How much literary “assistance” was being provided to GRR Martin by his assistants?
One of the assistants to George R. Martin left him to write the sci-fi series The Expanse. When he left was when George R Martin began spinning his wheels in terms of getting stuff done and/or quality. Is there a connection? I don’t know. I do like how in this interview, the assistant says Martin was a great mentor not in writing but in getting deals with Hollywood and other studios.
It wouldn’t be a massive surprise to learn that Martin, rather like FW Dixon and JK Rowling, eventually turns out to have been a committee effort. Although it must be admitted that his complete inability to finish his once-popular series tends to support the idea that it was solely his own work.
Then again, the fact that he has multiple “assistants” raises the question of what, precisely, those assistants were doing? While there’s nothing wrong with having co-writers and collaborators, a dependence on them tends to significantly reduce an author’s ability to write on his own.