Copies of Charles de Lint’s epic fantasy novel, Eyes Like Leaves, are due in our offices late this week. We have thousands of copies to ship to customers, so beg everyone’s patience as we do so. Look to this news page and our email newsletter for regular updates on shipping progress. Please note that both the signed trade and limited editions are both over 80% sold out, with more orders arriving all the time.

In the meantime, here’s a taste of the praise Charles’s “rescued” novel has been receiving:

From Publishers Weekly:
“World Fantasy Award–winner de Lint dusts off an enchanting epic fantasy written in 1980 but never published. The result is a delightful old-fashioned group quest, and though it occasionally lacks the older de Lint’s graceful skill with language, even his nascent poetic style evokes beautiful imagery.”

From Library Journal:
“This traditional fantasy…bears de Lint’s characteristically lyrical prose and hypnotic storytelling. Filled with Celtic lore and wonderfully drawn characters, this standalone epic should please the author’s many fans and lovers of medieval fantasy.”

From Booklist:
“This is classic high fantasy, written and revised by a master, unpublished when first completed some 30 years ago because de Lint decided to focus on contemporary fantasy stories and let it languish. It is a must for de Lint completists and, actually, for all high-fantasy and folkloristic fiction fans.”

From Fantasy Literature:
“Eyes Like Leaves is well-paced, and the action scenes flash with energy. Charles de Lint shows signs of the bardic gift in his ability to make scenes come alive…”

Booklist just posted a glowing review of Peter S. Beagle’s massive career retrospective, Mirror Kingdoms, and focused on those tales which haven’t been collected before: “‘What Tune the Enchantress Plays’ is the irritable dramatic monologue, delivered to a demon, of a woman tricked out of the love of her life and her subsequent
vengeance; it’s utterly convincing, for Beagle catches precisely the voice of just such a not-in-this-world character. ‘Vanishing’ is a ghost story about atonement and, just possibly, redemptive change by a man who let a moment of horror at the Berlin wall in 1963 ruin his life. The autobiographically tinted ‘The Rock in the Park’ and ‘The Rabbi’s Hobby’ are about, respectively, a boy’s run-ins with centaurs (in Central Park, yet) and the ghost of someone who never lived. They’re superb and in superb company.’”

We have a few updates on Robert McCammon’s Mister Slaughter to share, in no particular order:

1. We have ordered the slipcases for the limited edition, but are still a good 4-6 weeks away from being able to ship that version. We’ll post more info (and send it out in our newsletter) as soon as we have it.

2. The first edition copies, only available direct from SubPress at this point, continue to dwindle.

3. Some online retailers have gone through their inventory on the book and are waiting for more copies. Second printings are en route to those who’ve ordered, so shipping status at Amazon, etc. should be back to “Ships in 24 hours” very shortly.

4. Over at Matthew Corbett’s World, the site that Hunter Goatley runs for the series, he’s recently posted a list of characters from the Corbett novels — with descriptions to follow — along with a copy of the actual map that McCammon works from when writing the novels

Finally, here’s another fine review of the book, this time from Sense of Wonder: “Combining the best elements of detective, historical, horror and conspiracy fiction, this is a book and a series that deserves a wide readership.”

We’ve recently received a few returns from our wholesale accounts, and have roughly 25 copies each of two long out-of-print Ray Bradbury titles. Summer Morning, Summer Night contains 27 tales and vignettes of Green Town — 17 of them appearing for the first time in this collection.

The other title, Marionettes, Inc. is a celebration of Bradbury’s robot tales, anchored by the classic novella, “I Sing the Body Electric” and including a few other tales, along with an unpublished story and short teleplay. Each of the stories therein features at its head a fine pen and ink illustration by Mark A. Nelson. We don’t expect to have these around long, so take advantage of this second chance if you’re of a mind.

We’ve made arrangements with PS Publishing to snag a limited number of copies of their huge (140,000 words) Lovecraftian anthology, Black Wings, edited by noted critic S. T. Joshi. With authors such as Michael Marshall Smith, William Browning Spencer, David J. Schow, Norman Partridge, and a ton of others, this is sure to be one of the best horror anthologies of 2010. Get your order in now before our allotment runs out.

Our second Silverberg offering is truly special. The Last Song of Orpheus is a 30,000 word novella, his longest work in over a decade, which is one of his most remarkable accomplishments, a resonant recreation of one of the central myths of western civilization.

PS Publishing will soon release a new, standalone fantasy novel by the legendary Gene Wolfe, and we’ve managed to secure a very limited number of copies. With a great dust jacket by Dirk Berger, and an introduction by Tim Powers, The Sorcerer’s House is likely to sell out fairly quickly. Please head over to the product page and have a look.

Update: We sold out of our allotment of the limited edition in one day, but still have ten copies of the deluxe traycased version not yet spoken for.

Here’s a first look at J. K. Potter’s cover for our limited edition of Blackout by Connie Willis, which has just snagged another starred review, this time from Booklist: “On par with Doomsday Book (1992), Blackout depicts the times and the spirit of the British people remarkably vividly, and bits of comic relief leaven any somberness. Characterizations of the historians and the Brits they become close to are multifaceted and believable, and the ending leaves us keenly primed for the sequel, scheduled for November 2010 publication.”

Elizabeth Bear’s long fantasy novella, Bone and Jewel Creatures, also garnered favorable coverage, this time from Publishers Weekly: “Few family feuds feature gem-studded automatons facing off against zombies, but this quirky short fantasy by Hugo-winner Bear (By the Mountain Bound) is the exception.”