Comments (0)

By trhickman, May 25, 2010 8:29 am

A Special Invitation…

Available nowhere else! New York Times Best-selling author Tracy Hickman with his wife and partner Laura Hickman, world-renown fantasy authors for over a quarter of a century are writing a fantasy novel exclusively by subscription only!

Dragon’s Bard is an ambitious new project created especially for you by Laura and me. Dragon’s Bard is a series of fantasy novels which we will present directly to you in serial form. Here is how it works…

For less than you would spend on two dates to the movies, you can own something unique. When you subscribe to Dragon’s Bard: Eventide you will receive:

• A new chapter each week! You can look forward to watching the story unfold each week as you receive a download file containing the edited and formatted text of a new chapter written exclusively for our subscribers.
• Private Updates and Insights: What are the challenges and rewards of writing a serialization of a novel? Gain insights into the process through special communiques from the authors via an exclusive ‘subscribers’ only website and forum.
• … And the signed & numbered limited-edition hardback publication of the book! When the book subscription is complete, you will receive your own hardback, limited-edition copy of the book — each one numbered and signed personally by the authors!

This subscription offering is the first of three separate subscriptions which will complete this series. We have prepaid and five-installment subscription plans for both United States and International subscribers. (The only difference between Domestic U.S. plans and International plans are the shipping costs of the book at the end of the subscription.)

Subscribers to this first book will have a priority opportunity to acquire positions in later book subscriptions in this series, thus insuring that when you subscribe now will be able to acquire the complete three-book set.

Order now … once the subscription is sold out this offer will be closed.

The first book, Eventide, will begin with one chapter per week over twenty-plus weeks beginning June 5th. Our plan is to have the finished hardback book in your hands by Christmas — making Eventide a unique holiday gift as well. This subscription is LIMITED … we have a cap on the number of books we can produce, sign and ship. This means that the book you receive at the end of the subscription will be highly collectible — a unique memento of our journey together.

In some ways this is a very old idea brought into a new medium. Charles Dickens wrote his books in a ‘serial’ format very much like this and, if he were alive today, I think this is how he might be writing again. So, we will ‘write like the Dickens’ and produce a unique gift for you. We think YOU should become our publisher and that we should right directly for YOU.

Join us for Eventide … and own a unique gift of fantasy.

Comments (0)

By trhickman, April 12, 2010 6:18 pm

Early this morning, I woke up with the last few chapters of ‘Song of the Dragon’ waiting for me. Reading through this story again got me excited yet again about this story of Drakis — an insignificant slave of the mighty Rhonas elven empire and his amazing flight toward a destiny that he wants desperately to avoid.

The Rhonas Imperium rules the known world with an iron, elven fist. It’s slaves are kept in thrall through nightly House Devotions — a magical process where every bad memory from the day is repressed and replaced by pleasant ones. The elven wars of conquest are even fought by ‘Impress Warriors’ — slave soldiers trained to forget everything but their devotion to the Imperial Will. But when the spell in Drakis’ Master’s house is shattered — he and his fellow warriors are suddenly and catastrophically brought to remember the terrible treatment they have received under the sadistic house master — and are soon on the run from imperial forces who are desperate to enslave him once again.

Once again I was thrilled with the characters of this journey: Soen, the elven Inquisitor of the Iblisi who is hunting the fleeing slaves and, in turn, is being hunted by his own Order; Jugar the Dwarven Jester whose truth is far darker and more sinister than anyone suspects; Ethis the Chimerian who can change his form in unexpected way … Mala, Urulani, Belag the Manticore and the mysterious Lyric. It’s been a delight to visit with them again.

So I’m excited to get this book back to the publisher tomorrow and bring this wonderful journey one step closer to you!

Comments (11)

By trhickman, January 31, 2010 8:08 pm

There is an important battle being waged right now in the intellectual properties arena over ebooks. There’s a lot at stake here and while it revolves around money, it also deeply may affect the quality of the book you read … or may not get to read at all.

It all started when a quiet, private little battel erupted into a public one this weekend, as reported in the Huffington Post:

Amazon.com Pulls Macmillan Books From Site In E-Book Price Dispute

NEW YORK — New copies of Hilary Mantel’s “Wolf Hall,” Andrew Young’s “The Politician” and other books published by Macmillan were unavailable Saturday on Amazon.com, a drastic step in the ongoing dispute over e-book prices.

Macmillan CEO John Sargent said he was told Friday that its books would be removed from Amazon.com, as would e-books for Amazon’s Kindle e-reader. Books will be available on Amazon.com through private sellers and other third parties, Sargent said.

Sargent met with Amazon officials Thursday to discuss the publisher’s new pricing model for e-books. He wrote in a letter to Macmillan authors and literary agents Saturday that the plan would allow Amazon to make more money selling Macmillan books and that Macmillan would make less. He characterized the dispute as a disagreement over “the long-term viability and stability of the digital book market.”

Macmillan and other publishers have criticized Amazon for charging just $9.99 for best-selling e-books on its Kindle e-reader, a price publishers say is too low and could hurt hardcover sales, which generally carry a list price of more than $24.

Macmillan is one of the world’s largest English-language publishers. Its divisions include St. Martin’s Press, itself one of the largest publishers in the U.S.; Henry Holt & Co., one of the oldest publishers in America; Farrar, Straus & Giroux; and Tor, the leading science-fiction publisher.

Sargent credited Amazon in his letter, calling the company a “valuable customer” and a “great innovator in our industry.”

But, he wrote, the digital book industry needs to create a business model that provides equal opportunities for retailers. Under Macmillan’s model, to be put in place in March, e-books will be priced from $12.99 to $14.99 when first released and prices will change over time.

For its part, Amazon wants to keep a lid on prices as competitors line up to challenge its dominant position in a rapidly expanding market. The company did not immediately return messages seeking comment Saturday.

Then the Huffington Post reported that Amazon.com had just posted a notice saying that they, rather gruppily, were waving the white flag;

Dear Customers:

Macmillan, one of the “big six” publishers, has clearly communicated to us that, regardless of our viewpoint, they are committed to switching to an agency model and charging $12.99 to $14.99 for e-book versions of bestsellers and most hardcover releases.

We have expressed our strong disagreement and the seriousness of our disagreement by temporarily ceasing the sale of all Macmillan titles. We want you to know that ultimately, however, we will have to capitulate and accept Macmillan’s terms because Macmillan has a monopoly over their own titles, and we will want to offer them to you even at prices we believe are needlessly high for e-books. Amazon customers will at that point decide for themselves whether they believe it’s reasonable to pay $14.99 for a bestselling e-book. We don’t believe that all of the major publishers will take the same route as Macmillan. And we know for sure that many independent presses and self-published authors will see this as an opportunity to provide attractively priced e-books as an alternative.

Kindle is a business for Amazon, and it is also a mission. We never expected it to be easy!

Thank you for being a customer.

And so round one goes to McMillan — and every Kindle-user on the planet should be grateful that McMillan won.

I know that sounds crazy on the face of it but the truth is that ebook pricing was threatening primarily the livelyhoods of authors like me. Since ebooks do not require warehousing or physical shipping (they’re just a file, how much space or maintainance does that take per title?) you would think that they should be less expensive to distribute. True enough.

But the value in a book doesn’t lie in whether it is made of leather, paper, glue or just digital code: the real value in the book is in the story, the ideas, the journey and the meaning that those words elicite from the reader. It doesn’t matter whether you’re drawn into those words through ink on a page or digits on a screen — the value is in the meaning of the message not the medium.

Ebooks are cheaper to warehouse and distribute but by cheapening the costs to recieve that experience the PERCEPTION has been that books across the board have been devalued as well.

Amazon wants to establish the Kindle as their own market monopoly … I can understand that.  They want to make their ebooks sell at bargain prices. I can understand that, too. But when their zeal to sell their Kindle product makes it impossible for my publisher — and by extention me — to make a living off our words and stories … then story itself suffers.

Like my local pizza chain says in their advertising: “You can buy a cheaper pizza … but then you have to eat it.”

Comments (4)

By trhickman, January 19, 2010 5:14 pm

I’ve been rereading both of the first two Dragonships novels in preparation for launching into Book III. It may seem like a strange thing that an author needs to read their own book. Of course, Margaret does the primary writing of the text on nearly all of our joint collaborations and changes often take place in a text during the writing process, so perhaps it may not seem so odd. However, I would point out that I am also in the process of reading my last draft of my own upcoming ‘Drakis’ series on which I did the primary writing of the text. As I said, things do change in the writing and when one is working on a series … well, let’s just say it’s important to remember what you have already said in the story.

It may sound self serving and a bit narcissistic but I’ve thoroughly been enjoying myself back in the world of Skylan, Aylaen and the northern barbarians! It is delightful to know how well the words and world still inspire and delight me. The second book, ‘Secrets of the Dragon’ will not be in your hands until later this year but I can tell you that it will be a great ride … and that I’m very excited now to get started on Book III in earnest!

Comments (7)

By admin, January 4, 2010 10:53 pm

We’re coming into a new year and, as you can see, there are many changes coming!

Perhaps most exciting of all will be our implementation of an on-line Speculative Fiction Writing Seminar and Workshop program. We’ve been offering our writing workshops for several years now and will be making this curriculum available to you later this year.

We also have a number of new projects which we will be announcing right here over the next few months … many of which will open up new horizons for all of us and explore new directions in the telling and experiencing of epic fantasy.

As you can see, we have a great deal going on! So join us for our most exciting year ever. Register in the right column and I’ll keep you informed every step of the way.