George threw me under the fangirl bus last night.
See, we all somehow got seated so that GRRM and I were back-to-back with Tim Powers and his wife, and I had mentioned to Lugalirra just how much I love Powers' books. George asked if I had actually told Powers this, and when I answered "No, I don't like to harass writers at Cons because they're probably mobbed at all hours" he said "nonsense!" and turned around, thumped Powers on the back, and said "She loves your books! (turns to me) Tell him how much you like his books!!"
And so Mr. X and I got incredibly dorky and fannish with Tim Powers, and discussed his work teaching at a high school for the arts. He's incredibly friendly and very gracious, despite being accosted in the waning moments of his dinner.
Other notable con guests who rolled on by the BwB party: Scott Bakker. I'm not sure he remembers it all that well -- all 8 feet of him was listing dangerously due to a fair run on the beer downstairs. Hal Duncan stopped by for an hour or so, too, as did a bunch of other people I'm forgetting. I did not bartend much last night (big props to Yags, Mr. X and Alchemist) and spent it wandering the party and the rest of the hotel.
George read a revised version of the prologue. I'm not going to post anything here (spoilers, etc), but I thought it was pretty good. The ending is a total kicker (as all prologue endings should be). He also answered some questions regarding warging (the term only applies to those who can communicate with wolves/dogs), the HBO series (no greenlight yet, and it's in vague competition with a King Arthur-themed series), and Wild Cards (the January release is the first of a 3-book series, and there is the possibility that if this series does well, all the rest of the Wild Cards series will be put back into print).
I've just fled from a panel on HP Lovecraft. As much as I fangirl Tim Powers, I was just not ready to spend an hour listening to people talk about Lovecraft's rejection/subversion of the supernatural. Especially since I STILL have to finish this damned article for work. Which is what I'm about to do right now.
Part 1: http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6466196.html?nid=2789
Part 2: http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6468840.html?nid=2789
At Trinoc GRRM confirmed he has several publishers interested in the 3rd Dunk and Egg story he just hasn't settled "on the best venue" yet. He also said that D & E will be collected into a book and that all of the stories he has planned will not fit into one volume.
Another interesting thing from the con, at one point in a panel GRRM was commenting that he didn't like how in a lot of fantasy stories various races are all defined by a single personality (i.e. all orcs are evil, all elves are wise, etc), whereas it would be more realistic for various individuals within a race to have different personalities, viewpoints, etc. Some quick-witted audience member asked him how that idea applied to the Others in his own books, to which he replied, "I'm not gonna answer that." Food for thought.
Nobody as relayed this-but the question about this did come up with GRRM at the last con. And his answer was-basically... forget about it. For now there is nothing happening and he said that HBO could loose their option (let it run out). They are still waiting for an initial script and that would probably be rejected, a new one resubmitted, etc. It sounded to me like the option was probably going to expire with nothing happening - but that is just my take on what he said when the question was asked during the reading as well as later.
Oh, George said all the Stark children of this generation were full Wargs. I thought they were like one shot Wargs and were only bonded to their wolves but no they can warg into just about anything. Bran is just the only one working on it.
We did talk quite a bit of football...
I believe that he said that he felt that the Jets would do better than the Giants this year (i hope i didn't get that backwards)...He's very knowledgeable about football. I lament the fact that i had other duties at that particular time.
As far as fans of Oberyn (of which I'm the biggest, of course), I was talking to him about how much I liked the character even though we only got to spend a short amount of time with him and that the mountain killing him was my throw the book across the room moment. He then asked me how much I liked his daughters. I answered that I liked them quite a bit and that the Martells are my favorite family in Westeros. He commented that I should be very pleased with some of the coming events then.
I'll post more details and stuff later. It was really great meeting everyone. we had 19 people at dinner, and when we invided George to party with us in our rooms, he countered with inviting us up to his suite. He made sure he talked to most people up there at least a little. It was great being able to be that personal with him. an all around awesome experience.
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Most of us were not pre-registered, but that wasn't a problem. Registration was opened pretty late too. As far as I know, it went rather smoothly for most of us.
The biggest problems were of course with the schedule. As noted earlier, it wasn't until nearly the last 2 weeks that a schedule was even posted online and only a day or so before that the program had been posted. Of course the schedule that was posted was drastically different from the schedule given to us at the con. Eventually we got it figured out. The only real problem after that was with George's reading. The "Reading Room" had a capacity of 25. stunned.gif of course 3 times this number wanted to hear George. More then a few missed the reading because of this. Plus points to the con though, they very quickly realized the problem and moved us down to the large room where the meet and greet was held and moved those 6 people up to the reading room. Any of those that had stuck around trying to stand in the back or hear from the doorway were now all able to sit and listen to the reading.
Immediately after the reading, SSE and I talked to George and made dinner plans. The hotel staff was great in helping us out, letting us know of a good local place and such.
I don't think many of us spent much time in the con hospatality suite as mine and LP's rooms served for most of the BwB, but I did stop down there Sunday morning to give them our left over sodas. It seemed nice and well stocked and the people were very friendly and inviting.
All in all, the con was a great experience with very minor problems once it got going.
DWD is not done. George believes writing is an art and he has to find the right words and the right structure and that takes time and some re-writes. He still hopes for seven books.
He may write other stories in the IAF world that take places 100's of years before or 100's of years after.
He is a student of popular history and likes the story aspect of them. But he does like the sensation of not knowing what is going to happen next.
His experience in television influences the way IAF is written through act breaks that hook the readers.
Wildcards too was a training ground for ASOIAF. IAF is a Wildcards mosaic novel with George telling all the parts.
About the HBO series. David Benioff and D.B. Weiss are writing the screenplay. They have written the first draft of the pilot and have sent it to HBO for revision. There will be twelve hours worth of shows and George will write one hour. As for it all actually happening, George has not yet "bought the couch" meaning it is definitely not set in stone.
There are plans for nine D+E stories covering their whole life.
The concept of heroes and villains is a false dichotomy, in George's opinion. Real human beings are a mixture of good and evil.
All the characters are in danger.
There will be no gods on stage in the books and the reader will have to decide whether there are gods or not.
Once the books are done, we will have such a detailed description of Robert's Rebellion that a prequel will not be necessary or at least have little suspense.
The challenge with IAF is that he has to publish each book as it is written so he doesn't get to go back and edit earlier volumes like he would if had won the lottery.
I asked Ran's question about the King of Mountain and Vale [how they came to fall under the rule of the Targaryens] and George told me to keep reading for that one.