
What if the story you loved on television finished, had a prequel, and then another prequel was announced, all while you were still waiting for the next chapter of the original books? For fans of George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, this is not a hypothetical. It is the reality. The Winds of Winter, the long-awaited sixth book, is, as you may have heard, taking a very long time.
The original Game of Thrones television series premiered just before the fifth book, A Dance with Dragons, hit shelves in 2011. In the years since, the entire eight-season show has concluded, House of the Dragon has aired two seasons (with a third on the way), and another spin-off, based on his Dunk and Egg novellas and titled A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, is imminent.