Lin-Manuel Miranda no longer involved with adaptation of Patrick Rothfuss's KINGKILLER CHRONICLE series

Actor, writer and singer-songwriter Lin-Manuel Miranda has confirmed he is no longer attached to the long-gestating attempt to bring Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicle to the screen.

Interest in the property began back in 2007, when The Name of the Wind was published to a rapturous reception and very high sales. It intensified in 2011, when the sequel The Wise Man's Fear was published.

In 2015, Rothfuss reached a wide-ranging and high-value deal with production company Lionsgate that included a feature film trilogy based directly on the novels, as well as a TV show which would act as a prequel and focus on Kvothe's parents. The following year it was confirmed that Miranda, the nuclear-hot creator of hit stage musical Hamilton, was working on the project as a songwriter for both the films and the TV series, whilst Lindsey Beer was working on the script for the first movie, based on The Name of the Wind.

In 2017, things really got moving when Showtime optioned the TV series rights, attaching John Rogers (Leverage, The Librarians) to write, produce and showrun. In 2018 Sam Raimi entered talks to direct the first film. A few months later, in 2019, John Rogers confirmed he had written all ten scripts for Season 1 of the show, which was entering pre-production. Things looked like they were going very well.

Then things collapsed, pretty quickly. In September 2019 Showtime abruptly halted all work on the Kingkiller TV series and returned the rights to Lionsgate. By that time it was clear that Raimi had passed on the movie project, and subsequently opted to direct Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness instead. The rumour in Hollywood was that Showtime has massively over-committed to its ambitious Halo TV series, spending much more than originally planned, and had to quickly divest itself of several other expensive shows, even ones that had been greenlit, in order not to have a huge budget overrun. Ironically, of course, Halo was moved from Showtime to Paramount+ and the financial issues sorted out behind the scenes, meaning that possibly the Kingkiller project could have moved forwards after all.

In November 2020, Lin-Manuel Miranda confirmed he was still working on the IP, but the plan to adapt the (gigantic) novels as single movies had now been abandoned and the project was being reconceptualised as a TV show based directly on the novels. Miranda cited his work on the HBO/BBC co-production His Dark Materials (based on Philip Pullman's novels) as giving him a "fresh perspective" on the complexities of adapting a fantasy trilogy for the screen.

Miranda's departure from the project seems to be down to two reasons. First, his own workload is through the roof. He is currently enjoying huge success from his work on the Disney animated movie Encanto, including his first-ever Number One single for "We Don't Talk About Bruno." His 2021 film Tick, Tick...Boom! has also enjoyed significant critical and commercial success. Secondly, it sounds like he had not found a way of adapting the books' structure satisfyingly, noting that it has an "insane Russian nesting doll structure," a reference to its multiple timelines.

An unspoken fly in the ointment is that the third novel in the trilogy, The Doors of Stone, remains incomplete after eleven years. Rothfuss's editor confirmed in 2020 that she had not yet read a single word of the book and did not believe any work had been done on it since 2016. Rothfuss has since spoken more openly about progress on the book, and read its prologue for the first time last year. However, no release date has been set.

Given the immense success of the books - reportedly well over 10 million and possibly closer to 20 million copies of the two books have been sold to date, easily making them the most successful debut epic fantasy series this century - it is likely an adaptation will eventually happen. However, it will not be in the near future and it sounds like it will be without Lin-Manuel Miranda's involvement.

KINGKILLER CHRONICLE adaptation still in limbo, being rethought as a TV project

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Lin-Manuel Miranda has confirmed that work remains on hold on an adaptation of Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicle novel series.

Lionsgate acquired the rights to Rothfuss's novels in 2015 and put a multi-pronged plan into operation, including a direct adaptation as a movie trilogy, a video game and a prequel TV series about the parents of the main character in the books, Kvothe. Work initially went very well, with Showtime picking up the TV project and Sam Raimi in talks to direct the film. Screenwriter John Rogers even completed the writing of all ten episodes of the planned first season of the show. Unfortunately, the project then collapsed last year. Showtime, facing massive budget overruns from its Halo TV series, cancelled the TV series and returned the rights to Lionsgate, whilst Sam Raimi withdrew from the film project.

According to Miranda, his stint playing Lee Scoresby on the BBC's His Dark Materials has given him "a new perspective" on the project, including the plan to adapt each of the three Rothfuss novels as a two-hour film. His Dark Materials is developing each of Philip Pullman's books across eight hours and even so has had to leave material out. To put this in context, the second Kingkiller novel, The Wise Man's Fear, is longer than all three Dark Materials novels combined by itself.

It sounds like the movie part of the project may therefore be dead, with a direct adaptation of the novels themselves as a TV show now the plan.

Despite this rethink, the project remains where it was with no TV channel or streamer currently attached. Reportedly Apple+ has passed on the project, meaning there aren't many more venues that might be interested. Netflix and Amazon have multiple fantasy projects (including The Witcher, The Chronicles of Narnia, Conan the Barbarian and a live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender for the former and Wheel of Time and Lord of the Rings: The Second Age for the latter) either shooting or in pre-production already and other potential partners might be holding fire to see how they pan out.

An additional problem is that the Kingkiller Chronicle remains incomplete. It's been almost ten years since the previous volume in the series, The Wise Man's Fear, was released and in July Rothfuss's editor confirmed she hasn't read a word of it and doesn't believe Rothfuss has touched the manuscript since 2014. Rothfuss himself has refused to discuss the status of the third book, The Doors of Stone, for many years, instead running online charity events and video game streaming events.

The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man's Fear are two of the biggest-selling fantasy novels of the past two decades though, having chalked up approximately 20 million sales of just two books (in comparison, Brandon Sanderson has sold around 30 million copies, but of more than two dozen books), with a formidable fanbase. If an adaptation could be well-made, it would likely be popular, but after the reception to the final season of Game of Thrones, potential partners might be wary of embarking on a similar project.

Sam Raimi in talks to direct NAME OF THE WIND movie

Lionsgate Entertainment is in talks with acclaimed horror and fantasy director Sam Raimi to helm the movie version of The Name of the Wind, the bestselling fantasy novel by Patrick Rothfuss.

Lionsgate are developing an ambitious, multi-media approach to adapting The Kingkiller Chronicle. They are simultaneously developing a movie trilogy which will directly adapt the three novels - The Name of the Wind (2007), The Wise Man's Fear (2011) and The Doors of Stone (forthcoming) - and a prequel TV series which will explore the adventures of Kvothe's parents. The TV series is in development at Showtime.

Lindsey Beer has written the script for the film, but the real reason things are moving is down to Lin-Manuel Miranda. Having achieved superstar status thanks to his Broadway musical Hamilton, Miranda has made the Kingkiller project his next priority. He is working on the music for both the TV series and films, including the in-universe songs, and is executive producing. With Hollywood keen to tap his talent, interest in this project has sky-rocketed.

The financial success of the novels has certainly helped: Patrick Rothfuss is the biggest-selling debut fantasy author of the 21st Century. The Name of the Wind, The Wise Man's Fear and spin-off novella The Slow Regard of Silent Things have sold well over 10 million copies between them in just over a decade.

However, work on the project may be dependent on Rothfuss releasing the third novel in the series: despite claiming the trilogy was complete over a decade ago and releasing pictures of the apparent manuscript for The Doors of Stone in 2013, the book is still has no release date set.

Sam Raimi is an interesting choice to helm the movie: although his reputation was made in gory horror movies (such as the cult Evil Dead trilogy, its remake and the ongoing Ash vs. Evil Dead TV series), Raimi achieved his greatest success with his three Spider-Man movies starring Tobey Maguire. He also directed Oz the Great and Powerful in 2013 and has been looking for another feature film project since then.

Creator of HAMILTON working on NAME OF THE WIND TV series, movie and...stage show?

Lin-Manuel Miranda has gained recent fame as the creator, writer, songwriter and star of hit Broadway musical Hamilton, based on the life of Alexander Hamilton, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. His next project will be epic fantasy, with him tapped to work on on Lionsgate's multimedia Kingkiller Chronicle project.

Lionsgate bought the film, TV and video game rights to Patrick Rothfuss's fantasy trilogy, The Kingkiller Chronicle, a year ago. Their plan was to directly adapt the novels as a trilogy of movies, as well as using a TV show to explode side-stories and characters. Apparently they are also considering a stage show based on the trilogy.

Lindsey Beer is writing the script for the first movie, based on The Name of the Wind, and Miranda has been hired to write original songs and work on the soundtrack. Those familiar with the novels will now that the main character Kvothe is an accomplished musician and songwriter, so this is a surprisingly good match. Rothfuss will also be working on the film and TV show as a producer, with Miranda likely to serve as a musical director on the TV project as well.

The Kingkiller Chronicle consists of the novels The Name of the Wind (2007) and The Wise Man's Fear (2011). Together they have sold over 10 million copies, making Rothfuss the biggest-selling debut fantasy author of the century so far. The much-delayed third volume, The Doors of Stone, is expected in 2018. Rothfuss's writing will next be seen in the video game Torment: Tides of Numenera, due early next year from inXile Entertainment.

Patrick Rothfuss's books to be adapted into many things

Patrick Rothfuss has struck a deal with Lionsgate over his Kingkiller Chronicles books, The Name of the Wind, The Wise Man's Fear and the forthcoming Doors of Stone. The deal will involve feature films, a TV series and a video game.

The exact details of the deal remain to be hammered out, but will include both films and a TV series that will adapt the books, as well as potentially telling new stories in the world of Termerant. Robert Lawrence, who worked on Clueless, Rock Star and The Last Castle, will executive produce the project.

The level of Rothfuss's involvement also remains to be seen. Rothfuss is finishing off The Doors of Stone for (hopefully) a 2016 release, so will be free of any immediate, announced obligations in the near future. Rothfuss also picked up some recent video game writing experience when he contributed characters, quests and dialogue to inXile's forthcoming Torment: Tides of Numenera.

It's unlikely we will see anything on screen before (at the earliest) late 2017/early 2018, but the level of commitment from Lionsgate is seriously impressive.

The news also confirms that the Kingkiller books have sold just over 10 million copies, making it easily the most successful debut epic fantasy series of the past decade.

Studios clash for Patrick Rothfuss book rights

Several major studios are engaged in an epic battle to win the film rights to Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicles series of epic fantasy novels. Rothfuss invited the studios to pitch to him at Comic-Con in an unusually public display of bidding ferocity.

Rothfuss welcomed the opening bid for the film rights to his books, even if it was less than what he'd originally hoped.

The first two novels in the series, The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man's Fear, were released in 2007 and 2011 respectively. The concluding volume, The Doors of Stone, is expected in 2016. The imminent conclusion to the trilogy is probably what sparked interest from movie companies after several previous attempts to bring the project to the screen failed.

Warner Brothers, MGM and Lionsgate are believed to be leading the charge for the rights, with Fox and Universal also believed to be interested.

Lynch/Rothfuss London signing

Last night I attended a joint signing by Scott Lynch and Patrick Rothfuss at the huge Forbidden Planet store in central London. I'd met Pat before, four years ago, but this was my first time meeting Scott.

The signing table looms into sight at last, like Mount Doom after Frodo's long journey. Or something.

The signing was packed out. I mean, huge. The queue snaked around the entire store back and forth like a slow-moving conga. Fairly late in the process someone counted the number of people in the queue and came back with 300, but I think it was a fair bit more than that. Forbidden Planet is used to hosting massive signings from movie stars, but the size of this queue for two fantasy authors whose names don't have the initials 'R.R.' or 'J.K.' in them seemed to take the staff by surprise. I arrived at the store at 5.30 (the signing was due to start at 6.00) and finally got to the signing table at around 8.15pm. It turns out S.M. Stirling was also doing a signing upstairs and I contemplated getting one of his books to get signed, but he was long gone by the time the Lynchfuss signing was done.

A Gentleman Bastard and myself, yesterday.

Following the signing, we repaired to a nearby hostelry where Pat and Scott chatted with fans and did a bit of a double act discussion talking about their books and writing process. It sounds like we shouldn't be holding our breaths about seeing The Doors of Stone in the near future, but things sounded a lot more hopeful about The Thorn of Emberlain (though neither author, with wisdom born of experience, offered up potential release dates).

Myself, Pat Rothfuss and Pat Rothfuss's beard, which had its own hospitality suite. We should really be charging Tad Williams for free advertising here as well.

It was a bit of a slog to get through the signing process, but Pat and Scott were good speakers and the evening was fun. In the future, however, I think I'll make sure I get to the signing a bit earlier.

The Queue. Long will it haunt my dreams.

Patrick Rothfuss's NAME OF THE WIND optioned for television

It has been announced that New Regency Productions and Fox Television have optioned the TV rights to Patrick Rothfuss's novel, The Name of the Wind. If successful, the series would also adapt the other two books in The Kingkiller Chronicle trilogy, The Wise Man's Fear and the forthcoming The Doors of Stone.

Eric Heisserer will be writing the script. Heisserer's previous credits include Final Destination 5 and the unnecessary prequel to The Thing, as well as the reboot of A Nightmare on Elm Street.

There is no word on what network or channel this will air on yet. It's also only an option. A script will need to be written and then greenlit before it moves into production. Given Rothfuss's well-known love of the works of Joss Whedon, which have had 'problems' with Fox in the past, it is surprising that he's agreed to sell the rights to them. Some have suggested that Fox may be intending this project for their FX channel (which is more forgiving of low ratings and usually givest its shows a fairer shake than Fox itself), though that is pure speculation.

It will also be interesting to see how the story is translated to TV. Most of the story is from Kvothe's POV, and in fact there are strong hints that Kvothe is colouring his story for his own ends. How this would be translated onto screen remains to be seen.

Rothfuss recently said that The Doors of Stone should be published some time in 2014.

Rothfuss, Martin, Valente and Mieville win awards

Patrick Rothfuss won the David Gemmell Legend Award for Best Novel this week for his second book, The Wise Man's Fear. The other winners at the award were Helen Lowe's Heir of the Night for the Morningstar Award for Best Debut, and Raymond Swanland for the Ravenheart Award for Best Cover Art for Blood of Aenarion.

Meanwhile, the Locus Awards were also announced this week. George R.R. Martin won the Best Fantasy Novel award for A Dance with Dragons, whilst China Mieville won the Best SF Novel Award for Embassytown. Catherynne M. Valente won a triple prize of Best YA Book (The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making), Best Novella (Silently and Very Fast) and Best Novelette (White Lines on a Green Field). Shaun Tan won Best Artist and Ellen Datlow Best Editor.

The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss

Kvothe the Bloodless, Kvothe the Arcane, Kvothe the Kingkiller. He is a legend but the real man is an enigma. A man named Chronicler is trying to find out the truth behind the legend by convincing Kvothe to tell him his life story, a task so long it will take three days to complete.


On the second day, Kvothe relates more of his time at the Commonwealth University, his ongoing feud with another student named Ambrose and his increasingly proficient studies in various areas. He also tells of his time spent in Vintas, serving a nobleman seeking to woo a lady, and learning the arts of combat in far Ademre. But how much of Kvothe's story is truth and how much is his own fabrication?

The Wise Man's Fear is the sequel to The Name of the Wind and the second in The Kingkiller Chronicle trilogy. Since the trilogy was originally one extremely long novel split into three parts, The Wise Man's Fear has little preamble and not much of the climax. It starts, we follow the story for a time, and then it ends with little resolved. For a novel that is 1,000 pages long in hardcover, that should be a fairly damning comment.

Rothfuss's saving grace is his immense writing skill. He could make the telephone directory sound warm and interesting, and whilst the book is extremely long most of the chapters are short and snappy. The narrative is divided into two distinct sections, basically Kvothe in the University and Kvothe out in the world, and these sections are themselves fairly episodic. Whilst Kvothe's hunt for information about the Chandrian, the mysterious creatures that killed his family, provides a narrative spine of sorts, sometimes dozens of chapters pass without this plot element being as much as mentioned.

As a result The Wise Man's Fear feels less like a novel and more like a collection of tightly linked short stories (a feeling added to by the fact that one episode in the novel, The Road to Levinshir, was previously published as a separate short story almost a decade ago). This dichotomy - a very episodic book presented as a single novel - creates problems for pacing and consistency, with some of the episodes and stories being fascinating and others being tedious, whilst several more interesting-sounding incidents (like Kvothe standing trial for a misdemeanour) are skipped over in a couple of paragraphs. The Name of the Wind suffered from this as well, such as the incongruous and dull draccus incident towards the end of the book, but due to its much greater length The Wise Man's Fear is even more prone to it. Kvothe's dalliance with a famous Fae temptress goes on for far too long and winds up feeling a bit like the porn version of Tom Bombadil, whilst Kvothe's training montage with the Klingon Aiel Dothraki Vikings of the far north-east is just plain dull. Those who found Kvothe insufferable and Gary Stu-esque in the first novel will likely plain hate him here, as he picks up a ton more skills (including unarmed and armed combat, more magical skills and several more languages) with ease.

But Rothfuss does seem to be more overtly pulling the wool over the reader's eyes here. Kvothe reports on his badass fighting skills but then in a 'present' incident is unable to effectively defend himself from attack. Is this because he overrated his combat abilities, or because he's rusty, or because he deliberately holds back? The reader is invited to decide. Anomalies in Kvothe's story are also pointed out by Chronicler, and Kvothe admits to occasionally sprucing up his story. He's not exactly an unreliable narrator on the scale of Severian in The Book of the New Sun, but Rothfuss is at least letting the reader know that Kvothe himself might not be the best person to tell his tale, but he's all we've got to go on.


Elsewhere, plot elements are carefully alluded to rather than being spelt out, such as the motivations and identity of Denna's mysterious employer, or the relationship between Kvothe and a minor character that Kvothe himself is totally oblivious to. There is an impressive degree of subtlety running through this brick-thick tome that will no doubt raise questions and discussions that will keep fantasy forums busy until the final volume is released.

Rothfuss's powers of prose and characterisation remain highly impressive. The writing is rich and atmospheric, setting the scene perfectly, and Rothfuss has a keen eye for detail, humour and warmth (though in this book slightly more undercut by bitterness and cynicism), but those hoping for the story to explode into life, become bigger and more epic, will be disappointed. In a way Rothfuss is writing an anti-epic fantasy, with the focus narrowly on one character and the ordinary events that have been inflated out of all proportion. This forces the reader to keep downplaying expectations, since Rothfuss isn't playing the same game as a lot of other epic fantasy authors.

The Wise Man's Fear (***½) is a difficult book to review, as it's well-written, sometimes compulsively page-turning and features some extremely well-played and subtle storytelling. On other, briefer, occasions it's tediously dull, cloying and prone to attacks of purple prose (particularly in the frisky fairy section). The book is also monstrously overlong and could have been split into two or three more focused, shorter books without too much of a problem. But Rothfuss is too good a writer to let the book's many issues sink it, and the book ends with the reader left wanting to know what happens next, which is the key thing. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

It's done!!!

No, not that one, but almost as long-awaited:


The quasi-final manuscript for The Wise Man's Fear has been fired off to both Pat Rothfuss's American and British publishers and both are now on course to publish on 1 March 2011. Gollancz have just confirmed via Facebook that they have received the manuscript and it is now full steam ahead. In addition, on his blog, Rothfuss confirms that ARCs and reader copies will be going out in the near (ish) future.

Why 'quasi' final? The book, though fully drafted and revised, still needs last-minute corrections, copy-editing and checks but, essentially, the book is done. Huzzah!

Patrick Rothfuss in LOCUS

Patrick Rothfuss has been interviewed by the American Locus magazine, getting a cover promo as well as a bemusing but also awesome interior pic:


Rothfuss discusses the origins of the series and the problems that he faced in bringing The Wise Man's Fear to a close. The interview is in issue 595 and Rothfuss blogs about the interview here.

Brief updates

At Comic-Con, Patrick Rothfuss reported that The Wise Man's Fear has come in just short of 400,000 words, making it larger than, for example, any book in the Wheel of Time or Malazan series. He remains very confident of the planned March/April release slot.

A sinister hooded figure, made even more mysterious by being painted very, very small and put in a location where he looks like he's assessing the mould damage.

The new Avatar series, The Legend of Korra, is apparently only planned to be a 12-episode mini-series at the moment rather than an ongoing serial.

At the Battlestar Galactica panel, several actors and one of the writers hinted that we might be seeing the BSG characters again in some form. Meanwhile, the second half of Caprica's first season has been pushed back to January 2011. SyFy are apparently still debating whether to renew the series.

StarCraft II is released tomorrow. The United States defence department would not be drawn if the current naval exercises off the coast of the Korean peninsular were planned specifically to deter a North Korean invasion as millions of South Koreans skive off work to play the game, leaving the country dangerously distracted by Zerg rushes and mastering the new units.

Filming of Season 1 of Game of Thrones commences today in Belfast and will continue through to January 2011, with transmission a few months later. Good luck to the cast and crew!

Patrick Rothfuss announces WISE MAN'S FEAR deadline

As widely reported elsewhere in the blogosphere, Patrick Rothfuss has announced his deadline for turning in the final version of The Wise Man's Fear, the second book in his Kingkiller Chronicle trilogy, following on from 2007's acclaimed The Name of the Wind.


According to Rothfuss, if he finishes the final draft of book (there are three existing drafts) by September 2010, the novel will be published in the United States on 1 March 2011. Obviously, if he doesn't, it won't.

Encouraging news from Rothfuss. If Scott Lynch also hits his dates for the final draft and revisions to The Republic of Thieves, we could see these two much-delayed novels coming out very close together.

Patrick Rothfuss completes THE WISE MAN'S FEAR (again)

Having turned in his first draft of The Wise Man's Fear last year (itself a massive reworking of the original manuscript of all three books that got Rothfuss his publisher), Pat Rothfuss has confirmed that his second draft has been turned in. I have to say that 'draft' is a bit of a misnomer here. Based on his comments, the book has been pretty heavily rewritten and re-edited with changes to the structure of the book and new material added.

As Rothfuss states, this isn't the final draft of the book, nor does it mean a publication date will be forthcoming imminently. It is, however a big step in the right direction. I suspect that this news does mean that the book will be a 2011 release rather than a 2o10 one, however.

Pat Rothfuss signing

Last night Patrick Rothfuss was in London to sign copies of The Name of the Wind at Forbidden Planet. I headed down there, met up with Graeme and we got our copies of the book signed. We hit on the idea of doing some photos. Graeme went for the serious look:

Not a publicity photograph for a new cop show coming this autumn. But maybe it should be?

Pat suggested that we do the 'funny' picture, which resulted in Traumatic Unexpected Blogger Molestation:

Not me being attacked by a young Brian Blessed.

That was an unforgettable experience. Anyway, post-signing we repaired to a nearby holstery where Pat held a Q&A and did some readings: a poem, one of his college humour columns (advice on relationships via the medium of monkeys) and a reading from The Wise Man's Fear, which was very good. Some interesting information came out of the signing - more Bast in Book 2 but not his full story, we meet some other races and cultures, and maybe only 8% of all the building Pat has done for the world will come out in the books - and Pat is a friendly guy who has a promising secondary career in stand-up if he gets bored of the whole novel thing.

"You want this, don't you?"

Pat also expanded on the reasons for the delay to the book, citing structural issues and the complications that arise when you've had 13 years to work on a book and are then asked to turn the second book in within one year, and can it be better please? There was some interesting stuff there on the writing process as well.

All-in-all, a good time was had. Thanks to Pat for coming along and the Gollancz and Forbidden Planet crews for arranging everything!

Patrick Rothfuss has completed The Wise Man's Fear

Pat Rothfuss has finished the first draft of The Wise Man's Fear, the sequel to his mega-selling debut, The Name of the Wind. The process of editing and rewriting will now begin, but at last the process of getting the book onto the shelves is now underway. My guess is we will see the book on shelves within the year, possibly somewhat less than that.

No word on Scott Lynch's progress on The Republic of Thieves yet.

EDIT: I'm actually hearing there may be good news in a few weeks about Lynch as well, but I suspect it will mean scrubbing the book off your 2009 calendars.

Authors on Writing and Obligations

Whilst sparked by the GRRM furore of a couple of weeks ago, a number of other authors have spoken out about the problems they face with deliveries, promises, false release dates and a lack of understanding over the writing process. Charlie Stross weighs in here (some other authors and Tor uber-editor Patrick Nielsen Hayden appear in the comments), John Scalzi here and here, and, most recently, Patrick Rothfuss here. Tom Lloyd also offers a relative newcomer to the genre's perspective here.

Rothfuss, who has been suffering similar harassment to GRRM, makes some very interesting and good points about the issues he has been suffering on The Wise Man's Fear, but notably doesn't mention several of the big personal problems (which he did blog about last year) that have no doubt contributed to the delay. The idea that people would continue to moan about the book being late after that is pretty stunning.

In the meantime, those fretting over delayed gratification and want to hear about something that has been finished can read the first review of Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold here.