Yes, it is new, I was just creating a thread for it myself.
I am going to post this thought before I read the thread.
Yay! A campaign setting book. Even though I never use the Forgotten Realms, I always look forward to the sourcebooks.
As far as everyone else goes, now that we have something on the schedule that many people have been asking for...how long before somebody comes in and tries to pull the tower down?
On the one hand, I'm glad to see that there is something out there. On the other, I'm starting to think that WotC has forgotten that the Sword Coast has a world attached to it.
Purple Dragon Knight? That worries me. That really should not be in a book about the Sword Coast.
I'm no Realms fan (old news, I know), but I'm excited by this book for two reasons:
1) It shows they're willing to do setting(ish) books. If I'm lucky, maybe there will be something for Eberron in a year or two.
2) It might mean they've explored the Sword Coast as much as they plan to, right now. Ideally, that means they're ready to give some love to another world; but even somewhere else in the Realms would be a welcome change of pace, as an observer.
The regional scope doesn't bother me because a) the Realms is so freaking huge and b) if I convert this to Eberron, I could see each of the five nations eventually getting covered, which would be cool. We'll have to wait and see how it plays out.
There's a lot of room for error, on this. IMO, the worst possible case is a book of mostly crunch with just enough Realms flavor over the rules to ruin it for everyone else.