.
I must concur with what was said earlier, about ACoK not being as tightly nor neatly woven as AGoT. If nothing else, ACoK, IMHO, jumped around a little too fast and hard. In Thrones, everything was deliberate, timed, and effective. In Clash, everything more or less entered a melee and may the reader try and sort it out ...

Jeff
User ID: 0227464 Aug 19th 8:38 AM
It seems to me like GRRM is really setting himself up to write 2 distinct trilogies. We're going to see resolution of some major issues at the end of ASOS, if only to set the stage for the five year gap. That's going to force him to write a pretty tight book. The second trilogy seems set to focus on the events of winter, and I think three books seems appropriate for that story as well.

Jordan's problem is that he set us up way back in book 1 with the climactic battle that was supposed to occur between the Dragon Reborn and the ubiquitous Dark Lord. So, we knew that we were heading to that very distinct goal very early on and don't appear to be any closer. GRRM, on the other hand, has not mapped out any concrete prophecies or set any clear final "goal" for the series, so measuring "progress" is sort of meaningless.

agarrett
User ID: 9377263 Sep 2nd 1:05 AM
Well, no, it's not meaningless, just more difficult...

Now, let me start by saying that I have just finished Clash of Kings, and found it an excellent book. This series is definately topping my list of favorite fantasy books. However, I also found Kings to suffer a bit in comparison to Thrones.

Why? Because things did not change as much. The situation in Kings was essentially static, as opposed to the very dynamic environment we had in Thrones. Thrones started with a kingdom in (relative) peace, with Eddard Stark taking over as a high officer of the king. By the time it ended, both Eddard and the king were dead, and the kingdom was split and at war.

In Kings, by contrast, we were presented with 5 kings at the book's beginning (4 if you don't count Greyjoy until he declares himself). Now, there were battles, to be sure, shifting lines and castles, but by the end of the story, a whopping 1 king had died, everything was still at war, and none of the major characters had died, with the possible exception of Theon. For that matter, none of the major characters has even changed much - Tyrion got some scars and battle experience, Jon and Bran have discovered some very rudimentary new powers.

Don't get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I'll read it again sometime soon, I'm sure. It is only in comparison to the first book that it suffers.

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Sep 2nd 6:54 AM
One king dead is exactly how GoT ended too. ;)

But there's another king whose apparent hopes have been shattered (Stannis), a queen in another continent apparently now prepared to start _doing_ something rather than sitting in a city and waiting for others to do it for her, a major figure of the Kingsguard finding his way to her (Arstan/Barristan, or so it seems), Winterfell ruined, Bran and Rickon _believed_ dead, Arya killing people in cold blood, Cat apparently ready to do some damage to Jaime Lannister (or freeing him? It's still under discussion), Sansa is out of her betrothment and is a little more realistic (if not out of Joff's clutches, though that could possibly change soon), Littlefinger has continued to win massive rewards, the Tyrells and the Lannisters joining together are far more powerful than the Stark-Tully alliance, the wildlings are trooping southwards perhaps after finding some magic item, Jon is a member of the wildlings, and Tyrion has more than just 'some scars'; he's now far uglier than he was before, has been unable to defend himself or his plans since he's been in a coma for a couple of weeks (or something), etc.

Plenty happens. It's just not the same as what happens in GoT. :) I think the difference here is the fact that CoK has to follow through with what GoT did. You couldn't just end all the fighting in one book, with all the rival kings dead. That'd be unrealistic ('Oh, he's hurrying it all up and making this book feel rushed just so no one accuses him of taking too much time'.)

Next 20 Messages

Susan User ID: 7615523	Mar 26th 4:01 PM I'm worried by the news that the series is now going to fill 6 books. I got really bored with that other infamous long series, and had difficulty keeping track of all the characters and events. I'm afraid George R.R. Martin is going to lose control of his material, and pad it out to fill all these volumes. It's certainly a way to make more money, now that the first volume is a success, but I'm not sure it will make for good books or engaging reading. I stopped reading the Robert Jordan series with the third book. I don't want that to happen for me with this series, but I am concerned that the quality will drop as GRRM has to fill more and more pages. What do others think about this?
Fourthman User ID: 0923684	Mar 26th 4:19 PM 1.) Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. 2.) Adress the quality when it suffers. As far as I can tell, Martin isn't Jordan. WoT was RJ's first novel and series, right? GRRM is a seasoned writer with the experience of a 15 book series under his belt. Yes it had it's slow moments, but I never lost interest. 3.) Six books isn't that long, not at the rate most of us are reading GRRM. 4.) Are you confused by any of the characters yet? 5.) Do you think a(n unlikely) drop in quality in the 3rd book will be enough to make you stop reading?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Mar 26th 4:21 PM I'm not concerned. Martin has too-often shown himself to be a meticulous craftsman in the past, something which I cannot really say for Robert Jordan prior to his WoT series. I trust that, if he feels the various sub-plots can't just be handled lightly and really need to be drawn forward into some limelight, he does it knowing that doing so will please his audience. It may turn out this trust is wrong, but until that happens I'm fully supportive. I've tried to second guess the author, and it seems to me that one can very well fill six books with the reams of potential stories he seems to have. Certainly he has enough material for five. Maybe the sixth will be a stretch, but a lot of things can happen in the intervening three books to make that fit.
labor	Mar 26th 6:16 PM Susan, Jordan's books N� 4,5 and 6 are IMO much better than N�2 and 3, so you stopped too early. Ergo, I don't have any aprehension about Martin who is a much more experienced writer, as long as he stays by six and not a book further.
Revanshe User ID: 1404584	Mar 26th 8:06 PM Well, I think One and Two were Jordan's best, and three and four were good reads. Couldnt read after five. Although Martin may pull a Jordan, I doubt it...he seemed quite firm on the stance that it would not go past 6 books...thus, I think he has things much better planned than Jordan did.
haaruk	Mar 26th 8:29 PM I thought I recognized some artificially extended story lines in a ACOK. It was not as tightly knit as a game of thrones. Hopefully it is not a harbinger of things to come.
Ser Gary User ID: 9279843	Mar 27th 2:07 PM I have no doubt Martin will maintain the quality of this series. He has a clear vision about where the story should go, and it's not open ended. I think the only reason he extended to six books was so that he could do further justice to the story as a whole. Incidentally, I thought both AGOT and ACOK were fantastic reads....definitely among the best books I have ever read. If subsequent books are of that same level of quality, I have no problem with however many books it takes to tell the complete story.
Zer0hour User ID: 9356783	Mar 27th 3:20 PM Martin definately has a plan and NEEDS to fill six books. Let's look at the Titles: 1)A Game of Thrones -- Different houses play under the king's feet to gain control of the realm. 2)A Clash of Kings -- Four kings claim the throne and "clash" against each other. 3)A Storm of Swords -- The Houses engage in bloody battle that began at the end of A Clash of Kings. 4)A Dance with Dragons -- Daenerys triumphant return with her dragons (if you've read around, you know that I think there are many other dragons). 5)The Winds of Winter -- One of three things: 1.The people of the Westeros try to recover from the battles in ASoS and ADwD and try to survive the winter; or 2.The Others sweep down upon the the Seven Kingdoms using the "Winds of Winter" to their advantage; or 3.All of the Above. 6)A Time for Wolves -- The Starks triumphant (I love that word) return to glory, setting the lands of the Seven Kingdoms back to order. *Very rough yet educated predictions.
Min User ID: 9433023	Apr 1st 4:28 PM Right about Jordan. But what is right about Jordan need not be right about GRRM. Jordan seems to write as it comes to him. I still liked the fifth book, but then he completely lost the thread. But GRRM has not only finished several series. He also produced TV series. And, believe me, nothing is as good a treining for keeping a tight plot than that is! I also believe that Martin already knows what he will write about in the following books. And these charcters will definitely never loose life and blood and colour. So do not fear.
maerith	Apr 13th 1:55 PM >And these charcters will definitely >never loose life and blood and colour. Well, we know which signs to look out for (sniff, braid-tug...good that Dany's hair is short :)
Curious Reader User ID: 1662364	Apr 14th 12:55 PM I think Haaruk's right. There seemed to be some strain to extend the storyline in the second book. I was really disappointed when I heard the series would extend to six--it seems unnecessary. Unlike TV series, which move toward a single resolution at the end of each episode (except in the rare case of two-parters), these books are moving toward a single resolution at the end of the series: who's going to take the throne and/or expel the Others. I don't want to have to wait four more books to find out!
Omer User ID: 0485244	Jun 8th 5:58 PM I think Martin, unlike Jordan, is a good writer. I think he's a great writer. I've been reading his stuff for only 3 months, and already he's one of my favorite writers. Unlike Jordan, he CAN write. Just look at the stories in Legends - Martin's tale is shorter then Jordan's ( although not by much) and is nothing short of brilliant! Jordan drags for 60 pages wbefore giving us some relative exitment. I liked WoT 6, but A crown of sword was SO bad that I'm stopping to uy them. If my friends will buy them, I'll take a look. But I'm not gonna give this guy a reward for destroying half of the rain forests. I have complete confidence in Martin's ability and good senses to give us high quality entertainment till the year 2006(?). Think about it as something like the Star Trek or James Bond movies, only Martin's work is LIGHT YEARS better!
Ser Gary User ID: 9279843	Jun 8th 6:04 PM Omer, if you want to read more comments about WOT, we have a topic to that effect floating around here somewhere.
haaruk	Jun 14th 10:33 AM I am quite worried about the extension of the series to six books. It is because I so admired the effort that is a " A GAME OF THRONES ". I even debated, in a formal venue, the strength of Martin's "minor" characters when compared to those of Dicken's and Tolstoy. What a stimulating battle that was and I did very well. The technical precision necessary to make midstream corrections in a series can lead to a meandering and sloppy performance. I hope it does not happen to Martin's masterpiece.
Ser Gary User ID: 8068153	Jun 14th 1:59 PM I agree with you, Haaruk. But Martin extended to six books early in the process when he decided he could not do justice to the telling of the story in four. I don't think it will now extend from six. Quality is always a concern, but I don't think GRRM will compromise quality for anything. WOT remains open-ended. To the best of my knowledge, RJ has not come forward with a formal announcement that the story has, say, only 38 books left to go!
KAH User ID: 9209903	Jun 14th 2:13 PM I think RJ said something to the effect of 'being more than half-way through' after finishing book 7. Whether this should be taken seriously, I'll leave as a mental exersice for the reader - while asking said reader to keep in mind the 'progress' of the first 200 pages of PoD.
Doc User ID: 0770504	Aug 18th 10:38 PM I'm afraid I'm an ignorant back-water farmboy who's never read any of RJ's works. However. I must concur with what was said earlier, about ACoK not being as tightly nor neatly woven as AGoT. If nothing else, ACoK, IMHO, jumped around a little too fast and hard. In Thrones, everything was deliberate, timed, and effective. In Clash, everything more or less entered a melee and may the reader try and sort it out ...
Jeff User ID: 0227464	Aug 19th 8:38 AM It seems to me like GRRM is really setting himself up to write 2 distinct trilogies. We're going to see resolution of some major issues at the end of ASOS, if only to set the stage for the five year gap. That's going to force him to write a pretty tight book. The second trilogy seems set to focus on the events of winter, and I think three books seems appropriate for that story as well. Jordan's problem is that he set us up way back in book 1 with the climactic battle that was supposed to occur between the Dragon Reborn and the ubiquitous Dark Lord. So, we knew that we were heading to that very distinct goal very early on and don't appear to be any closer. GRRM, on the other hand, has not mapped out any concrete prophecies or set any clear final "goal" for the series, so measuring "progress" is sort of meaningless.
agarrett User ID: 9377263	Sep 2nd 1:05 AM Well, no, it's not meaningless, just more difficult... Now, let me start by saying that I have just finished Clash of Kings, and found it an excellent book. This series is definately topping my list of favorite fantasy books. However, I also found Kings to suffer a bit in comparison to Thrones. Why? Because things did not change as much. The situation in Kings was essentially static, as opposed to the very dynamic environment we had in Thrones. Thrones started with a kingdom in (relative) peace, with Eddard Stark taking over as a high officer of the king. By the time it ended, both Eddard and the king were dead, and the kingdom was split and at war. In Kings, by contrast, we were presented with 5 kings at the book's beginning (4 if you don't count Greyjoy until he declares himself). Now, there were battles, to be sure, shifting lines and castles, but by the end of the story, a whopping 1 king had died, everything was still at war, and none of the major characters had died, with the possible exception of Theon. For that matter, none of the major characters has even changed much - Tyrion got some scars and battle experience, Jon and Bran have discovered some very rudimentary new powers. Don't get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I'll read it again sometime soon, I'm sure. It is only in comparison to the first book that it suffers.
Ran User ID: 0283314	Sep 2nd 6:54 AM One king dead is exactly how GoT ended too. ;) But there's another king whose apparent hopes have been shattered (Stannis), a queen in another continent apparently now prepared to start _doing_ something rather than sitting in a city and waiting for others to do it for her, a major figure of the Kingsguard finding his way to her (Arstan/Barristan, or so it seems), Winterfell ruined, Bran and Rickon _believed_ dead, Arya killing people in cold blood, Cat apparently ready to do some damage to Jaime Lannister (or freeing him? It's still under discussion), Sansa is out of her betrothment and is a little more realistic (if not out of Joff's clutches, though that could possibly change soon), Littlefinger has continued to win massive rewards, the Tyrells and the Lannisters joining together are far more powerful than the Stark-Tully alliance, the wildlings are trooping southwards perhaps after finding some magic item, Jon is a member of the wildlings, and Tyrion has more than just 'some scars'; he's now far uglier than he was before, has been unable to defend himself or his plans since he's been in a coma for a couple of weeks (or something), etc. Plenty happens. It's just not the same as what happens in GoT. :) I think the difference here is the fact that CoK has to follow through with what GoT did. You couldn't just end all the fighting in one book, with all the rival kings dead. That'd be unrealistic ('Oh, he's hurrying it all up and making this book feel rushed just so no one accuses him of taking too much time'.)