Hopeful fans are now waiting for the release The Winds of Winter believing that it will be out this year. As George R.R. Martin revealed that he had a "stress-free" Christmas, a lot wonder why the A Song of Ice and Fire series author is not busy writing.

The 68-year-old novelist shared on his blog that this year's festivity was quite mellow for him. In fact, he just spent the holidays at home with Parris, some of his friends, cats and he definitely had a good time. From here, fans speculate that he is done writing the sixth novel of the much-awaited Game of Thrones knowing that he is having a more relax time.

Martin's post gives birth from one news to another as some deem that The Winds of Winter is now on proofreading stage. Hence, they strongly believed that the book will soon come out. However, fans should only take the assumptions as a grain of salt as the short-story writer and the novel's publisher are yet to announce its completion.

Meanwhile, a Reddit user named AdmiralKird predicted why The Winds of Winter release comes late. The redditor explained that the novel has a broad scope of the story, thus, it isn't unveiled in 2016. In fact, he believed that there is a big chance that the book would be divided into to two to three volumes because of its long narrative.

His claim is also supported by another Reddit user named BrydenBFish, who is considered an expert theorist about A Song of Ice and Fire. He said that Martin's previous Game of Thrones novels are indeed very long. With that, if the author wrote more than 1,500 pages of the story, it would be too difficult to compile in one book.

As nothing is confirmed yet as of this writing, fans still have to wait for an official announcement for the release of The Winds of Winter.