Elizabeth Bear’s mosaic novel New Amsterdam has drawn praise from Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal. Among the most recent good words are these, from Charles Stross: “In the tradition of Randal Garrett’s Lord Darcy stories, Elizabeth Bear has carved out a disturbingly dark alternative past, where the gaslit neuroses of Victorian colonialism rub shoulders with the nightmares of an older, grimmer age. Watch out for this fantasy — it’s got fangs.”

Distributor orders have been very strong for this title. We expect the trade edition to go out of print in the next 3-4 weeks, and are down to the last 20 copies of the limited edition.

Trade Edition:

$25

One of the most important fantasy debuts of the past few years is in stock and shipping, as a deluxe limited edition. Join con man Locke Lamora and his “gentleman bastards” compatriots in a book overstuffed with plot, action, and intrigue, complete with a full-color dust jacket and three full-color interior illustrations by Edward Miller. The Lies of Locke Lamora is selling very well for a first novel, with over 75% of the 500 signed numbered copies shipping on publication.

Limited Edition:

$75

We expect Elizabeth Bear’s mosaic novel, New Amsterdam to go out of print in the next three to four weeks, given the glowing reviews it’s receiving:

From Publishers Weekly:
“Bear’s tales are not only ingeniously mysterious but also richly textured with details that bring the society and history of her alternate America to vivid life. Readers who like the grit of Laurell K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake novels and the historical heft of Chelsea Quinn Yarbro’s vampire tales will find similar pleasures here.”

From Library Journal:
“Sparkling with wry humor and precise period detail, this belongs in most fantasy collections.”

From Booklist:
“The joy here arises from watching the story’s twists and turns unfold… Once in the New World, [vampire detective] Sebastien adds to his blood sources sorcerer Abigail Irene Garrett, who’s actually an officer serving the Crown’s Duke Richard, and the plot complexities multiply, as do the cast members, giving new resonance to the term ‘characters’ in this fast-moving supernatural tale that’s bloody well good.”

For those interested in the Signed Limited Edition, with a bonus 5,000 word chapbook story, we’re down to our last 30 copies of that version.

All you Pluto hayters will not get equal time. This week over at Subterranean Online, John Scalzi takes up the former planet’s case in a delightful short short. Less delightful, but no less well done, is a short-short by Joe Hill related to his novel, Heart-Shaped Box. Check out “Jude Confronts Global Warming,” but (spoiler alert) not before you’ve read the novel proper.

While you’re over at Subterranean Online, don’t forget all the great fiction by Joe R. Lansdale, Poppy Z. Brite, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Neal Barrett, Jr. as well as a full-length novella by Charles Stross, and an audio book by Kage Baker.

Joe’s main publisher, HarperCollins, has asked that all copies of the second printing of the Subterranean Edition of Heart-Shaped Box be signed, rather than just the 100 deluxe copies, as originally planned. Joe and I talked, and it turns out there was a miscommunication between Joe’s agent and HarperCollins about exactly what portion of the reprint would be signed, so we’ve decided to accommodate them. It will take an extra week or two to have the extra signature pages printed and send to the author for signing. We’ll keep everyone posted as to the book’s progress via our online newsletter.

Please note, the bonus material will still only appear in the extra 100 copies, already sold out. The only change here is that all copies of the reprint will now be signed.

We’ve got three brand new limited editions shipping in the next two weeks, including the first volume of Scott Lynch’s epic fantasy, The Lies of Locke Lamora, as welll as the limited edition of Gordon Dahlquist’s expansive, impressive literary fantasy, The Glass Blooks of the Dream Eaters.

Last, but certainly not least is Elizabeth Bear’s New Amsterdam, a “mosaic” novel featuring Deputy Crown Inspector Abigail Irene Garrett and “The Great Detective,” wampyr Sebastien de Ulloa. In addition to the $25 trade hardcover, there’s a signed limited edition ($40) which includes a previously-unpublished 5,000 word story chapbook not available anywhere else.

Alan Campbell has graced us with a 26,000 word novella, Lye Street, a prequel to his stunning fantasy debut, Scar Night, the first novel of the Deepgate Codex. As those who’ve read the novel know, Scar Night begins with an apocalyptic battle between the angel Carnival and the warriors of the church. Lye Street is the tale that leads up to the exact moment of that battle.

The Greene family is cursed. Every fifty years Deepgate’s scarred angel, Carnival, returns to murder another descendant. Now, five hundred years after the first victim’s death, Sal Greene is facing his own doom. His time has almost run out. In a desperate attempt to break the chain of violence and save his family, he summons a demon to the chained city: a warrior he hopes is powerful enough to stand against the angel.

Yet the creature which arrives in Deepgate is not quite the legendary mercenary Sal Greene was expecting.

Due to ship in January 2008.

Signed Hardcover Edition: $25
Lettered: 26 signed traycased hardcovers: $200

The Best of Lucius Shepard is the first ever career retrospective collection from one of the finest writers of the fantastic to emerge in the United States over the past quarter century. It contains nearly 300,000 words of his best short fiction and is destined to be recognized as a true classic of the field. Lucius Shepard writes from the darkest, truest heart of America — not the heart of the United States or of North America, but all of America — and he writes of it with rare passion, honesty and intelligence. His earliest stories, the ones that made his name a quarter of a century ago were set in the jungles of South America and filled with creatures dark and fantastical. Stories like “Salvador”, “The Jaguar Hunter”, and the excoriatingly brilliant “R&R” deconstructed war and peace in South America, in both the past and the future, like no other writer of the fantastic.

The Best of Lucius Shepard will be available as a $40 cloth bound Trade Hardcover, and as a The Limited Edition ($125) accompanied by an entirely separate volume (projected to be 250-300 pages) of rarities, including such uncollected gems as the novella “Skull City” and “The Glassblower’s Dragon.”