If there was no real possibility of those expectations being met, so be it, but then Martin and his biggest supporters have spent the past six years fanning them with “it’s a seven-book series” and “the knot is the only thing holding him up.”

The idea that some readers are disappointed because they “wanted a conclusion midway through the series” is a pathetic straw man. Everyone who did not mistakenly walk into Dance believing it to be the last book understood that Dance was not going to resolve the war with the Others or who sits on the Iron Throne when all is said and done.

They wanted a reason to believe the series was moving *toward* a timely, entertaining, and credible conclusion. Instead, the Others appear to not be doing much of anything to threaten the Seven Kingdoms, Dany is still mucking around out East with untrained dragons, and yet another war for the Iron Throne, which few readers expect to be the last of the series, has just started.

When these readers start looking for reasons *why* the series is at where it’s at at the end of Dance, they’re inevitably going to lay the blame on pacing problems, which naturally calls to mind terms like “filler,” “pointless travelogue,” and “sitting around doing nothing.” One might be the type of person who interprets the same material as “elegant descriptions,” “unparalleled world-building,” and “brilliant characterization,” but these are ultimately subjective matters. The series growing beyond seven books and taking more than a decade to complete, if that ultimately happens, is not.

The readers disappointed in the state of affairs at the end of Dance are not necessarily wrong. IF the series grows to eight or more books and takes a decade or more to be completed, or if some people find the final two books rushed with sequences of events lacking credibility, there are reasons for it — whether one believes those reasons improve or diminish the series as a whole — and among those reasons will be what Martin did or failed to do in AFfC and ADwD.

Remember, Martin himself said it would take seven books to tell his story. This implies both a conclusion and a timeframe of sorts that people have used to decide whether to invest time in following and discussing the series.

If Martin has decided to transform his Song of Ice & Fire into an endless historical epic set in his fantasy world, however brilliant, instead of telling the story of the War for the Dawn and the struggle for the Iron Throne of Westeros, so be it, but he owes it to his fans to come clean with his intentions.

As far as his editor, statements like “The stuff with Penny alone…” and ” no one, I felt, could be unsatisfied by the developments” are proof that she has lost touch with the audience that exists outside of Martin’s “inner circle” of friends and hardcore fans.

And this type of blatant spin almost always comes back to haunt you in the long run: “Yet when I read that final draft, it was as clean and seamless and as perfect as if he had always intended it to be that way,” particularly when one of the individuals who volunteered to help with editing suggested three more months would have helped improve the final state of the book markably. So much for “you can’t rush art.”

From the interview I can pinpoint the problem immediately and in her own words, …”In addition to being his editor, I am also a huge fan,…” Many jobs have some sort of objectivity clause, IE.. if you are so close to the subject you shouldn’t be working on it. This publishing house has violated that very astute rule and it shows. Two mediocre books of +900 pages could have been easily edited down to one awesome book of approximately 1100-1200. If it is not the abject fandom blinding the editor, it is the fact that Georges success has become to strong for them to reign in. Either way they are compromised and should relinquish the job they are supposed to be doing.

Now as the ravening sycophantic wolves come in to blast me and say, “You are just being nonobjective because you are angry over the huge delay.” Let me say you are the ones being nonobjective. Any person who can read reviews from people who have no ties to the writer or book can find the overwhelming truth at any review site. The last two books have TANKED in popularity compared to the first three. Any outrageous sales numbers are due to the success of the first three books and the HBO series, not the sheer awesomeness of the last two disappointments and you know it.

Dance had everything that was bad about Feast and more.

One of the two people involved here are not doing their jobs correctly. Another 5 year wait for a weak book will be a joke.