George R.R. Martin: father of 'Game of Thrones'

George R.R. Martin, the 70-year-old writer behind HBO's blood-spattered epic "Game of Thrones", has created a multitude of fantasy worlds spanning medieval pasts to distant sci-fi futures. Portly, with a white beard, glasses and usually wearing a cap, Martin has been described as "America's Tolkien" and says he was inspired by the British fantasy master's "The Lord of the Rings" as a teenager. Martin started on the first in the series in 1991 aiming to "write something just as big as my imagination," he told Time in 2017.