Just in time for the holidays, I have put on sale a complete autographed set of The Chaos Chronicles (to date), right here in my very own, shiny new Etsy shop! This is a matched set of trade paperbacks from my very own Starstream Publications. Signed, personalized, you name your fondest desires. What makes a better gift than brand-new books autographed by the author? Plus…discounted 20% for the holidays!
I will be adding other books to my shop, but we’re starting out with the crown jewel! Click right here to take a look. There’s no harm in looking, right?
Edit: I have added two more listings to my Etsy store: autographed hardcovers of Reefs/Crucible, and autographed Eternity’s End!
I’m pleased to let the world know that Eternity’s End is back in print—and by print, I mean treebook, paper! For this new edition, I have arranged for the use of the cover painting created by Stephen Youll for the original Tor hardcover and paperback. This time, it’s paired with great type design by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff. It’s a big book, too—very hefty. I’m extremely pleased with the way this came out.
This cover design will very soon be applied to the ebook, as well.
I did the interior layout myself, using Vellum software, which I thought did a really snazzy job.
Alert reader Laura _ sent me this copy of The Reefs of Time that she bought from Barnes and Noble online. Anything look wrong to you?
As you can see from this shot, I am holding just the cover open. The first page inside the cover is Prologue Two. Missing are all the front-matter pages, including title page and copyright, dedication, “Previously in The Chaos Chronicles” synopses, and Prologue One. Yikes! How many other people got defective books like this, and didn’t trouble to get in touch with me to let me know?
The book, as far as I have been able to determine so far, was printed by Ingram, a usually solidly reliable producer of books. I’ve asked for an investigation, but I don’t expect to have an answer anytime soon.
If you, or anybody you know, received a defective book, please let me know! Thanks!
Oh, and ditto if you get a copy of Sunborn with the cover type skewed to the side (which happened to me).
Sunborn, the fourth book in The Chaos Chronicles, has blazed forth in a new treebook edition, a solid trade paperback designed to go nicely with Reefs and Crucible and all the others! The complete set will look great on any shelf! It’s available right now from Ingram, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon, which means you can ask your local bookstore (or library) to order it, or you can buy it online. (As of this moment, it’s discounted at B&N. I don’t know why, or how long it will last.)
With this, all the published books in The Chaos Chronicles are available in print as well as ebook. (Still planned: a reformatting of Neptune Crossing, which is in a larger trim size than the others. It was the first one I put back into print, at 6×9 inches, and I later decided to go with the 5.5×8.5 inch size for the new books.)
Coming soon: an all-new audiobook of Sunborn! It’s already recorded and uploaded. It might take a couple of weeks to become available. Don’t change that dial!
Stars are dying. Bandicut and his friends must learn what threatens the Starmaker Nebula—and confront a billion-year-old adversary of life as they know it…
The next phase of my w/o/r/l/d/ c/o/n/q/u/e/s/t/ “Return to Print” campaign is complete! A new paperback edition of The Infinite Sea is now out, with the same knockout cover art by Chris Howard that appears on the ebook. It’s available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and any store (or library!) that cares to order it from Ingram. It’s quite a handsome edition, if I do say so myself. Like Strange Attractors before it, it’s in a companion trim format with The Reefs of Time / Crucible of Time.
The audiobook, with narration by Stefan Rudnicki, is also complete and hot in the distribution pipeline. Barring unforeseen difficulties, it should be showing up in online audiobook stores in the next week or two!
I know this seems crazy, coming right after Reefs, but the new paperback version of Strange Attractors (Book 2 of The Chaos Chronicles) has been almost ready for months. I got it done just before taking flight to Atlanta. Right now it’s available only through Amazon, but I’ll be getting it into Ingram soon, to make it more widely distributed. This is all part of my effort to get the entire series of Chaos books back into print editions.
And the audiobook is coming! It’s been recorded, and while some final tweaks have to be made, most of the hard work is done. By Stefan Rudnicki! Stay tuned!
Yes—the hardcover is finally out! I made it live just before I left for Dragon Con, and by now it should have trickled into all the store catalogues. I think it came out great!
If you would like to ask your local library to order a copy (Please do! Ask nicely, but ask!), you can tell them it’s available from Ingram, and the ISBN is 978-1-61138-834-3. Same info applies to your local bookstore.
We are at 52 days and counting, for the launch of The Reefs of Time! You can tell by the countdown timer I’ve installed on the front page of my website. I’m taking this seriously! This is rocket science. Also, alien science, with a side of quantum entanglement, on a scale that no human scientist would know how to do. (But those alien scientists: They’re pretty smart. If you don’t believe me, take a ride in one of their n-space ships. Basically, 0 to 60 [parsecs] in three imaginary seconds.)
I decided I needed a name for this project. It’s not just a launch of Reefs, and not just a launch of Crucible. It’s also a relaunch of all the earlier books in the series—in print, not just in ebook. I got tired of calling it “my book launch mega-shoot-me-now-project,” or whatever phrase sprang to mind at any given time. As of today, it’s Operation Countdown! Our motto: Launch or Die!
Here’s where we are in the countdown:
Uncorrected (but still pretty good) eARCs, or ebook advance reading copies, ready — Check!
Reefs proofread and corrected and formatted for print — Check!
Reefs cover finished — Check!
First print proofs ordered from Amazon — Check!
First print proofs from Ingram… um, still vaporware. Soon! Soon!
First review-copy eARCs sent out to Publishers Weekly and Locus — Check!
Review-copy print ARCs sent out to other publications… Soon!
Review eARCs available through NetGalley to qualified reviewers — June 1 — Check!
Various promotional activities underway (Bookbub promotion, coasters, flyers, ads, other stuff) — getting there! Marathon, not a sprint!
Crucible proofread, and corrections and formatting… In progress!
Crucible cover art — In progress!
New print editions of four previous books… in progress, but not very far along. Hope springs eternal.
Can I stop now? (That’s actually just the highlights. I could keep going, but you get the idea.) By the way, that image up there is the full wraparound cover for the print edition, gorgeous art by Chris Howard and smackdown type design by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff. Click on the image to see it bigger and clearer. It’s in CMYK format, which is for print. The colors are a bit exaggerated on a screen.
Launch at 52 days and counting. What’s that gokat doing on the launch gantry??
Grab a partner and hold tight!The Reefs of Time have taken a sharp left turn. My long-time publisher, Tor Books, has declined to publish it, sight unseen.* This came as something of a shock. The reason given is that it’s been too long since the last book—which is certainly true.
Fear not—the project is not grounded! But it has changed direction abruptly. I will publish it through my own imprint, Starstream Publications, in cooperation with Book View Café. While at first glance this seems like a setback, I choose to regard it as a blessing and an opportunity. I’ll get the rights back to the earlier material, and can now control the entire series, top to bottom. And I can publish the new work the way I want.
It does mean I have a lot of work cut out for me, and I don’t just mean publishing Reefs. Before the new book can come out, I need to have all the first four books available in new print editions, so that new readers can start at the beginning and read the whole story. These books are already available in ebook, but many people still prefer print. And then, of course, I need to do all the production of ebook and print book on the new novel—including cover design.
I have hired an assistant for the promotional efforts. I have called on artist and writer Chris Howard, who has already done two covers for me, to outdo himself. Various of my colleagues, both in and out of Book View Café, have stepped forward with offers of help. It’s been amazing, really. Still others have offered strong encouragement, including some terrific authors who have been dropped by traditional publishing and gone on to do exactly what I’m doing, and done quite well at it.
This all happened suddenly, and it’s too soon to have a realistic time frame sketched out. But my goal is to have the new work out in time for the World Science Fiction Convention in Dublin, in August.
Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!
*This might seem odd, since I’ve been working on the book with my editor for about eight months. But he’s working on a consulting basis for Tor, and it was only when the books were ready to go into production in-house that the editorial oversight team at Tor said no. I’m not taking it personally; in fact, they’re settling graciously, and unlike many authors I’ve known in similar positions, I’m getting all my rights back without a fight. It’s an amicable divorce. There are no hard feelings on my part.
A long time ago in a publishing house far, far away, my novel Neptune Crossing, Volume One of The Chaos Chronicles, was published by Tor Books. (Okay, Tor, now part of Macmillan USA, is in New York, which isn’t that far away.) The book has been out of print in paper for not quite as long, but long enough.
Now it’s back—in a nice trade paperback—from my Starstream Publications imprint, in association with Book View Café! You can order it! You can buy it! You can give it away!
For the moment, it’s available direct from CreateSpace, an Amazon company. Edit: And now it is available at Amazon.com. In a few days, it should become available at Amazon.com. I make a smidge more from selling it at CreateSpace, but do what works best for you. Can you get it in time for Christmas? I honestly don’t know. I ordered copies from my publisher account, and they will not be here in time for Christmas, but it might be different for regular customers. If you find out, let me know! Edit: I think it’s possible, if you order from Amazon.
In the fullness of time, it will be available through other stores, as well, including (perhaps) your local bookstore. But that may take a while, and possibly a second printer/distributor.