Another year, another season of Game of Thrones on television. If only the books arrived at such a steady pace. The first book in George RR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series, A Game of Thrones, came out 20 years ago this September. The succeeding volumes have each taken five years or so to produce, to the ire of fans. “People yell at you and say: ‘We want the next book right away.’ They’re like babies,” Stephen King said to Martin in a public interview last week. I don’t mind settling for a new instalment every five years – they’re meaty, good to reread, and frankly, too damn time-consuming to pick up every 12 months.

But I must admit I was less happy when Martin announced in January that he had missed the deadline of 31 December 2015, which would have allowed book six, The Winds of Winter, to come out before the TV show embarked on storylines not yet reached in the books. The HBO series thus became a weird mishmash of new and old news, with the vast majority of events coming from book five, A Dance With Dragons, but with some sudden leaps into the unknown, possibly from The Winds of Winter – or even book seven, A Dream of Spring. In the books, Jon is still lying stabbed on the floor in the Black Keep, Cersei hasn’t gone all Godfather on King’s Landing yet, and Arya is still training with the Faceless Men – all of which is in the distant past now for the TV characters.

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Until now, there was always a sense that Martin’s plots were improved somehow in translation to the screen: stories were streamlined, unnecessary characters removed. But certain characters are currently frozen in completely different storylines in the books: Sansa, for example, is still in the Vale with Petyr Baelish and was never married off to Ramsay (that “honour” goes to poor Jeyne Poole, a character who is barely in the show). Catelyn Stark has yet to be bought back to life in the TV show. Jon Connington and Daenerys’s cousin Aegon Targaryen have yet to appear outside the book (but Jorah Mormont seems to be taking on certain plot points from Connington’s story) and Theon and his sister never went to Meereen to pledge fealty to Daenerys – that was Victarion Greyjoy, who is not in the show either.

Certain characters in the books now feel dispensable – and no one wants to be dispensable in a George RR Martin novel

This new season has irrevocably changed how I read the books, because for all the promises that the books and show will do different things, I honestly don’t know how Martin is going to maintain suspense. The idea that the biggest reveals have been taken out of the hands of their creator really saddens me. When I first read the books and reached chapters where, say, Joffrey dies, I loved the feeling that Martin was somewhere gleefully pulling a party popper and shouting “Surprise!” I am predicting something more perfunctory for The Winds of Winter, where quite a few events (read: deaths) have already happened. As a reader, watching it with non-readers for the past five seasons, I lost the wonderful sense of superior wisdom, where I could hint at coming events to unsettle those watching with me. This season, they’d turn to me and I had to say: “I have no idea.”

The characters that have yet to appear or have been written out of the show are starting to feel pointless in the books: Victarion, for example – the TV show bypassed him straight to his brother Aeron – seems like unnecessary filler now. Various Martells have yet to even be mentioned in the show, so I care less about them. And I can’t but feel Catelyn Stark’s storyline, while so interesting in the books, looks as if it is entirely unimportant to the overall plot. Certain characters in the books now feel more dispensable – and no character wants to be dispensable in a George RR Martin novel.

There may be some good things that come from the show. Martin could use the show in the same way the producers use his books, to streamline a few storylines that dragged in season six. Jon’s inevitable Christlike resurrection could be done in one chapter (not multiple episodes). Arya’s storyline had a great climax in the final episode, but her wavering allegiance to the Faceless Men became boring very quickly.

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So far, Martin has revealed 11 chapters from The Winds of Winter, in public readings and blogposts, and has promised to start the book with a bang – or two: The Winds of Winter will begin with the battle for Meereen (handled very nicely in season six of the TV show) and the battle in the north between Ramsay Bolton and presumably a living Jon Snow (a twist I would have liked to have read first, if I am being picky). So far, so familiar now. But will Martin make any changes to the major plots to reintroduce suspense again? Will Arya turn up in Westeros to get revenge on Walder Frey? Is Jon the son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen (again, a twist that readers of the books have been musing over for years)? Will Cersei kill absolutely everyone? If he does keep these storylines, I hope Martin bashes through them quickly, with the awareness that we’re treading an already beaten path. Then, maybe, readers can get ahead of TV again.