Just wanted to let everyone know that we will be closing the miniatures balloting on Tuesday. That will be one full week, enough time for everyone to vote.

Barring a flood of new votes in the last few days, it looks as though the winners will be Tyrion (overwhelmingly), Robb, Brienne, and the Red Viper. Prince Oberyn leads the current fifth-place candidate, Asha Greyjoy, by over a hundred votes, and the margin is widening.

I’ve never done one of these before, and I must say, I am finding the results fascinating. So are my friends at Dark Sword. Interestingly enough, on Dark Sword’s other main lines — the ranges based on the artwork of Larry Elmore and Keith Parkinson — the hot babes in chainmail bikinis regularly outsell all other miniatures. No woman in Westeros would be caught dead in a chainmail bikini, of course (well, actually, if a real woman warrior ever wore one of these things, she WOULD be found dead, and very quickly), but we still made sure to include several hot babes in our own list of choices.

Well, Asha Greyjoy is doing well enough, and will finish just out of the money, looks like… but Shae and Arianne Martell are both bringing up the rear, running behind even Prince Joffrey at this juncture. Instead my readers want a dwarf, a bisexual Dornishman, and the homeliest woman in the Seven Kingdoms. Okay.

So what does that mean? Are my readers less horny than Elmore and Parkinson fans? Do they have something against scantily clad women? Is it my large female readership weighing in against sexist stereotypes in fantasy? Is it more just a reflection on the specific characters (Asha’s strong showing would suggest that)?

Interesting to speculate, anyway…

The characters who don’t make the cut this time will have another shot somewhere down the line, have no fear. So long as you guys keep buying these, Dark Sword will keep making more, and we hope to get to everyone eventually.

My thanks to all of you who voted. The turnout has been astonishing.

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