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Greetings:
And welcome to the latest issue of the Pyr® newsletter. This month sees the release of second installments in two of our hottest ongoing series: the second volume of Kay Kenyon's sci-fantasy quartet, The Entire and the Rose and the second volume of Joe Abercrombie's The First Law trilogy. Both of these novels, I'm happy to say, avoid "middle book syndrome" and, according to the critics and early readers, deliver even more than the books that preceded them. So let's get started...
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Near Sighted
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 Kay Kenyon's A World Too Near hits shelves this month, bolstered no doubt by a starred review in Publishers Weekly which proclaimed that, "Tangled motivations, complex characters and intriguing world-building will keep readers on the edges of their seats." (Astute readers of this newsletter will recall that book one, Bright of the Sky, made PW's Best of 2007 list as well.)
And, of course, I should tell you that a whoppin' 60 pages of A World Too Near is now online for you to read, also downloadable as a pdf file.
Meanwhile, two very thoughtful, articulate (and spoiler ridden) reviews of Bright of the Sky and A World Too Near are up at SF Reviews. Of book one, they say,
"If what you crave in your SF is a fresh and dynamic approach to
world-building, wed to epic storytelling with believably flawed heroes
and vividly imagined alien cultures, and you're frustrated that nobody
seems to be bloody doing it, odds are you've been skipping over the Kay Kenyon novels every time you go to the  bookstore." Looking at book two,
they say, "...it must be said that at the end of the day, this series,
exciting as it's turning out to be, is in many ways pure fantasy
formula - just tricked out in the most gorgeous production values
imaginable. But who cares if it's formula as long as the entertainment
value is blowing your doors, right? A World Too Near is
sweet, splendid entertainment. Kay Kenyon will have you solidly hooked
with this series, and if you've never had her name down on your reading
list before now, it's way past time you added it." And who can argue with that?
 And while we're talking "the most gorgeous production values imaginable," a huge, heartfelt congratulations to Stephan Martiniere, whose cover illustration for the third book in Kay 's quartet, the forthcoming City Without End, just won the Silver Spectrum award in the book category. All of Stephan's covers in this series have been amazing. City Without End may be one of my favorite Martiniere illustrations ever and certainly continues the high bar set with the previous two covers. What do you think?
Finally, if you want to get those first edition hardcovers signed, you can catch Kay on the road if you can get to any of these:
ConDor, Feb 29-Mar 2, San Diego, CA.
OmegaCon, Mar 13- 16, Birmingham, AL
A Book For All Seasons, Saturday, Mar 22 1:00-3:00, Leavenworth, WA, signing.
Read It Again Books, Monday, Mar 24, 6:30 p.m.
11 Palouse St, Wenatchee, WA (509) 662-2093, signing
University Bookstore, Apr 9, 7:00 p.m., Seattle, WA, signing with Louise Marley also known as Toby Bishop of Airs Beneath the Moon fame.
Readercon, July 17 - 20, Burlington MA
World Fantasy, Oct 30 - Nov 2, Calgary, AB Canada
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The Best of the "Best Ofs"
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 The website Visions of Paradise recently aggregated the "Best of the Year" mentions from some twenty sources, including SF Site, Fantasy Magazine, Bookgasm, SFF World, Fantasy Book Critic, Strange Horizons, Locus Online, Locus Magazine, as
well as award nominations for the BSFA, Nebula, and Philip K. Dick
Awards. They then listed the books which received the most mentions, to
produce a "best of the best" list. The result - Ian McDonald's Brasyl is the clear leader with 16 out of 20 mentions! Here is the full list, which also includes Joe Abercrombie's The Blade Itself with seven mentions and Kay Kenyon's Bright of the Sky with five.
Meanwhile, Locus Online then updated their 2007 SF/F/F Books on Year's Best Lists, with the result that Brasyl comes in 2nd after Harry Potter (no shame there) with 8 mentions, and Kay Kenyon 's Bright of the Sky now appears on four.
All of which means that you don't need to take my word for it that these are books and authors worth reading. But you knew that already, right?
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Baron Destructo's Bookclub
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 I spent five years in the late 90s working in Hollywood, where, I'm sorry to say, I was often exasperated by how few people who worked in storytelling actually read "dead tree media." So it was a very pleasant surprise to discover that Stargate: Atlantis writer/executive producer Joseph Mallozzi is not only an avid and informed reader of science fiction and fantasy, but that he runs a book discussion group on his very popular blog. Furthermore, it was my tremendous good fortune that his readers chose my own anthology, Fast Forward 1, as one of two books for their February discussion, devoting an entire week to talk of the book. First, Joe kicked off the discussion by soliciting questions from his thousands of readers. Then he returned the next day with a huge, story-by-story analysis of his thoughts on FF1,again generating many comments. Based on the enthusiastic responses, he came back with even more thoughts here and here. And finally, on February 21st, he invited Yours Truly to guest blog, in what became a massive 6,600 word response to all the wonderful questions and insights his readers provided (plus
comments from some of the contributors to the anthology who I roped in, and illustrator John
Picacio on the cover illustration.) The entire experience was amazing, generating a wealth of incredible feedback, and I'll never forget it. Also featured, a few embarrassing
pictures I dug up from my time on the set of Babylon 5. So if you want to know where Paolo Bacigalupi found the inspiration for "Small Offerings" or want to see me clowning around in B5's makeup trailer as "Minbari Lou", head right over.
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Before the Hanging
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 Joe Abercrombie's Before They Are Hanged is the other debut this month. The second volume of his "First Law" trilogy, the book recently received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, who wrote, "This grim and vivid sequel to 2007's The Blade Itselftranscends its middle volume status, keeping the reader engaged with
complicated plotting and intriguing character
development....Abercrombie leavens the bloody action with moments of
dark humor, developing a story suffused with a rich understanding of
human darkness and light."
Meanwhile, SFWorld have voted on their favorite books of 2007 and naturally we're very excited that their Top Five list is bookended by Abercrombie:
1. Before They are Hanged
2. The Name of the Wind - Pat Rothfuss
3. Reaper's Gale - Steve Erikson
4. Renegade's Magic - Robin Hobb
5. The Blade Itself/The Lies of Locke Lamora - Scott Lynch
'Nuff said.
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That's it for this issue. As ever, be sure to see the coupon at the bottom of this newsletter, and please feel free to check out our entire catalog and drop by our blog.
Have a Happy New Year,
Lou Anders
Editorial Director, Pyr®
an imprint of Prometheus Books
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