Stormed Fortress Hardcover Revisited

Wars of Light and Shadow
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Janny,

I have absolutely loved reading (and re-reading) this series over the decades! It is such a wonderful world with truly amazing characters that are so relatable. I may have even convinced my wife to name our daughter Elaira :wink:

I know that over the years, there has been much discussion about the lack of a hardcover release of Stormed Fortress from the publisher. With the pending release of Song of the Mysteries and the conclusion of a decades-long labour of love, would it be worth again asking the publisher to release a hardcover of SF? Maybe even re-release all of the titles in a limited availability hardcover Collector’s Set?

Maybe I’m beating a dead horse here. It just seems like such a shame that that one book in the middle of the series never got that honor.

Thank you so much for listening, for all of your hard work, and for the many many hours of joy!

Joe

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That would be cool - though it might make it interesting when your daughter gets old enough to date. “Oh, please Ath, let her fall for an Arithon, rather than a Lysaer!”

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I already own way too many copies of the hardcovers, trades, and mass market sizes. Even so, I would definitely buy a hardcover set whose equal book heights make a pleasing horizontal line across my shelf!

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Hi Joe, and welcome back Blue (yay Brian!). This has been a hope of mine since the crashing disappointment when the hardbound was canceled.

Best I can suggest: pick on the publisher, also, pick on your favorite small presses who do select editions.

I tried (admittedly years ago) to ‘revert’ the hardcover rights they had not used to open the way for doing a special edition. Got the NO.

It’s the same old story: numbers talk, and frankly, relative to other series, we don’t have them right now. Many series get ‘anniversary’ editions - Wars of Light and Shadows would be in it’s ‘Thirtieth’ anniversary (based on pub date for Curse of the Mistwraith) in 2023…if we could break the piggy bank in the numbers department, anything is possible. Best I can do is write the best finale I can to make this happen. Without the books being featured in shops – the series is invisible except by word of mouth. That pretty much handcuffs me, since self promo burns out readers faster than anything.

I would do all I could (and will continue to push the publisher) to see this effort happen. Thanks again for your interest and support!

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Thank you for the welcome back, Janny!

Part of the problem, as I see it, is that there are not many bookstores left. That is one of my main peeves about the internet era, that so many brick and mortar stores are going under. I used to LOVE to go to a bookstore, and browse for hours on end. I would have a book in mind that I would want to purchase, and did, but there were also gems hidden in plain sight that I would not have found had I not had the time to wander around and pick books up and check the back cover.

LOL, it is the main reason, when I worked in a bookstore myself in 1997, that I rarely went home with a paycheck.

I can’t say that it is ALL publishers, but many of them really need to take a look at their business model and pull their heads out. They need to do more to PARTNER with their authors, and publicize the work of their authors. Perhaps have a division within their company that would interact with fans of that author’s work(s).

After all, they make their money selling the works of authors. It’s not good practice to disengage with either the authors of the works, or the buyers.

Since my preferred method of buying books is becoming more and more scarce - the loss of bookstores - I am stuck dealing with a frustrating online experience. Sometimes, the details of the books are either absent altogether, or look like it was written by illiterates.

A brief description, much like the back cover of a novel, telling the potential buyer what the book is all about to whet the appetite would be nice. Also, it would be good to know exactly what edition the buyer is looking at - is it hardbound? Trade paperback? Mass market paperback?

There also needs to be moderation of the comments sections, though I understand that would be a herculean task.

A genuine issue, such as missing pages, is something that should be brought to the attention of the publisher, who can correct the issue, rather than dragging down the book’s rating, and potentially making it unpalatable to a new buyer. “I loved the book otherwise, but I am giving it only one star, because of the issue of missing pages.” Hardly the author’s fault, and the book should not suffer because of it.

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Blue, my wife and I have definitely tried to model the type of relationship we want her to have. She’s in her second year of university now and so far her “type” seems to be more along the lines of Kharadmon…prankster through and through! :rofl:

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LOL, sorry, Joe, I misunderstood your post. I thought you were a soon to be Dad, and that you and your wife already knew you were having a girl.

Brian, I, too, have multiple copies of this series. At the moment, my actual collection is in storage, and I decided I HAD to have copies to read, so I could keep up with any discussions here.

Last year, when my stupid odyssey began, my mass market paperback copy of Fugitive Prince decided to split its binding. I hate having to chase after pages flying around, so I got another copy of it from Evil Bay. Alas, it spent a good ten days in Las Vegas before I actually got it delivered. I sent Janny an email with the cryptic subject line, “Ath, I thought Jaelot was tasteless!”

I had imagined Arithon making that comment as he and Elaira walked hand in hand along the Vegas Strip. I also mentioned that I thought they had to spend the extra time there to pry Dakar out of one of the brothels.

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I also have multiple copies of all the books and have the little mini Book Club hardback of Stormed Fortress, but would love a hardback copy that actually was the same size as all the others. I also missed the character art on the Stormed Fortress cover, it was the first book not to have a version with character art. :frowning: