Steven Eriksons Malazan series

[barsoomcore]

As you say, Pants, there's definitely problems with GotM. I like it, as well, but I recognize its flaws. When I finished it, I thought, "Well, there were a lot of cool ideas in there, but I don't know that he's much of a writer."

I read it over again, though, so obviously the cool ideas really spoke to me. They were cool enough that I made the effort to plug through the writing and figure out what was going on.

It's Deadhouse Gates that draws people in. Honestly, everyone, if you thought GotM had good ideas but found it confusing or not super-exciting, you owe it to yourself to pick up DG and give it a go. Things REALLY take off with that book, and for my money the one following -- Memories of Ice -- is even better. MoI is one of the best books I've read in recent years. Absolutely blew me away, and convinced me that Erickson just might be a genius. Whether or not he actually is a genius remains to be seen -- if he can wrap up this series in a satisfying manner and maintain the level of quality he's reached, then yep, he's a genius.

I don't know that he's as good as Steven Brust, but he's awfully darn good. But then, Steven Brust is the best writer EVAH, so obviously nobody is as good as him.

 

[neg]

Tor/Erikson/Me

Nice to see Erikson getting some posts on my favorite boards.

I work as a salesperson for Tor and all of the publishers associated with the parent company.

Let me see if I can give you some information that might be useful:

Comparisons to the Black Company are very apt. I am reading Glen Cook's series right now.

Gardens of the Moon in mass market in January '05, look for it very late in December. It contains a teaser to Deadhouse Gates, Book 2.

If you are a hardcover junky, it has been marked down and now is the time to get it at chain bookstores like Barnes and Nobles, Borders, Hastings, Books a Million, and Media Play. If you would be so kind to hunt down your local Media Play and purchase it there, I would be ever so greatful as I handle that account.

Book 2 Deadhouse Gates is being published in two different and simultaneous formats.

Hardcover Deadhouse Gates ISBN 0765310023 $25.95. Should hit the streets on 2/2/05. May be difficult to find because of the other version we are publishing, so you might want to special order it.

Tradepaper of Deahouse Gates ISBN 0765314290 $14.95. Should hit the streets on 2/2/05 and will definitely be the choice format stocked and promoted at most bookstores. You can probably hunt down a discount copy early after publication. I know Media Play will have it 20% off. I am sure other retailers will have it discounted as well, just not sure who.

Tor felt they didn't get the audience they wanted on the first book, so they did a wise and gutsy play and they are hoping it will pay off. They heavily markdowned the hardcover of book 1 to build the readership and they will publish the next book in a cheaper trade paper edition to further build readership.

They are looking to publish a new Erikson every nine months at this point.

Hope this was helpful, let me know if there are any questions. I might be able to answer them.

-neg

 

[neg]

What a great find!

This series is kind of interesting in the way it's getting published. Erickson has published two novellas set in Malazan with minor characters from the "core" novels through a company called PSPublishing, and now that same company has announced a novel being written by one Ian Cameron Esselmont that is apparently a Malazan-set novel. Esselmont is apparently the co-creator of the Malazan world and an old friend of Erickson's, so this is all kind of wacky and fun.

Holy cow! Thanks barsoomcore, this made my day.

You can buy the three books mention by barsoomcore at this website in the United States, I was able to hunt down the link for PSPublishing.

http://www.clarkesworldbooks.com/index.html

Yum! More Malazan goodness!

-neg

 

[jester47]

I work as a salesperson for Tor and all of the publishers associated with the parent company.

Comparisons to the Black Company are very apt. I am reading Glen Cook's series right now.

Tor felt they didn't get the audience they wanted on the first book, so they did a wise and gutsy play and they are hoping it will pay off. They heavily markdowned the hardcover of book 1 to build the readership and they will publish the next book in a cheaper trade paper edition to further build readership.

They are looking to publish a new Erikson every nine months at this point.

Hope this was helpful, let me know if there are any questions. I might be able to answer them.

-neg

Hey Neg,

Let me see if I can give you some information that might be useful, hopefully you can get it back to TORs marketing people...

Some reasons sales might not have been as good:

The art on the cover looked like "Generic Fantasy Epic here! Our cover looks like a bunch of other cheap authors you have never heard of so buy this book." They need to get the original art or get a new Non-Bore-Laggio artist to do the cover. Apparently marketing has NO IDEA that their covers are killing their sales. F/SF readers go off the cover. DEL REY knows this. Wizards of the Coast knows this. Ballentine knows this. When browsing, they judge by the cover. Readers think "Hey, they kicked down some money(or took some time to find a good artist) for this art, someone has a discerning eye and has a good (probably expensive) cover design graphic artist, that means they are putting some effort behind it, so it might actully not be trash." Use the original art used for Deadhouse Gates, I garuntee sales will jump.

On any kind of promotion they need to say its like Gleen Cook meets George R. R. Martin. They need to leave any mention of Jordan out of it. Even though I never liked the guy (Jordan), most of us that WERE fans are getting really sick of that him (at least I am finding more and more). The last thing we want is ANOTHER Robert Jordan spinning our WHEELS and wasting our TIME.

No one knows who this Steven Erikson guy is. He needs reviews in lots of places. People need to see where he got to in canada and the UK. If TORs Marketing is worth their salt, they wont depend on the book jockys at B&N to know who he is and spread the word. I found out about him by word of mouth through a collector. I had never heard of him before. AND I WAS WORKING AT B&N, and I prided myself on at knowing most of the obscure authors names in the SciFi/Fantasy section.

Of course if you don't ever talk to the marketing folks (I think you do cause sales is pretty darned close to marketing) then I guess this is a useless rant.

Aaron.

 

[neg]

Hey Aaron-

Thanks for your input. Sales actual does get some input on marketing and such. The covers have been a hot topic of discussion and continued to be mulled over. I believe the feeling was that the first two British covers were good, but after that the artwork got less "useful" in relation to the actual content of the books. It continues to be debated...I won't say more than that.

The publisher and the in house readers know the better comparisons are to Glen Cook, and George R. R. Martin. We are steering comparisons to Martin more than anyone else. We know that this is not a Wheel of Time, and sales has been conveying to the publisher that Jordan is seeing some pushback from the readers as to his novels. New Spring in particular, stressed this point. I think the publisher understands that now.

With all that said, I must defend Tor. They are the top Sci-Fi/Fantasy publisher in the US, hands down. They might not be your personal favorite, but the industry knows this to be true. Tor has been voted Locus magazines "best publisher" like 16 years running. They do know what they are doing a vast majority of the time.

However, this is case where sales enthusiasm outstripped marketing efforts I believe, and we are seeing some difficuty with sell through. The publisher is making adjustments, and some intelligent ones at that. I think once the first mass market lands, more people will pick up the book and they will have a better result with book 2, especially with it coming in trade paper to launch.

You still in the book industry?

-neg

 

[jester47]

Sorry to get all ranty Neg, Tor is a good publisher I like a lot of their stuff, just the art somtimes... I think they slipped on "moon." But then again, its somtimes better to build hype slowly than to shout "TADA!" and then sadly watch everyone continue on their business like nothing had happened.

Yes and no to being in the book industry. I always consider myself in the industry as my mother wrote the Harbrace College Handbook for many years. So I was around publishers and editors for much of my life. Enough so that I think I can tell whole divisions of publishing companies how they should do their job. As for it putting food on the table, nope, I am now in the proud employ of a major software producer in the pacific northwest. Yay.

Marketing is my guilty fantasy. I think I know what sells cause I pay attention to how people think...

Aaron.

 

[drothgery]

On any kind of promotion they need to say its like Glen Cook meets George R. R. Martin. They need to leave any mention of Jordan out of it. Even though I never liked the guy (Jordan), most of us that WERE fans are getting really sick of that him (at least I am finding more and more). The last thing we want is ANOTHER Robert Jordan spinning our WHEELS and wasting our TIME.

But the Mazalan books aren't Cook meets Martin, they're Cook meets Jordan (unless Martin picked up a much more High Fantasy tone after book two, where I gave up on Martin, which I'm pretty sure he didn't). They're in a world where magic is common and powerful. Ancient history is a major driving force in the story. The cast of characters is incredibly large. Erikson is more likely to kill off a character than Jordan, but he's far less likely than Martin to do so.

 

[jester47]

But the Mazalan books aren't Cook meets Martin, they're Cook meets Jordan (unless Martin picked up a much more High Fantasy tone after book two, where I gave up on Martin, which I'm pretty sure he didn't). They're in a world where magic is common and powerful. Ancient history is a major driving force in the story. The cast of characters is incredibly large. Erikson is more likely to kill off a character than Jordan, but he's far less likely than Martin to do so.

YMMV?

 

[jester47]

Hey there Neg,

I gotta apologize. I happened to be in a bookstore today and I realised the mistake I made. For some reason, don't ask me why, I get TOR and BAEN confused. BAEN is the company o' bad covers. However the fact I thought that "moons" was published by BAEN does say somthing about its cover art...

Again sorry, ussually the cover art for TOR books is spot on.

Aaron.

 

[neg]

Covers

Yeah Baen seems to have kept the same artist since almost inception of the imprint, which makes there covers just too similar book to book in my opinion.

Tor had a little bit of the same habit, especially on their fiction side imprint called Forge. However, I think they have gotten away from that in the past few years. Much to the betterment of the books and the sales. Still a wider array of covers would only further benefit us. But publishing is always looking for repeated successes, so innovation isn't always at the top of the list.

I haven't read Martin, but I have read Cook and Jordan. Erikson falls into the Cook comparison easily, but I don't know about the Jordan comparison, though I have only read Eye of the World.

Sadly publishing always has found the need to draw easy boxed comparisons for sell in and sell through. Buyers/readers/salesman/editors et all...would rather know who a person writes like rather than what makes them stand out from the pack so that they can easily draw comparisons and nod their heads. It is just the way the business works. For Fiction it is Da Vinci Code, before that it was Lovely Bones, before that it was Nanny Diaries. For Sci-Fi/Fantasy it is almost always Jordan, Goodkind, Brookes (I see that fewer than the other two), Martin, and Orson Scott Card. It is the nature of the business.

-neg