Yes, his books were very popular before the TV show. I got my start reading GRRM when Asimov's s.f. magazine published the Daenerys chapters from A Game of Thrones as a novella. The first three books were absolutely some of my favorite fantasy books, but, imho, GRRM fell into a great trap.
His novels are popular for many reasons, but one of them is that they are surprising. Good, well-liked characters die sometimes. Evil characters are rewarded sometimes. Etc. I won't get into spoiler territory (hah), but GRRM and his fans got addicted to Red Weddings, and, well, how do you do better than the Red Wedding?
Turns out that consistently killing off your best characters leaves you with a bare stable. Replacing them is not so easy. His original plan had been a large year skip to give some of the younger generation time to grow up. That was a stupid idea, and it failed.
AFfC and ADwD were just painful slogs, both literally (half the books comprises characters slogging through winter snows and getting nowhere fast) and figuratively.
He's written himself into a hole, the reaction to the later seasons of the show are terrifying to GRRM, and what does he do now?
He's still not as lame and gay as Patrick Rothfuss who shits on his fans left and right!
Yes, his books were very popular before the TV show. I got my start reading GRRM when Asimov's s.f. magazine published the Daenerys chapters from A Game of Thrones as a novella. The first three books were absolutely some of my favorite fantasy books, but, imho, GRRM fell into a great trap.
His novels are popular for many reasons, but one of them is that they are surprising. Good, well-liked characters die sometimes. Evil characters are rewarded sometimes. Etc. I won't get into spoiler territory (hah), but GRRM and his fans got addicted to Red Weddings, and, well, how do you do better than the Red Wedding?
Turns out that consistently killing off your best characters leaves you with a bare stable. Replacing them is not so easy. His original plan had been a large year skip to give some of the younger generation time to grow up. That was a stupid idea, and it failed.
AFfC and ADwD were just painful slogs, both literally (half the books comprises characters slogging through winter snows and getting nowhere fast) and figuratively.
He's written himself into a hole, the reaction to the later seasons of the show are terrifying to GRRM, and what does he do now?
He's still not as lame and gay as Patrick Rothfuss who shits on his fans left and right!
But I liked the Kingkiller books :(
I did too! I thought they were great!
Then I made the mistake of going to the Kingkiller reddit and seeing how Rothfuss treats his fans. Not pretty.
If he comes out with the 3rd book ever, I'll no doubt come crawling back, but I am not, personally, a fan of Rothfuss.
Brandon Sanderson is my ideal of a hardworking author who treats his fans amazingly.
Fan: I had a rough day.
Sanderson: Here, read this book I wrote that will cheer you up.
Fan: But I've read all your books.
Sanderson: This is new, wrote it last night.
Fan: But how, when do you slee-
Sanderson: Here's three more books I just wrote while you were replying.
Fan: Bu-
Sanderson: Here's several background short stories for those new books.
Fan: Wh-
Sanderson: Here's a sequel to the first book I sent.
Fan: Ho-
Sanderson: Here's a link to a 3 hour podcast I recorded in the last 2 minutes going into greater detail about all the new books.
Fan: That's not even possible, how do you record 3 hours from 2 minutes?
Sanderson: Shh, no questions, only books.