[Werthead]

The first Monarchies omnibus should now be on sale in the UK and USA. Ads like this one are also appearing in the British press, with the Erikson recommendation prominently displayed:

[Abyss]

Monarchies really is a great series and it's nice to see it getting some proper treatment, and the much needed rewrite of the last book.

- Abyss, still has an icky feeling over those werewolves...

[Tsundoku]

New interview with Paul:

http://solaris-edito...ul-kearney.html

-----

EDIT: includes a very cool shout out to SE

Solaris: So you’d like to see authors escaping real-world reference altogether? Interesting, given your own strongly historically-themed settings. Are you tempted to try something completely alien yourself?

PK: Nope. People tell me, when they know what I do, that I must have a great imagination, but I really don’t. I just get inspired by some fragment of history and then I run with it. To make up everything, and I mean everything, in the way guys like Erikson do, is unfathomable to me. I come up with the story first, and the world comes later. And I want to get that world out there as fast as I can, so that it can keep up with the story I want to tell. So for me, the worldbuilding comes last. Is that heresy for a fantasy author to admit?

Solaris: Not at all. Having mentioned Erikson... he’s been quoted citing you as an inspiration, and calling you one of the “best writers of fantasy around.” Care to comment on his own work?

PK: Steve’s books leave my jaw bumping along the floor in awe. I remember when I first picked up Gardens of the Moon, and just the opening of the book had me gritting my teeth and thinking you son of a bitch – because he had the courage to get in there, dark and dirty, and chuck his world at the reader with almost a sneer. He takes no prisoners, and expects those who read his work to be paying attention. It takes real bravery on the part of an author to do that. And despite what I said about world building in the previous question, I think Erikson’s is so deep and real that it permeates every page of his books, and gives his world a rock solid gravitas that never – and I mean never – falters or stumbles. He simply never drops the ball. With Erikson, you don’t see the wizard behind the curtain, and there aren’t many writers I can think of today who manage that.

This post has been edited by Sombra: 06 October 2010 - 11:49 AM

[Paran]

Big Kearney fan - loved Monarchies series (still thank SE for that recommendation), but have to agree that not everything gelled. Still think Corfe is one the most awesome characters. Seriously though, dude had me almost feeling sorry for priests committing genocide! (nice were wolves, please stay away!)

Any news on his Rol Corthisane series (This forsaken earth, etc..Sea beggars?). Will it be finished?

Looking forward to Corvus, will be interesting to see how Rictus has changed/grown.

[Werthead]

Paran, on 07 October 2010 - 07:45 AM, said:

Any news on his Rol Corthisane series (This forsaken earth, etc..Sea beggars?). Will it be finished?

Eventually. Apparently the previous thought was that they'd just have to wait for This Forsaken Earth to go out of print and then x number of years later (between 5 and 10, based on other authors' situations) the rights would revert to Paul and then Solaris could reissue the first two books and then the last one. Apparently there are problems, since Bantam are still making money out of the books. That may indicate they still have foreign rights sales and that might increase the amount of time before the rights revert to Paul. Certainly don't be expecting this situation to be resolved in the next couple of years.

[WhiskeyJackDaniels]

Since the Ten Thousand was based very heavily on Xenophon and his ten thousand's march to the sea, what should we expect out of Corvus? Just reading the back flap it almost seems like he's fudging ancient greek timelines a little bit and having Rictus meet up with Alexander the Great? Is this going to be a more original work?

[Bauchelain the Evil]

According to Wert's review, while it's inspired by Alexander, Corvus is a much more original work than The Ten Thousand which was a grrat book anyway, even though it was basically the Anabasis in an alternate world

[Tsundoku]

Bought Corvus at Galaxy bookshop when I was in Sydney, and started it on the plane trip back (1 hour and a bit). Am now 150 pages in and only tiredness and headache stopped me. Very readable, typical Kearney magic where with 1 paragraph he can convey what other much more verbose writers require multiple chapters.

Thoroughly recommended.

[Fid]

Sombra, on 14 December 2010 - 01:34 PM, said:

Bought Corvus at Galaxy bookshop when I was in Sydney, and started it on the plane trip back (1 hour and a bit). Am now 150 pages in and only tiredness and headache stopped me. Very readable, typical Kearney magic where with 1 paragraph he can convey what other much more verbose writers require multiple chapters.

Thoroughly recommended.

Definitiely agree - he is a very good story teller, especially good on the military details and the intensity of infantry battles

[Tsundoku]

He does grim, deeply human 'drama' without the 'melo-' at the front.

[Werthead]

Kearney's Sea-Beggars series is - at last! - to be completed. Solaris will release a complete omnibus featuring the two extant novels - The Mark of Ran and This Forsaken Earth - and the concluding part, Storm of the Dead, in late 2012.

[Mentalist]

Monarchies was amazing. I bought the omnibus edition, and read through it in less then a week. Corfe's story is simply jaw-dropping.

Like Ten thousand as well, will certainly pick up Corvus, once its out in mmpb.

[RolandDeschain]

I just started the first omnibus,only 50 pages in but its great so far.

[korik]

Thanks for the info on the sea beggers, its good to see it getting released...

[Tsundoku]

Well, it appears The Kings of Morning will be out on Feb 28 2012, only delayed by almost a year. GRRM take note.

In other news, wtf happened to his website??? I tried checking it for updates and all I got was a redirect to his Amazon page.

Inspector Werthead, the ball is in your court.

[Werthead]

Emailed him, will try to find out what the problem is.

[Werthead]

Heard back from Paul. There's some technical and creative reasons the website is down and it may be a while before it's sorted out.

[Werthead]

Update on the Sea-Beggars omnibus: after several years of being messed around by the former publishers, Solaris have basically killed the project for the time being. The UK wing of Bantam gave up the rights after a lot of negotiating and then the American arm completely failed to do so, because it appears that the first two books are still in print in the USA and still selling. Because of the international nature of the Solaris deal (from what I can gather), that effectively prevents Solaris from publishing the omnibus.

Now you might think if they're still in print in the USA and still selling, then Bantam can release the third book anyway? Apparently they are not interested. So Bantam USA are blocking the release of the third book so they can continue to sell copies of the first two, but won't then publish the third book themselves for totally undisclosed reasons. WHAT THE HELL.

In the meantime, Solaris have decided to reprint Paul's early, stand-alone novels instead. First up is A DIFFERENT KINGDOM, out on 28 January 2014 with an excellent cover:



THE WAY TO BABYLON and RIDING THE UNICORN will follow, though it's unclear if they will be published separately or as an omnibus.

[polishgenius]

So basically we're in a situation where the only way to get the series published properly is to get America to stop buying it so Bantam give it up?

Seriously, what a bunch of wankers.

[Werthead]

polishgenius, on 23 August 2013 - 06:01 PM, said:

So basically we're in a situation where the only way to get the series published properly is to get America to stop buying it so Bantam give it up?

Seriously, what a bunch of wankers.

I guess. Or otherwise get tons of people to buy them so Bantam shower Paul in money to give them the third volume?

This is the oddest SFF publishing story I've heard of since Ace Books tried to pirate LORD OF THE RINGS back in the 1960s. Totally unfathomable.