So , what did they change , specifically ? I don ' t have time to search all of these links and posts and compare them back and forth . <| sep |> People are generally pretty bad at estimating the time it takes to do things that involve solving problems . You can learn to keep track of how long it took to solve a similar problem and estimate based on that and pad it a bit for good measure , but some people just have this super optimistic idea of how they ' ll just finish this thing that they for some reason think shouldn ' t take any time at all . As a web developer I see this with people I work with constantly . I ' ve been guilty of it , too , though I try to give decent estimates and say , I honestly don ' t know , when something comes up that I don ' t have a great gauge for . As he writes , he likely has to keep solving the problems of how to explain this , how to illustrate that , how to not break continuity or character traits so the Internet won ' t explode on him , etc . which makes things pretty challenging . Sure , he has the outline of the story , but we all get hooked on the books for the stuff jammed in between those major plot points , so he really can ' t cheap out on that stuff or everyone will lose their shit on him . It ' s tough because he ' s kind of gonna get hate whether he rushes and churns out the book not in the state everyone wants it to be in or takes his time and deliberately crafts the story we all want so desperately to read . The situation sucks for us as fans and it probably sucks for him , too . I ' m sure he doesn ' t want to have the Internet , his publisher , and his subconscious sense of creating his legacy constantly wondering WTF he is doing and why he isn ' t done . I ' m a relatively new reader and have only been waiting a couple of years , so I can ' t imagine what it ' s been like for some of the people who have been fans since the early days of the books , but all we can do is wait and not take any timeline seriously until book sellers are advertising a date .