'Winds of Winter' release date rumors: Winter brings no good cheer to Westeros as dark chapters add up

Having waited for five years for the next installment to his massively popular book series, fans of George R.R. Martin are thankful for every little update the author shares about his progress on "The Winds of Winter," the highly anticipated sixth book in the "A Song of Ice and Fire" saga. From teaser chapters to the occasional Q & A's, every detail on the upcoming book matters, and every answer to the simplest questions counts.

Martin's recent appearance at the Guadalajara International Book Fair, as cited by Entertainment Weekly, has just given fans an assurance that work on the book is still ongoing and that the author is making some significant progress toward finally finishing it.

According to Martin, fans can expect "a lot of dark chapters," in the upcoming book, wherein some of the characters will be in "very dark places." Now that winter has finally arrived, the world will be filled with cold and darkness where nothing good is in store for the beloved characters of the fantasy book series.

"Winter is the time when things die," Martin said.

A lot of bad things can be expected to happen before the characters' fates eventually sort themselves out in the end. Are key characters going to die? Who stands out as the ultimate victor in the end? Martin did not say. He did, however, mentioned that the highly anticipated conclusion to his long-running saga is slated to happen in the seventh and final book currently titled "A Dream of Spring."

He refused to share anymore details about the ending, but based on where the story stands now, Martin said that the overall flavor of the last book may be "as much bittersweet as it is happy."

Meanwhile, Screencrush has cited a blog post made by Martin that offered fans more assurances that progress on "The Winds of Winter" is going on well. The post also advised fans that the Guadalajara International Book Fair was his last scheduled appearance this year and that he will be doing a limited amount of events in 2017 to focus more time on "The Winds of Winter."