20 Mind-Blowing Facts You Never Knew About George RR Martin

17. He's A Millionaire, But Doesn't Act Like It

There's a lot of gold in George R.R. Martin's coffers, but he puts it to better use than most (and to better use than most of his characters, but then that's not difficult). By virtue of not only having a crazy popular book series that, even a good decade on from the first instalment was published, remain in the best-sellers list but also royalties from the similarly popular TV series adaptation of said books, Martin earns several million dollars a year. He gets something like $15 million a year from HBO alone, before you factor in his other interests. And yet, he doesn't live a particularly flashy lifestyle. His biggest outgoing, in fact, might be that aforementioned wolf sanctuary to which he frequently donates (there's also a rather sweet story of a young British Game Of Thrones fan trying to donate his meagre savings in the hope of appearing in The Winds Of Winter, to which Martin responded by donating thousands to an equivalent UK charity). That ancient DOS word processor that he does all his writing on is just the tip of the iceberg. Because despite having the ability to live like the decadent royalty who so frequently writes about, Martin and his wife instead chose to have a very simple, frugal lifestyle. He does, admittedly, own two houses on the same street in Santa Fe, but they're fairly basic bungalows. He drives the same beat-up Mazda he's had for years. He gets takeaways instead of dining in the finest restaurants. He's a man of simple tastes.