Have included me here in their list of top books for the fantasy reader. It’s an interesting selection, with Steve going mainly for the biggest names of the genre, and Nick plumping for the young guns – of which he’s including me in. Interesting to note that three of the four were published in the same year by Gollancz, since there’s Scott Lynch and Joe Abercrombie as well. Certainly can’t complain about the company I’m keeping there!
16 thoughts on “Those lovely blokes from Elitist”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
I actually remember that year.
Around once per year or every couple of years [funds permitting] I try to pick up half a dozen books from new authors whom I’ve not heard of. Generally there will be one or two that I really like and add to the list of authors who I will unfailingly pick up new books by.
That year I picked up debuts by:
You
Scott Lynch
Joe Abercrombie
Patrick Rothfuss
and all four were amount the best debut novels i’d ever read [scrathc that, remove the word debut.] And the weird thing was I kept expecting the next book from the group to be an utter dud… and was instead presented with an absolute statistic anomaly, an aberration to the norm.
Unfortunately I have been spoiled by this and susequent years have bought a fair bit of disappointment from my new author batches. /sadface
Why thank you!
Just out of interest, which debuts have disappointed you?
LJ now says I talk to much to fit my reply in the comment box.
Apologies but you asking coincided with something I’ve been meaning to do for a while so I’ve answered your question here: http://the-alleycat.livejournal.com/95536.html
Apologies for the length but you did ask ;p
;0) I got a plug, how could I complain?!
No worries.
Put as delicately as I can, I’m surprised by the fact that you seem to have a lower profile/level of awareness amoung readers than others on my list.
I’ve seen a lot more noise about books which are significantly inferior to your own
I picked up your book because I was doing my new author haul rather than any pre-existing awareness of you.
Maybe you need to go shout at your marketing department ;p
Don’t even get me started on the marketing side of things… ;0)
The fact of the matter seems to be that most of my sales come through people picking them up in the bookstore and liking what they see. Since I’m perhaps not doing the more fashionable sort of fantasy that the hardcore fans are asking for these days, I’m not getting the internet chatter that others are. From what I’ve ben told, my UK sales are really not far off some authors whose profiles are vastly bigger than mine.
It’s partly because of them having better sales in other territories, it’s partly I’m just not so popular on the net and a few flamers decided to trash Stormcaller publicly when i started (Malazan forums for starters), so my reputation isn’t so great.
The fact that almost no marketing money was spent on the first three books might not have helped though. I think it’s coming a little less grudgingly now that I’ve massively earned out the (very modest) original advance I got for Stormcaller so I look good on the balance sheet.
BUT, I’m going to make someone’s life hell if they don’t come up with a decent marketing push once the complete series is out and there’s a finished product for readers. So many people have not wanted to start another unfinished series that there are lots of readers to remind about trying book 1, as well as the millions who’ve never heard of me.
I’m no expert but a big push when they’re all done may be the way to go…
Many years ago and before there was much of an internet a friend gave me a copy of Robert Jordans first wheel of time book. Well i bought all the rest and a new hardback came out around a month later [think book 8.]
Then I found out that the book had had a gap of several years from the one before. The one after was again a good few years wait and I remember saying in jest “I hope he’s a young guy because I would want him to die beofre this series actually ends…”
So yeah, complete series may be a plus.
I’m kinda suprised that you got trashed on a Malazan forum [well, actually i’m not but that’s due to the nature of forums and opinions being like assholes,] since in some ways I’d expect Malazan fans to understand perservering with an initially complex narrative.
Having quickly checked out some of your more negative amazon reviews, i’d be interested to see what those folks thought of gardens of the moon and American Gods. Both are books I will unfailingly recommend but always with the caveat that the reader will need to push through to the second half for things to start becoming clear.
It has been a while since I read The Stormcaller but from what I remember I can understand the complaints about complexity, however I don’t remember being at all confused by the end which rather suggests things are all worked out and make sense by the conclusion.
I wonder what people were expecting, I enjoy having my expectations confounded [sign of something original] but I know many others don’t enjoy that.
I love that your book toys with some tropes [imo enough to give a sense of direction amoung the aforementioned complexity] and then things get fucked up and the reader is then entirely unsure what to expect.
Now i’m going on but I’ve been thinking quite a bit since starting this and other discussions over the last couple of days; so bear with me a minute longer.
Joe abercrombie a whiel ago linked all his one star Amazon reviews and the trend [on the first page at least] was people complaining that it had been recommended because they like Gerge RR Martin and it wasn’t like him…
Well no, Mr Martin is writing the SoFaI books and doing a pretty good job of it. Mr Abercrombie is writing his own books.
Is is perhaps that many times people want more of the same and so don’t know how to handle something that is different. Is it easier to read/watch/listen to something where we already know roughly where its going.
Dunno, but we are back to opinions, and what they’re like
[I for example just cannot understand at all people who don’t enjoy Terry Pratchett, does not compute, but they are out there.]
Well yes, sometimes there are just people you don’t get. Frankly, I’m not unhappy with the bad reviews that say it’s an overly complicated book – it’s not going to be for everyone and I didn’t want the series to be a simple quest to kill a dark lord.
The guy who gave up 30 pages from the end saying he didn’t get what was happening annoyed me though. You’ve read 470 pages and didn’t bother to find out if things made sense once you read the end? That’s just weird.
I actually remember that year.
Around once per year or every couple of years [funds permitting] I try to pick up half a dozen books from new authors whom I’ve not heard of. Generally there will be one or two that I really like and add to the list of authors who I will unfailingly pick up new books by.
That year I picked up debuts by:
You
Scott Lynch
Joe Abercrombie
Patrick Rothfuss
and all four were amount the best debut novels i’d ever read [scrathc that, remove the word debut.] And the weird thing was I kept expecting the next book from the group to be an utter dud… and was instead presented with an absolute statistic anomaly, an aberration to the norm.
Unfortunately I have been spoiled by this and susequent years have bought a fair bit of disappointment from my new author batches. /sadface
Why thank you!
Just out of interest, which debuts have disappointed you?
LJ now says I talk to much to fit my reply in the comment box.
Apologies but you asking coincided with something I’ve been meaning to do for a while so I’ve answered your question here: http://the-alleycat.livejournal.com/95536.html
Apologies for the length but you did ask ;p
;0) I got a plug, how could I complain?!
No worries.
Put as delicately as I can, I’m surprised by the fact that you seem to have a lower profile/level of awareness amoung readers than others on my list.
I’ve seen a lot more noise about books which are significantly inferior to your own
I picked up your book because I was doing my new author haul rather than any pre-existing awareness of you.
Maybe you need to go shout at your marketing department ;p
Don’t even get me started on the marketing side of things… ;0)
The fact of the matter seems to be that most of my sales come through people picking them up in the bookstore and liking what they see. Since I’m perhaps not doing the more fashionable sort of fantasy that the hardcore fans are asking for these days, I’m not getting the internet chatter that others are. From what I’ve ben told, my UK sales are really not far off some authors whose profiles are vastly bigger than mine.
It’s partly because of them having better sales in other territories, it’s partly I’m just not so popular on the net and a few flamers decided to trash Stormcaller publicly when i started (Malazan forums for starters), so my reputation isn’t so great.
The fact that almost no marketing money was spent on the first three books might not have helped though. I think it’s coming a little less grudgingly now that I’ve massively earned out the (very modest) original advance I got for Stormcaller so I look good on the balance sheet.
BUT, I’m going to make someone’s life hell if they don’t come up with a decent marketing push once the complete series is out and there’s a finished product for readers. So many people have not wanted to start another unfinished series that there are lots of readers to remind about trying book 1, as well as the millions who’ve never heard of me.
I’m no expert but a big push when they’re all done may be the way to go…
Many years ago and before there was much of an internet a friend gave me a copy of Robert Jordans first wheel of time book. Well i bought all the rest and a new hardback came out around a month later [think book 8.]
Then I found out that the book had had a gap of several years from the one before. The one after was again a good few years wait and I remember saying in jest “I hope he’s a young guy because I would want him to die beofre this series actually ends…”
So yeah, complete series may be a plus.
I’m kinda suprised that you got trashed on a Malazan forum [well, actually i’m not but that’s due to the nature of forums and opinions being like assholes,] since in some ways I’d expect Malazan fans to understand perservering with an initially complex narrative.
Having quickly checked out some of your more negative amazon reviews, i’d be interested to see what those folks thought of gardens of the moon and American Gods. Both are books I will unfailingly recommend but always with the caveat that the reader will need to push through to the second half for things to start becoming clear.
It has been a while since I read The Stormcaller but from what I remember I can understand the complaints about complexity, however I don’t remember being at all confused by the end which rather suggests things are all worked out and make sense by the conclusion.
I wonder what people were expecting, I enjoy having my expectations confounded [sign of something original] but I know many others don’t enjoy that.
I love that your book toys with some tropes [imo enough to give a sense of direction amoung the aforementioned complexity] and then things get fucked up and the reader is then entirely unsure what to expect.
Now i’m going on but I’ve been thinking quite a bit since starting this and other discussions over the last couple of days; so bear with me a minute longer.
Joe abercrombie a whiel ago linked all his one star Amazon reviews and the trend [on the first page at least] was people complaining that it had been recommended because they like Gerge RR Martin and it wasn’t like him…
Well no, Mr Martin is writing the SoFaI books and doing a pretty good job of it. Mr Abercrombie is writing his own books.
Is is perhaps that many times people want more of the same and so don’t know how to handle something that is different. Is it easier to read/watch/listen to something where we already know roughly where its going.
Dunno, but we are back to opinions, and what they’re like
[I for example just cannot understand at all people who don’t enjoy Terry Pratchett, does not compute, but they are out there.]
Well yes, sometimes there are just people you don’t get. Frankly, I’m not unhappy with the bad reviews that say it’s an overly complicated book – it’s not going to be for everyone and I didn’t want the series to be a simple quest to kill a dark lord.
The guy who gave up 30 pages from the end saying he didn’t get what was happening annoyed me though. You’ve read 470 pages and didn’t bother to find out if things made sense once you read the end? That’s just weird.