George Raymond Richard Martin (born September 20, 1948), sometimes referred to as GRRM, is an American author of fantasy, horror, and science fiction prose, as well as a screenwriter and television producer. He is best known for A Song of Ice and Fire, his international bestselling series of epic fantasy novels that HBO adapted for their dramatic series Game of Thrones. Martin serves as the series' co-executive producer, while also scripting one of each season's 10 episodes. Martin was selected by Time magazine as one of the "2011 Time 100", a list of the "most influential people in the world".

Biography

George Raymond Martin (he took the Confirmation name Richard at the age of 13) was born on September 20, 1948, in Bayonne, New Jersey, the son of longshoreman Raymond Collins Martin and his wife Margaret Brady Martin, who also had two daughters, sisters Darleen and Janet; the family's heritage is Irish. They lived in a federal housing project near the Bayonne docks.

The young Martin began writing and selling monster stories for pennies to other neighborhood children, dramatic readings included. He also wrote stories about a mythical kingdom populated by his pet turtles; the turtles died frequently in their toy castle, so he finally decided they were killing each other off in "sinister plots". Martin attended Mary Jane Donohoe School and then later Marist High School. While there he became an avid comic-book fan, developing a strong interest in the innovative superheroes being published by Marvel Comics. Fantastic Four No. 20 (Nov 1963) printed a letter Martin wrote to the editor, the first of many sent, e.g., FF #32, #34, and others from his family's home at 35 E. First Street, Bayonne, NJ. Other fans wrote him letters, and through such contacts Martin joined the fledgling comics fandom of the era, writing fiction for various fanzines. In 1965 Martin won comic fandom's Alley Award for his prose superhero story "Powerman vs. The Blue Barrier," the first of many awards he would go on to win for his fiction.

In 1970 Martin earned a B. S. in Journalism from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, graduating summa cum laude; he went on to complete his M. S. in Journalism in 1971, also from Northwestern. Eligible for the draft during the Vietnam War, to which he objected, Martin applied for and obtained conscientious-objector status; he instead did alternative service work for two years (1972–1974) as a VISTA volunteer, attached to the Cook County Legal Assistance Foundation. He also directed chess tournaments for the Continental Chess Association from 1973 to 1976. Then from 1976 to 1978 he was an English and journalism instructor at Clarke University (then Clarke College) in Dubuque, IA, becoming Writer In Residence at the college from 1978 to 1979.

Martin began selling science-fiction short stories professionally in 1970, at age 21. His first story, "The Hero", sold to Galaxy magazine and was published in its February 1971 issue; other sales soon followed. The first story of his nominated for the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award was With Morning Comes Mistfall, published in 1973 by Analog magazine. A member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), Martin became the organization's Southwest Regional Director from 1977 to 1979; from 1996 to 1998 he served as its vice-president.

In 1976, for Kansas City's MidAmeriCon, the 34th World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon), Martin and his friend and fellow writer-editor Gardner Dozois conceived of and organized the first Hugo Losers Party for the benefit of all past and present Hugo-losing writers, their friends and families the evening following the convention's Hugo Awards ceremony. Martin was nominated for two Hugos that year but ultimately wound up losing both awards, for the novelette "...and Seven Times Never Kill Man" and the novella The Storms of Windhaven, co-written with Lisa Tuttle. The Hugo Losers Party became an annual Worldcon event thereafter, its formal title eventually evolving into something a little more politically correct as both its size and prestige grew.

Although Martin often writes fantasy or horror, a number of his earlier works tell science-fiction tales occurring in a loosely defined future history, known informally as "The Thousand Worlds" or "The Manrealm". He has also written at least one piece of political-military fiction, "Night of the Vampyres", collected in Harry Turtledove's anthology The Best Military Science Fiction of the 20th Century.

The unexpected commercial failure of Martin's fourth book, The Armageddon Rag (1983), "essentially destroyed my career as a novelist at the time", he recalled. It began his career in television, however, as a result of a Hollywood option on that novel that then led to him being hired, first as a staff writer and then as an Executive Story Consultant, for the revival of the Twilight Zone. When the CBS series ran its course, Martin migrated over to the already underway satirical science fiction series Max Headroom. He worked on scripts and created the show's "Ped Xing" character (the president of the Zic Zak corporation, Network 23's primary sponsor). Before his scripts could go into production, however, the ABC show was canceled in the middle of its second season. Martin was then hired as a writer-producer on the dramatic fantasy series Beauty and the Beast; in 1989 he became the show's co-supervising producer. He also wrote 14 episodes. During this same period, he also worked in print media as a book-series editor, overseeing the development of the lengthy and still on-going Wild Cards series, which takes place in a shared universe in which a small slice of post–World War II humanity gains superpowers after the release of an alien-engineered virus. In Second Person Martin "gives a personal account of the close-knit role-playing game (RPG) culture that gave rise to his Wild Cards shared-world anthologies". Martin's own contributions to the multiple-author series often feature Thomas Tudbury, "The Great and Powerful Turtle", a powerful psychokinetic whose flying "shell" consisted of an armored VW Beetle. As of June 2011, 21 Wild Cards volumes had been published in the series; earlier that same year, Martin signed the contract for the 22nd volume, Low Ball, which has since been completed and will be published by Tor Books in mid-summer of 2014. In early 2012 Martin signed another Tor contract for the 23rd Wild Cards volume, High Stakes.

Martin's novella, Nightflyers, was adapted into a 1987 feature film of the same title; he was not happy about having to cut plot elements for the screenplay's scenario in order to accommodate the film's small budget.

Martin ran a campaign of Chaosium's 1983 role-playing game Superworld in Albuquerque, which eventually gave rise to his series of superhero novels known as "Wild Cards", published between 1987-1995.


A Song of Ice and Fire


In 1991 Martin briefly returned to writing novels and began what would eventually turn into his epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire inspired by the Wars of the Roses and Ivanhoe, which will comprise seven volumes. The first, A Game of Thrones, was published in 1996. In November 2005, A Feast for Crows, the fourth novel in this series, became The New York Times No. 1 Bestseller and also achieved No. 1 ranking on The Wall Street Journal bestseller list. In addition, in September 2006, A Feast for Crows was nominated for both a Quill Award and the British Fantasy Award. The fifth book, A Dance with Dragons, was published in July 2011, quickly becoming an international bestseller, including a No. 1 ranking on the New York Times Bestseller List and many others; it remained on the NY Times list for more than a year. The series has received praise from authors, readers, and critics alike. In 2012, A Dance With Dragons made the final ballot for science fiction and fantasy's Hugo Award, World Fantasy Award, Locus Poll Award, and the British Fantasy Award; the novel went on to win the Locus Poll Award for Best Fantasy Novel. Two more books are planned in the series, but have not yet been written, at least tentatively consisting of The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring.


HBO series production

During completion of A Dance With Dragons and other projects, George R. R. Martin was also heavily involved in the production of a television series adaptation of the A Song of Ice and Fire books named after the first book, A Game of Thrones. Martin's involvement included the selection of a production team and participation in scriptwriting; the opening credits list him as a co-executive producer of the series.

HBO Productions purchased the television rights for the entire A Song of Ice and Fire series in 2007 and began airing the fantasy series (titled "Game of Thrones") on their U. S. premium cable channel April 17, 2011; it ran weekly for ten episodes, each approximately an hour long. The series was renewed shortly after the first episode aired. The first season was nominated for thirteen Emmy Awards, ultimately winning two, one for its opening title credits and for Peter Dinklage as Best Supporting Actor. The second season of ten episodes, based on the second Ice and Fire novel A Clash of Kings, began airing on HBO in the U. S. April 1, 2012; the second season was nominated for twelve Emmy Awards, including another Supporting Actor nomination for Dinklage. It went on to win six of those Emmys in the Technical Arts categories, which were awarded the week before the regular televised 2012 awards show. The first season of 10 episodes was also nominated for a 2012 Hugo Award, fantasy and science fiction's oldest award, presented by the World Science Fiction Society each year at the annual worldcon; the show went on to win the 2012 Hugo for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form, at Chicon 7, the 70th World Science Fiction Convention, in Chicago, IL; Martin took home one of the three Hugo Award trophies given in that collaborative category, the other two going to Game of Thrones showrunners' Benioff and Weiss. The second season episode, "Blackwater," written by George R.R. Martin, was nominated the following year for the 2013 Hugo Award in the Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form category; that episode went on to win the Hugo Award at LoneStarCon 3, the 71st World Science Fiction Convention, in San Antonio, TX.