Every time the subject comes up on Reddit, there are people who are genuinely mad at the guy like he wronged them for taking so long to end-cap the series.
It reminds me of the subset of my forum users who get out their pitchforks just because I, the creator, haven't been around for a while, like I owe them yet more of my free time. Or as if they've paid me money and I'm squandering it.
I was college when I read ASOIF, I was expecting the Winds of Winter to come out before I finished the others. It didn't. I read the Tales of Dunk and Egg to while the time expecting it to come out like he promised. It didn't.
ASOIAF is my favorite storyline ever. I adopted a puppy yesterday and named him Aegon after Aegon the Unlucky. The fifth Aegon — Maester Aemon's younger brother.
It's because I was waiting on ASOIAF that I spent a little over two years reading 21 volumes of Wild Cards (26 now), and every year he kept missing his deadlines.
It's as if when you've got your money in your hand, and the pizza guy says the restaurant will open in a few mins, but it doesn't open for weeks, and he mixes coke in his pizza and you're addicted.
I don't think I can explain my frustration to you in mere words on the internet, but it's so painful that I've stopped reading his blog or thinking about it. One day it'll come out, but until that day I won't be duped by this man's false deadlines.
Imagine if I have the most delicious cupcake in the world that I bake for you, and I tell you that it'll be ready in ten minutes. 15 mins later, you ask me and I tell you that I need ten more minutes. This happens a dozen times, until you finally get angry and tell me to be reasonable. Then imagine me telling you that it's a 'you' problem and that you have the agency of mind but to allow a mere cupcake to influence your life such that expectations about it become 'painful'.
Now imagine Martin doing this to not just me but all his fans.
At some point, stringing readers along and missing deadlines repeatedly becomes part of the problem too.
If only the cupcake weren't that damn good.