Finish the Book, George

My travels caused me to stumble across this blog directed at George R. R. Martin, admonishing the author for misdeeds both real and percieved. One favorite topic, of course, is that Martin is now neck-deep in the hole on a book that was supposedly half-finished when it was promised to us four years ago. Another is the lackluster performance of the previous book. Still another is Martin’s weight. (He’s fat, you see.)

It’s an interesting perspective, and it’s hard to disagree with many of the blog’s points. It’s kind of hard to defend a man who started a blog to discuss anything and everything except the one thing his fans actually care about. It’s even harder to defend the practice of using half of said blog to sell merchandise for a series that has been spinning its wheels for a decade.

So the blog is funny and well-written, and is focused on taking pot shots at a man who both deserves it and has specifically asked for it. I used to follow Martin’s blog, back in the day; I remember his post instructing his critics to get their own blogs if they wanted to complain about him. Well, these guys did. Now that it’s in my radar, I’ll be keeping up with it periodically. It’s more entertaining than Martin’s anyway.

A key area where I disagree with these guys, though, is the subject of Martin’s writing.  We disagree, for example, on the quality of A Feast for Crows. Their issue is that the book doesn’t do anything to advance the story, and therefore might as well not exist. And they have a point; if the story is going to end up revolving primarily around Jon and Dany, what good is a book with neither Jon nor Dany in it? Well, nothing really, if you’re just interested in the story and how it plays out. Make no mistake, I am interested in that story. To me, though, these books are more than just the story they’re telling; there is a world here, and it’s so well-realized and well-developed that I feel as though I could inhabit it. In Feast, Jaime crosses the war-ravaged riverlands to oversee the Lannister victory in the dwindling war — the war we’ve just spent three books reading about. His journey isn’t particularly exciting, but it is interesting, because he’s visiting places I’ve been to before under much different circumstances. I’ve come to care about those places and what happens to them

Feast also gives us a detailed look at the Iron Islands and Dorne. Many folks hated those chapters because the involve a lot of new characters who will probably end up being very minor in the grand scheme of things. (Indeed, one poor bastard gets a single viewpoint chapter and is then killed in the most anticlimactic way possible.) If you’re just interested in the core story being told, yes, I concede these sideplots are a waste of time. To readers as engrossed in the world as I am, though, they are like candy. The Ironmen and the Dornishmen are little more than flavor when you consider the greater whole of Westeros, so getting such a good in-depth look at them makes the flavor all the richer.

Perhaps in a more typical fantasy series these sideplots would not have made it into the core books, published instead a supplemental material. No hardcore Lord of the Rings fan considers the books to start and end at the trilogy, after all. There’s that prologue, you see, and two complete ages of history besides. Virtually nothing at all important to the story at hand, but a treasure trove of material to pore over if you happen to be in love with Middle-earth.

As it happens I am not in love with Middle-earth; The Silmarillion bored me senseless, and I had a great deal of difficulty getting through the spots in the trilogy that bog down with long-winded descriptions of foliage or endless, pointless songs. I’m in love with Westeros, though, so the minutiae doesn’t bother me. Tolkien had trees and rivers, Martin has heraldry and political maneuvering.

Of course, Tolkien had the foresight to not include incredibly tacky sex scenes in his work. Had he written about a “Myrrish swamp” you can be damn sure he was referring to a god’s honest swamp.

And, you know, there’s that thing where he actually finished his books before he died.

Anyway, there are two major schools of thought on Martin’s inability to produce a fifth book. One is that he should get it done, because four years is far longer than is acceptable for a professional writer to finish half-a-book. The other is that Martin doesn’t owe anyone anything, and that we should all just shut up and be patient.

The most damning thing the Finish the Book blog has said on this topic, in my opinion, is that if they’d known ahead of time what a huge mess the series would become they’d have never started reading it. That’s a sentiment I can totally understand; honestly, I’m not sure if I’d have started reading it either. When I first borrowed the books from a friend of mine I didn’t know the series was unfinished; I thought it was just a trilogy. After I finished A Storm of Swords I had to wait for what felt like way-too-long for the next book to come out, and I’ve been waiting ever since. Who knows if it’ll ever get finished, or if I’ll ever know how this world I’ve come to love evolves? Or how the story, which I’ve become so invested in, finally concludes? Or what becomes of these characters, great and small, I’ve come to know so well?

It’s time to finish the book, George.