'Winds of Winter' release date, plot rumors 2016: George R.R. Martin is 'working hard' on book 6; novel could confirm 'Mad Queen' theory

Following the confirmation that HBO's "Game of Thrones" will end with its eighth season, fans have begun talking about "The Winds of Winter," the upcoming sixth novel in George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" saga, once again.

In January, Martin confirmed that he had failed to meet an end-of-year deadline that his publisher had established for the book. This meant that the sixth season of "Game of Thrones" aired before the book could be published, causing the TV series and the source material to diverge.

Earlier this year, the "Game of Thrones" author also announced that he will be dropping other projects so that he could focus on writing "The Winds of Winter."

Now that it has been confirmed that the Emmy-winning HBO fantasy drama only has a handful of episodes left, fans of both the books and the TV adaptation are wondering if "The Winds of Winter" and "A Dream of Spring," the final installment in the saga, could possibly come out before the series concludes.

On Aug. 1, Martin published an entry on his "Not A Blog" LiveJournal to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the bestselling franchise. He also offered an update on "The Winds of Winter," saying, "But here I am, twenty years later... still working on book six... ((and no, sorry, I have no announcement to make on that front))."

In an interview with Newsweek, Martin's publishing editor, Jane Johnson, said that she has no idea when Martin will finish working on "The Winds of Winter."

"I'm like Jon Snow: I know nothing!" she wrote in an email to the outlet. "All I do know is that George is working very hard. And as soon as we possibly can after he delivers, we'll publish the book."

"It's worth saying he's written the best part of two million words of this series in the past 20 years," Johnson added. "So given the average length of a novel is around 100,000 words, that's 20 novels in most writers' worlds."

Meanwhile, Reddit user BryndenBFish, who has posted various "Game of Thrones" theories that have become quite popular, recently spoke with The Verge about his predictions for the upcoming "The Winds of Winter."

According to the Redditor, in "The Winds of Winter," Daenerys Targaryen could give in to the Targaryen madness and, instead of becoming the heroine that readers expect, will end up becoming increasingly violent and may even burn Westeros to the ground with her dragons.