George RR Martin
George RR Martin, author of the "Song of Ice and Fire" fantasy series that is the basis of the television series "Game of Thrones," gestures during his masterclass at the Neuchatel International Fantastic Film Festival (NIFFF) in Neuchatel, July 10, 2014. Reuters/Denis Balibouse

The fans have been eagerly waiting for George RR Martin to announce the completion of “Winds of Winter.” A new theory suggests that the author may have already completed the book, and there is a good reason to not make the announcement yet.

A report be Nerdist points out that Martin has been working on the book for a very long time now. Back in 2012 the author has said that he planned to have the book out by 2014, then in 2015 he said he can finish the book in a few months, and later in 2017 he suggested that the book would be released by the end of that year.

Martin’s most recent deadline is early 2019. However, what is clear from his statements is that he has already finished most of the work for the book. What then is the reason for the delay? The report suggests that additional commitments in the form of new TV shows or other writing projects just don’t completely explain the delay, and there may be another reason.

One problem that Martin has admitted is complication in the plot. He has had to rewrite a lot of the book after either finding loopholes in his work or finding better ideas. The main problem is that this is the penultimate book, which requires the author to start connecting all the dots from the very first book. There is very little room for error because the author doesn’t have too many future chapters to fix any pending problems.

The report suggests that Martin has already completed “Winds of Winter” and is now busy writing the last book “A Dream of Spring.” The author has the tendency to write future chapters from the next book or push chapters from his current book to the next. However, this time he may be purposely writing the last book to make sure there aren’t any loose ends that need to be fixed.