George RR Martin sometimes mentions that it was his teenage love of Marvel superhero comics that may have ignited his writing passion. In fact his first writing award (an Alley Award for amateur writers) was when he was 17 for a story titled Powerman vs The Blue Barrier. He went on to study journalism, completing his Masters in 1971.

It was around this time that he began to write Sci-Fi books, his story With Morning Comes Mistfall, being nominated for both the Hugo and Nebula Awards in 1973.  Martin was again nominated twice in 1976 for Hugo, his stories now becoming the more familiar fantasy and horror style that he is famous for.  During the 80’s he turned to television writing, most notably for the revamped Twilight Zone and the Beauty and the Beast series, before returning to the fantasy novel scene in the early 90’s.

It was then that he penned what is considered his masterpiece, the first volume in the A Song of Ice and Fire series, titled A Game of Thrones. This was released in 1996 and has since spawned five sequels with another two yet to be published. This series of books formed the basis of the hugely popular HBO Television show ‘Game of Thrones.’ Martin believe that currently there is around 6 seasons worth of material for the TV show and hopes to have completed the final two books in time for their translation to the screen.