George RR Martin has been working on his penultimate book in his hit A Song of Ice and Fire series since 2011.

In that time, the Game of Thrones TV adaptation has been and gone, with the showrunners having to rely on his bullet point planned plot points for the final two books.

Despite claiming he got a lot written during the pandemic lockdowns, a release date for The Winds of Winter remains nowhere in sight, as the 76-year-old addressed the seemingly never-ending delay.

Martin spoke with TIME about his upcoming fantasy novel: “That's the curse of my life here. There's no doubt Winds of Winter is 13 years late.”

Martin continued: “I’m still working on it. I have periods where I make progress and then other things… divert my attention and then suddenly I’m working for… I have a deadline for one of the HBO shows, I have something else to do.

But the two things are not connected, I swear. I opened a bookstore and people say, ‘Why is George RR Martin opening a bookstore? He could be writing Winds of Winter.’ I don’t actually work in a bookstore. I own it, I hired people to do... [Fans] “overestimate how much time I put into these things.”