What's the story with George RR Martin's " A Dance with Dragons"?  Is the book for sale yet?  Is it better than his last book of the series? I thought he lost interest in his own story.

You got me.  I haven't seen it in any bookstore yet.  It was supposed to be released months ago.

George R.R. Martin keeps a blog (which he calls 'Not a Blog') on Livejournal.  You can always visit his official site as well for updates on the progress on the book, among other things.

Long story short....book 5, "A Dance with Dragons" is not done.   Projection is sometime in 2009 now (of course many of us have been anticipating this latest book since 2007, ha!).  Though I'd like the rest of the series written NOW, I know in the end that I'd rather have him take as long as he needs to get the whole series out.  It's such a great series that I'm happy to wait (even if I am impatient about it sometimes).  Martin does have many other projects he works on as well (Wild Card series for example) so he does seem to split his time, so that slows the process down (but perhaps it's better for him to have many other projects so that he doesn't become too burned out on A Song of Fire and Ice).

I pre-ordered this on Amazon last summer when it was slated to ship in...May, maybe?  And then got the Amazon email saying, sorry, your shipment has been delayed - with a projected delivery date of October 2008.  Then another email saying they didn't know when, if ever, my "item" would be available...then a follow-up saying it was slated for delivery October 2009.  Poor publisher; they keep pushing the pub date to try to keep up with George R.R. Martin's efforts.  And he, in turn, is trying to get it out (at least according to his blog) but keeps running into snags.  But I'm with Alexandra (above) - I'd rather it be right than come out before it's good and ready to come out.  Sigh!

I have a feeling this series is never going to be finished.  It'll go the way of the Wheel of Time series.  So while I do want him to take his time and get it right, I also want this series to get finished by him. 

Brenda, I know just what you mean!

Although - for Douglas Adams fans, the book he was in the middle of writing when he passwed away is finally going to be finished -- by Eoin Colfer (of the Artemis Fowl series).  How cool is that?