George R.R. Martin’s Next Plot Twist Won’t Be Seen on Game of Thrones

George R.R. Martin has planned another big twist plan in his A Song of Ice and Fire saga – but you won’t see it on HBO’s Game of Thrones.

The author told IGN he’s decided to move forward with the mysterious narrative move in his next novel, The Winds of Winter. It’s a twist Martin first told EW about early last year, but at the time he wasn’t sure if he was going to pull the trigger or not.

“I have decided to do that, yes,” Martin said in the new interview when asked about his previous quote. “Will you know it? I don’t know. It’s fairly obvious because it is something that involves a couple of characters, one of whom is dead on the show, but not dead in the books. So the show can’t do it, because they have killed a character I have not killed. But that doesn’t narrow it down much because at this point there are like 15 characters who are dead on the show who are still alive on the books.”

Last April, Martin told EW he came up with a twist on a long-time character that he never previously considered. “This is going to drive your readers crazy,” he teased, “but I love it. I’m still weighing whether to go that direction or not. It’s a great twist. It’s easy to do things that are shocking or unexpected, but they have to grow out of characters. They have to grow out of situations. Otherwise, it’s just being shocking for being shocking. But this is something that seems very organic and natural, and I could see how it would happen. And with the various three, four characters involved … it all makes sense. But it’s nothing I’ve ever thought of before. And it’s nothing they can do in the show, because the show has already — on this particular character — made a couple decisions that will preclude it, where in my case I have not made those decisions.”

Of course, divergence between Martin’s books and the HBO hit series is nothing new. Thrones does plenty of plot twists that are not in the novels and the show will depart into almost entirely new territory this season as the program’s narrative extends beyond the scope of the author’s five published novels in the saga. In January, Martin announced to his readers that Winds, despite his best efforts, would not be finished in time for the return of Thrones on April 24. To keep up with Martin’s latest posts, read his Not a Blog.

This article originally appeared on EW.com