[Slow Ben]

Abyss, on 07 March 2011 - 05:30 PM, said:

i'll believe it ten minutes after the book is in my hands.

I'm just curious why the transition from hands to brain will take 10 minutes....

[wolf_2099]

Slow Ben, on 07 March 2011 - 06:08 PM, said:

Abyss, on 07 March 2011 - 05:30 PM, said:

i'll believe it ten minutes after the book is in my hands.

I'm just curious why the transition from hands to brain will take 10 minutes....

Take a while to see through all the drool?

[Abyss]

caladanbrood, on 07 March 2011 - 05:34 PM, said:

Knowing you 'byss, that'll be 3 months after the rest of us.

Die. Just die.

wolf_2099, on 07 March 2011 - 08:10 PM, said:

Slow Ben, on 07 March 2011 - 06:08 PM, said:

Abyss, on 07 March 2011 - 05:30 PM, said:

i'll believe it ten minutes after the book is in my hands.

I'm just curious why the transition from hands to brain will take 10 minutes....

Take a while to see through all the drool?

Suspension of disbelief.

[Skinner]

I'm also a little dubious but this time the man himself confirmed it, so I'd be inclined to raise my hopes up a few notches for once. Maybe timing the book release with the TV series doesn't hurt the bottom line either

How many years has it been? I think I've moved apartments, cities and countries multiple times since A Feast for Crows came out.

[blackzoid]

Both A Dance with Dragons AND Duke Nukem Forever coming out this year?
Is Jesus also booked for this year?

[End of Disc One]

blackzoid, on 07 March 2011 - 10:32 PM, said:

Both A Dance with Dragons AND Duke Nukem Forever coming out this year?
Is Jesus also booked for this year?

There's also this which has been in development for 40 years.

[wolf_2099]

End of Disc One, on 07 March 2011 - 11:04 PM, said:

blackzoid, on 07 March 2011 - 10:32 PM, said:

Both A Dance with Dragons AND Duke Nukem Forever coming out this year?
Is Jesus also booked for this year?

There's also this which has been in development for 40 years.

With a 5 million dollar budget which it seems was just being made to be able to hold onto the rights.

[King Bear]

blackzoid, on 07 March 2011 - 10:32 PM, said:

Both A Dance with Dragons AND Duke Nukem Forever coming out this year?
Is Jesus also booked for this year?

I believe that's booked for 2012.

[FastBen]

End of Disc One, on 07 March 2011 - 11:04 PM, said:

blackzoid, on 07 March 2011 - 10:32 PM, said:

Both A Dance with Dragons AND Duke Nukem Forever coming out this year?
Is Jesus also booked for this year?

There's also this which has been in development for 40 years.

I am humiliated for the people involved with this film.

[Tsundoku]

Werthead, on 05 March 2011 - 09:54 PM, said:

Not this again.

The publishers do not own the rights to A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE. Martin does, and when he passes away they fall to his literary heirs, who have already committed to not allowing anyone else to finish the series. Maybe their heirs, decades from now, will sell the rights on and allow a sequel to be written, but it's either that or wait for the copyright to expire.

More to the point, there are absolutely no notes or outlines of the kind that Jordan left behind for the last WoT book(s) that made it even remotely possible for Sanderson to finish the series. Without those notes, any conclusion to ASoIaF would be fanfiction and guesswork, and why the hell should anyone be interested in paying money for fanfiction when they can read it on the Internet for free?

Sorry Wert, what was that? I - and more importantly Martin's heirs - couldn't quite hear you over the sound of the truckload of money being backed up to their place ...

So he doesn't have notes? I'm sure he does have conversations, brainstorming sessions with his mates/editors etc. After the near-disaster with RJ, I have heard that nervous publishing houses demand projected outlines at least these days. Might not be widely spoken of, but there you go. Makes sense really, as who - having invested millions - would trust GRRM when he says "Nah, it's all cool, got it all in my head. Well, a bit of it so far anyway. Until I change it ..."?

[Tyr]

Gothos, on 07 March 2011 - 03:31 PM, said:

the LotR setting is VERY good. The story, the characters, dialogue, battle - just don't get me started. It's genre-defining work, sure, but as stories, LotR just doesn't offer the caliber of ASOIAF, MBOTF or Mistborn, at least how I see it.
Now don't get me wrong, it's a great thing to have happened (even if I'd have to be threathened with bodily harm to ever read the books again, bar Silmarillion), but it's in no way the Alpha and Omega.

I hated GotM and it was still better than The Hobbit, Fellowship and Two Towers (ugh, the horror).

Tolkien may be the the most well known progenitor of fantasy, but the genre has evolved, and there are far, far better works out there now.

[Tarcanus]

I just wanted to say that it's Heresy to compare aSoIaF and MBotF to Mistborn. Sanderson's writing quality isn't anywhere near that of Martin or Erikson. In my head, I picture Sanderson writing his books with one of those 2 foot long, thick, number two pencils with inspirational religious verses printed on it while Martin uses a normal pen and paper and Erikson uses an elaborate quill pen.

[Abyss]

Sombra, on 08 March 2011 - 07:32 AM, said:

Werthead, on 05 March 2011 - 09:54 PM, said:

Not this again.

The publishers do not own the rights to A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE. Martin does, and when he passes away they fall to his literary heirs, who have already committed to not allowing anyone else to finish the series. ...

Sorry Wert, what was that? I - and more importantly Martin's heirs - couldn't quite hear you over the sound of the truckload of money being backed up to their place...

QFT.

Obviously we're not going to assassinate GRMM to settle this debate, but i say $ trumps artistic integrity.

[Mentalist]

Briar King, on 08 March 2011 - 06:12 AM, said:

Skinner, on 07 March 2011 - 09:51 PM, said:

I'm also a little dubious but this time the man himself confirmed it, so I'd be inclined to raise my hopes up a few notches for once. Maybe timing the book release with the TV series doesn't hurt the bottom line either

How many years has it been? I think I've moved apartments, cities and countries multiple times since A Feast for Crows came out.

Coming up on 6 full yrs I think. I think it was middle of 05 for AFFC.

in Canada, it was released around xmass 05. I was in my first year of undergrad and snatched it up right before the holidays.

[rhulad]

I'll probably buy it... only read the first one so far.

[Werthead]

caladanbrood, on 07 March 2011 - 12:45 PM, said:

This is a good point. But how big is the hardback? Because I have doubts that they actually need to split them up. The paperbacks from A Storm of Swords between them are shorter than, say, an individual volume of the Night's Dawn Trilogy. I heard Martin talk about "physical printing limits", but that sounded like an excuse to me - I've seen bigger paperbacks. Money-making ploy?

Formatting and font size. Actually, A Storm of Swords is an eye-opening 70,000 words longer than The Reality Dysfunction (maybe 30,000 longer than The Naked God). If you really want to get puzzled, Jordan's The Shadow Rising is 392,000 words, which is longer than any of Erikson's books (though only just), but a clear 250 pages shorter than MoI/BH/RG/TTH/DoD in mmpb. And the font size doesn't seem to be much different.

As for which books get split and which don't, it's down to their printers, and some printers are far less flexible than others. Bantam UK (Erikson), Arrow (Diana Gabaldon) and Pan Macmillan (Hamilton) can print 1,300-page paperbacks, whilst Voyager (Martin) and Gollancz (Sanderson) can't. Gollancz split Martin's Dreamsongs and they're going to split The Way of Kings in paperback. I'd be pretty surprised if they didn't split The Wise Man's Fear as well.

One contact from my blog has even claimed to have spoken to HarperCollins' printers (somehow) and apparently they got pretty irritable at the suggestion they could put ASoS and ADWD into one volume in paperback, and when it was pointed out that other publishers could print bigger books in one volume with no problem they abruptly left the conversation. So greed, yes, but from the printers to the publishers, not the publishers to the public.

Quote

Sorry Wert, what was that? I - and more importantly Martin's heirs - couldn't quite hear you over the sound of the truckload of money being backed up to their place ...

So you'd gladly pay to read some random author's fanfiction idea of how ASoIaF ends? That's weird.

Quote

So he doesn't have notes? I'm sure he does have conversations, brainstorming sessions with his mates/editors etc.

You'd be wrong. He's told the TV producers 'something' about a couple of the mysteries to the series, but only enough for them to cobble together an ending off their own back, not an outline he himself is committed to following. As for the rest, no. He's discussed plans for WILD CARDS and his anthologies with his writer's group but ASoIaF is apparently not talked about.

Quote

I have heard that nervous publishing houses demand projected outlines at least these days.

They can demand all they want. When you reach Martin's sales bracket (individual books selling better than Pratchett and not far off Jordan), the author dictates terms to the publishers, not vice versa

Quote

Makes sense really, as who - having invested millions - would trust GRRM when he says "Nah, it's all cool, got it all in my head. Well, a bit of it so far anyway. Until I change it ..."?

Maybe they don't trust him (I imagine they certainly take his estimates with a pinch of salt) but what are they going to do? "Sorry George, an outline or we won't publish the book! Hang on, come back! No, don't go to Tor, we're sorry!"

[D'iversify]

Werthead, on 08 March 2011 - 10:07 PM, said:

Formatting and font size. Actually, A Storm of Swords is an eye-opening 70,000 words longer than The Reality Dysfunction (maybe 30,000 longer than The Naked God). If you really want to get puzzled, Jordan's The Shadow Rising is 392,000 words, which is longer than any of Erikson's books (though only just), but a clear 250 pages shorter than MoI/BH/RG/TTH/DoD in mmpb. And the font size doesn't seem to be much different.

As for which books get split and which don't, it's down to their printers, and some printers are far less flexible than others. Bantam UK (Erikson), Arrow (Diana Gabaldon) and Pan Macmillan (Hamilton) can print 1,300-page paperbacks, whilst Voyager (Martin) and Gollancz (Sanderson) can't. Gollancz split Martin's Dreamsongs and they're going to split The Way of Kings in paperback. I'd be pretty surprised if they didn't split The Wise Man's Fear as well.

One contact from my blog has even claimed to have spoken to HarperCollins' printers (somehow) and apparently they got pretty irritable at the suggestion they could put ASoS and ADWD into one volume in paperback, and when it was pointed out that other publishers could print bigger books in one volume with no problem they abruptly left the conversation. So greed, yes, but from the printers to the publishers, not the publishers to the public.

These books are even longer but many of them can be easily bought as one volume, e.g. War & Peace and Atlas Shrugged: http://en.wikipedia....illic_alphabets

[caladanbrood]

Werthead, on 08 March 2011 - 10:07 PM, said:

caladanbrood, on 07 March 2011 - 12:45 PM, said:

This is a good point. But how big is the hardback? Because I have doubts that they actually need to split them up. The paperbacks from A Storm of Swords between them are shorter than, say, an individual volume of the Night's Dawn Trilogy. I heard Martin talk about "physical printing limits", but that sounded like an excuse to me - I've seen bigger paperbacks. Money-making ploy?

Formatting and font size. Actually, A Storm of Swords is an eye-opening 70,000 words longer than The Reality Dysfunction (maybe 30,000 longer than The Naked God). If you really want to get puzzled, Jordan's The Shadow Rising is 392,000 words, which is longer than any of Erikson's books (though only just), but a clear 250 pages shorter than MoI/BH/RG/TTH/DoD in mmpb. And the font size doesn't seem to be much different.

As for which books get split and which don't, it's down to their printers, and some printers are far less flexible than others. Bantam UK (Erikson), Arrow (Diana Gabaldon) and Pan Macmillan (Hamilton) can print 1,300-page paperbacks, whilst Voyager (Martin) and Gollancz (Sanderson) can't. Gollancz split Martin's Dreamsongs and they're going to split The Way of Kings in paperback. I'd be pretty surprised if they didn't split The Wise Man's Fear as well.

One contact from my blog has even claimed to have spoken to HarperCollins' printers (somehow) and apparently they got pretty irritable at the suggestion they could put ASoS and ADWD into one volume in paperback, and when it was pointed out that other publishers could print bigger books in one volume with no problem they abruptly left the conversation. So greed, yes, but from the printers to the publishers, not the publishers to the public.

That is crazy, I had no idea about Shadow Rising. Sounds conspiratorial to me!

[Werthead]

George's editor holding the MS for ADWD:



That's pretty big. And the hardcover should be about half as thick, considering the MS is single-paged. That's still massive.

[Abyss]

Werthead, on 08 March 2011 - 10:07 PM, said:

...

Quote

Sorry Wert, what was that? I - and more importantly Martin's heirs - couldn't quite hear you over the sound of the truckload of money being backed up to their place ...

So you'd gladly pay to read some random author's fanfiction idea of how ASoIaF ends? That's weird.

How is a published work post-humously continuing an author's story any different from what's been done to WoT, Middle-earth, Dune or Bourne, to name the obvious ones?

Sure sure the authors all left copious notes no doubt setting out everything so the new author, in Dune and Mid-earth's case with the help of the no doubt awesomely talented family member who somehow eluded publication previously, is merely assembling some adjectives and perhaps a transitionary paragraph or two...

I am far from buying that a story is quality just because a publisher decides to release it to the public with a cover and a marketing campaign, but its far from fanfiction, the moreso if an actual author with some amount of talent is doing it. Or are you going to suggest that if, by some weird convergence, GRRM kicked and SE was hired to finish the series, you wouldn't be right there drooling with the rest of us? (or conversely horrified if it was, say, Christopher Golden or whoever, but i digress...)

Werthead, on 17 March 2011 - 08:49 PM, said:

George's editor holding the MS for ADWD:



That's pretty big. And the hardcover should be about half as thick, considering the MS is single-paged. That's still massive.

Wow... that's almost encouraging!