To prologue or not to prologue?

[CryptofCthulhu]

Yeah, I'm preparing myself to be lynched but I find Martin's work very overwhelming at times. I certainly like and appreciate what he's built, but the sheer number of characters and how one minute we'll be in Arya's head, the next we'll be in 'slave boy number 1's' head feels disjointed sometimes.
Don't get me wrong, I'll still be buying the Winds of Winter, whenever it comes out

His work was pretty lean and mean to begin with but then it started to suffer from bloat and too many secondary plots that did nothing but obscure what the main plot is supposed to be.

I wouldn't count on ASOIAF being finished in GRRM's lifetime. He's just this side of 70 years old and doesn't look to be in the best shape. Not to mention pretty much all of his "not a blog" updates are about things he's working on that have nothing to do with the next installment of ASOIAF. He spends far more time talking about editing Wild Cards, who should win the Hugo awards, and doing stuff at the movie theater he recently purchased.

Back to the topic. 

[marshall_lamour]

His work was pretty lean and mean to begin with but then it started to suffer from bloat and too many secondary plots that did nothing but obscure what the main plot is supposed to be.

It is starting to feel a bit more like an anthology of shortstories than a focused and holistic work at this point. I don't think I would ever endeavor to stretch one story so far, but I can't say that I haven't enjoyed it. Fortunately, Winter is coming, and I can't think of a better opportunity to tie up loose ends.

[krisjerome]

Personally I have never had a problem with Prologues or Epilogues. Usually I just think of them as another chapter (albeit a chapter that is either stylistically or temporally removed from the main narrative enough to not be a "regular" chapter). I don't think I have ever skipped either.

For my own novel I have both a Prologue and an Epilogue. The former takes place twenty years before the main narrative, while the latter takes place immediately afterward. They serve as "bookends' to the main narrative, and also feature characters who do not have POV's in the rest of the book. I am still not sure if my Epilogue character will have chapters in the second book or not...

[Peat]

I often find it a good way for authors to put a lot of questions in the readers' minds quickly, which is a good thing.

Rescinding my response: I was tired and misread as "put a lot of questions to rest" and ended up restating what you said. [What questions does a reader really have until the story starts? The information given in the beginning of a story should have a reader asking questions of the story until the end, and sometimes, yes, a prologue can accomplish this. An expositional prologue might guide the reader to ask the right questions of the story to follow, but I think that this is best accomplished within the story itself. An author can't really expect the reader to care about exposition without context.]

I dabbled with the idea of utilizing an interlogue in that manner, actually, and while I think I've settled on not including one, I did write it and found it to be an excellent exercise, at least. It's proved to be a great way to summarize large chunks of the work that goes into worldbuilding without the pressure of maintaining narrative flow.

I think you put it better than me in any case and I really like the idea of an interlogue now that you've mentioned it - first I've come across it, but I can see possibilities.

[CryptofCthulhu]

His work was pretty lean and mean to begin with but then it started to suffer from bloat and too many secondary plots that did nothing but obscure what the main plot is supposed to be.

It is starting to feel a bit more like an anthology of shortstories than a focused and holistic work at this point. I don't think I would ever endeavor to stretch one story so far, but I can't say that I haven't enjoyed it. Fortunately, Winter is coming, and I can't think of a better opportunity to tie up loose ends.

Winter is coming on HBO, that's for certain.