George R.R. Martin reveals details about new HBO series Roadmarks

The other week, we learned that A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin was producing an adaptation of Roadmarks, a 1979 fantasy novel by Roger Zelazny about a road that travels through time. Protagonist Red Dorakeen travels the road, searching for a time and place half-remembered, and getting into all kinds of interesting situations along the way.

Now, Martin has revealed a bit more about the series on his Not a Blog. “We had not intended to announce anything yet, to be sure,” he said, implying that this information may have leaked.

But the Roadmarks pilot order is a real thing, “[w]hich is more than can be said about most of the stories about me that I stumble over these days, boys and girls.  (I have said it before, and will say it again, but sometimes it seems no one listens. Do not believe everything you read).” We certainly have no idea what kind of story he could be talking about.

In any case, Martin has a lot of respect for Roger Zelazny, best known for his The Chronicles of Amber series. In fact, Martin adapted the author’s short story “The Last Defender of Camelot” for The Twilight Zone back in 1985, the first script Martin wrote that was actually produced for television. If you’re interested in learning more about the guy, Martin recommend check out books like Nine Princes in Amber, Lord of Light, Doorways in the Sand, Creatures of Light and Darkness, This Immortal, The Dream Master and more while we wait for the Roadmarks series. “Roger was a friend, a mentor, and one of the greatest science fiction writers who ever lived,” Martin wrote. “He died in 1995, but his work will live for so long as people read SF and fantasy. It was an honor to be able to bring one of his stories to television. And now I am hoping we will be able to do it again.”

That said, Martin admits that “[d]evelopment is a long and uncertain process” and that the show may never even make it to air. But he’s clearly excited about the possibilities. “Honestly, the concept is as big as Amber and could easily have sustained a whole series of books, though Roger only penned the one. It’s our hope that it can also sustain a dozen great seasons on HBO.”

A dozen sounds like it’s pushing things but might as well aim for the stars, I guess.

Will Roadmarks distract George R.R. Martin from finishing The Winds of Winter?

At this juncture, let’s remind fans worried that Martin will never be able to finish The Winds of Winter with all these distractions that he’s not going to be taking a hands-on role with this show. That duty will fall to Star Trek and The Walking Dead veteran Kalinda Vazquez. “[I]t is Kalinda who will be doing most of the work from this point on,” Martin wrote. “I am only an executive producer. Kalinda will be writing the pilot, and if indeed we get a series order, she will be the showrunner, presiding over the writer’s room and in charge of the whole shebang.”

Martin’s duties seemed to mostly be pitching the idea to HBO in the first place. Apparently he pitched it alongside “four other SF and fantasy works (by various other writers) that I thought had the makings of great shows.” He’s fans of them all, obviously, but HBO liked Roadmarks. “A great choice, I think.”

So might we see Roadmarks on the air? Martin predicts it’ll be “a year or two.” In the meantime, there’ll be other things coming out that bear some connection to Martin, even if he’s not personally involved in them:

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