Skyrim Veteran Tells George R.R. Martin: Leave Game of Thrones Behind

One fantasy heavyweight has some blunt advice for another: it may be time to walk away from Westeros.

Bruce Nesmith, former lead designer on Skyrim and now a fantasy novelist, says George R.R. Martin should stop trying to finish A Song of Ice and Fire and move on from Game of Thrones entirely. In a recent interview, Nesmith argued that HBO’s eight-season adaptation effectively completed Martin’s saga for him — and that the author would be “wise” to let that stand.

“They finished my work” vs. the curse of Winds

“George gave his story to somebody else and they ran with it and they did an amazing job with it,” Nesmith said in comments reported by GamesRadar+. “I think he’d be wise to say they finished my work and now I want to do something new.”

It’s a stark contrast to Martin’s own stance. The 77-year-old author has repeatedly called The Winds of Winter his top priority, even as he admits the book has become a years-long burden and “the curse of my life,” according to a recent roundup of his comments on the delay.[1]

By most accounts, Winds is massive: timelines compiled by outlets like The Week suggest Martin has drafted more than 1,100–1,500 pages, putting it on track to be the longest book in the series.[2] But word counts haven’t calmed fans who’ve watched HBO roll out multiple new Westeros projects while the main novels remain unfinished.

Here at Escape Into Books, we’ve already seen how that tension is playing out across Martin’s career — from piling TV commitments to his own insistence that no one will finish the saga if he can’t.

TV spinoffs, games, and a never-ending to‑do list

Nesmith’s comments land at a busy moment for Martin. Beyond Winds, he is helping steer HBO’s growing slate of spinoffs, including A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms and a long runway of planned Dunk & Egg stories, plus other Westeros sequels he’s teased in recent years.[3]

He’s also involved in an upcoming Elden Ring film and has talked up a planned follow-up to Fire and Blood alongside more Targaryen lore.[4] In a May 2025 update, Martin again reassured readers that Winds remains on his desk, but admitted he keeps blowing through self-imposed deadlines.[5]

From Nesmith’s point of view, the answer is to stop fighting the clock. As a novelist who has finished two different series since leaving Bethesda, he frames completion — by whoever delivers it — as more important than authorial purity. He even jokes that if HBO ever adapted his own work, he’d gladly let Game of Thrones showrunner David Benioff write the ending.

Should an unfinished epic ever be left unfinished?

Nesmith’s suggestion is bound to rile readers who felt burned by HBO’s final seasons and are counting on Martin to “correct the record” with a radically different book ending. The author himself has promised that his version of Westeros will not land where the show did.[6]

It also deepens a growing creative‑ethics debate: after more than a decade of delays, does an author owe fans closure, or the freedom to walk away? Other fantasy writers, from Brandon Sanderson to Andrzej Sapkowski, have publicly weighed in on Martin’s struggle; now a major game designer-turned-novelist is effectively arguing that HBO has already delivered the ending, for better or worse.

For book readers, the question may be less about whether HBO “finished” the story and more about whose version of Westeros they want to live with. As Martin continues to juggle spinoffs, films, and side projects, Nesmith’s provocation lingers: is it braver to keep wrestling with a cursed masterpiece — or to finally put it down and build a new world from scratch?

[1] 9meters: George R.R. Martin offers update on books he’s working on
[2] The Week: Timeline of Martin’s progress on The Winds of Winter
[3] Martin teases new Game of Thrones sequel series
[4] Yahoo: George R.R. Martin shares new insights into Winds delay
[5] UPI: Martin says Winds of Winter is still a priority
[6] GRRM promises a different book ending than HBO’s Game of Thrones