The Meerenese Knot refers to the plot points in AFFC and ADWD that created problems for GRRM and eventually took him eleven years to figure out. What plot points do you think GRRM is having trouble figuring out in TWOW? The Meerenese Knot can partially be explained by the removal of the timeskip in the plotline, but I can't think of a similar problem that could be delaying TWOW.
Posted Aug 15, 2017, 4:18 AM UTC
The actual solution of the Meerenese Knot + fAegon, with a gigantic ????? on the outline portion headlined "What the fuck is the endgame involving Lady Stoneheart, Brienne and Jaime"
I don't know that there is such a knot in this case. These are massive books with complicated plots and they take years to write.
And, to be fair, the Meerenese Knot has not been solved yet. GRRM clearly intended his five year gap to build up each of his major characters in new ways. Jon would spend five years preparing the defenses of the Wall and learning to be a commander, Sansa would learn political intrigue from Littlefinger, Arya would be training with the Faceless Men, Bran with the Last Greenseer, Dany would be ruling and learning to be a queen, etc, etc. And in the books published so far you can see GRRM trying to find ways around this or speed things up. Dany didn't have five years to learn to control her dragons... but her allies are about to have a magical horn for controlling dragons dropped in their laps. Bran didn't get five years of training... but he is getting a special magical potion/mixture designed to rapidly advance his abilities. Samwell won't have five years to train to be a Maester... but he is about to get a crash course from the disciples of an actual mage.
Point is, until we're out of Meereen, the knot is intact. GRRM seems like he's figured out a way to get there, but it's not a short path.
I think he could have made the five year gap work. People already separate the first three books from the other books. So it could have been pregap and aftergap. I think it really could have worked. I know, he didn't think it flowed well and would have to do a lot of explaining. But honestly it might have ended up letting him write a hell of a lot faster ironically
On top of Meereen, we have some similar knots in Winterfell and Kings landing.
The Northern Knot
He never actually solved the Knot in the first place.