Wise Man's Fear [SPOILERS!]

[Calibandar]

I would second that. The DAW schedule for the second half of 2010 has yet to be announced, so TWF could still be slotted in there. Depends on how much work needs to be done after the editor's read it. But it feels more like 2011 to me, as with Lynch. And Bakker. And Abercrombie.

One hopes GRRM will be able to get his in for 2010 with so many others moving to next year. Though of course Bakker is still unconfirmed at this point as well.

[Werthead]

I haven't checked schedules for a while, but is Bakker's new thriller still due for late 2010 and then The White Luck Warrior for first half of 2011?

It would be interesting if Lynch, Rothfuss (touch wood) and GRRM all completed their books within a few months of one another and the books came out close together. Of those three, we know ADWD will be rushed out ASAP and Lynch's is being given a lot of time for rewrites before release. Rothfuss is a bit more difficult to judge, as his first book really was a huge, massive success (far bigger than GoT or TEotW or WFR on first release). DAW might be treating it as a GRRM situation and get the book out very quickly after completion or they might want to give the book longer for edits.

I do have to say that almost a year for re-edits and re-drafting is quite substantial. That's more like a significant rewrite of the entire book than just a redrafting process.

[Calibandar]

I haven't checked schedules for a while, but is Bakker's new thriller still due for late 2010 and then The White Luck Warrior for first half of 2011?

Yes, September '10 and March '11 respectively. Interesting also that Orbit already has the listing for the book after White Luck Warrior, Horns of Golgotterath, schedules less than a year after WLW.

[gyrehead]

I would second that. The DAW schedule for the second half of 2010 has yet to be announced, so TWF could still be slotted in there. Depends on how much work needs to be done after the editor's read it. But it feels more like 2011 to me, as with Lynch. And Bakker. And Abercrombie.

tWF is the biggest thing sitting on DAW's horizon. being a rather small sub-imprint as it were means they have a bit of latitude when it comes to giving it the attention and still getting it out. What their actually printing and binding window looks like though remains to be seen.

I'm leaning towards mid-spring 2011 myself. I think DAW will want to re-push Pat and his work considering the delays. Maybe not their unprecedented arc release of the first book, but I can still see review copies, even if promotional editions, getting out at least a month prior to get people talking since it has been awhile. DAW is a bit new to the staggered bumpy release of huge serial epics. Last time they had a successful series hit so many bumps in terms of hitting release dates, it was Melanie Rawn failing to turn in Captal's Tower. And they are still waiting for that.

However a push toward getting the book on shelves this fall around Thanksgiving would be a big revenue infusion in the last quarter. And could shove Pat up there onto the hardcover bestseller listings.

Again, though, DAW is in a somewhat new position with tWF compared to both Martin and Bakker and their publishers vis-a-vis missed releases. So it will be interesting if they do a rush or not. Or if they have the capability in terms of getting a flexible printing or binding window. I think that more than editing will play a part and not just because it seems that Pat and his editor have been treating the work as ongoing in terms of drafting and re-drafting.

Yes, September '10 and March '11 respectively. Interesting also that Orbit already has the listing for the book after White Luck Warrior, Horns of Golgotterath, schedules less than a year after WLW.

I suspect that is a carryover from when they were thinking WLW was due out this year. I've noticed Gollancz often has two listings for the same book when something gets pushed back schedule wise. Sapkowski for a long time had three different hardcover editions showing. And Duguay's Motley Man is another that keeps having weird multiple listings. I think that there has to be an active recall, if you will, of a prior listing and the publishers often forget and figure the re-configured schedule will automatically erase any now contradictory listing. It makes for some amusement as it always sparks grassy knoll types who howl at Amazon and such for "making up" false listings.

[Werthead]

Yes, September '10 and March '11 respectively. Interesting also that Orbit already has the listing for the book after White Luck Warrior, Horns of Golgotterath, schedules less than a year after WLW.

Horns of Golgotterath is the old working title for The White Luck Warrior as well, IIRC, so maybe Bakker is just using that as his go-to working title. I remember Bakker saying something along the lines that the title of the final book in TAE series and the title for the entire third series are massive spoilers and won't be revealed until later.

Also, and this is where things get slightly confusing, Bakker did say after PoN that he was going from 12 months per book to 18 per book, but he was also putting out his thrillers in that time. Since he reversed that decision and has dropped the thrillers to concentrate on the main series, it is possible he could be planning to return to a 12-month schedule. But I wouldn't put money on that.

[kuenjato]

I seem to remember Bakker commenting that he worked on multiple projects at the same time, and that although the overall progress on the individual books became slower, he tended to get more done in the long run ("the shortest path"? :ph34r:). It could be that he's already written passages for book 3.

[jurble]

I seem to remember Bakker commenting that he worked on multiple projects at the same time, and that although the overall progress on the individual books became slower, he tended to get more done in the long run ("the shortest path"? :ph34r:). It could be that he's already written passages for book 3.

Parallel processing. Just gives the illusion of getting more done.

Regardless, I understand Rothfuss, but what's with Lynch? Massive rewrites or something?

[AverageGuy]

Regardless, I understand Rothfuss, but what's with Lynch? Massive rewrites or something?

There's not a lot of info on Lynch, it seems he had some sort of personal issue. Poor form to speculate. A month or two ago, though, I checked his livejournal and there do seem to be some sort of massive rewrites going on.

Here. September 8th, 2009 entry:

"I suppose my venom in my previous post can be attributed, in part, to a discovery made during tonight's revision binge. Namely, that there's a continuity error so glaring early in the final third of TRoT that I simply cannot believe I let it slip in in the first place...

"This particular knot in the story will have to be handled by the Sherman Tank of Paradox Eradication."

[Jussi]

Wise Man's Fear can't be found in the DAW fall 2010 catalog. Perhaps early 2011?

http://booksellers.penguin.com/static/pdf/berkley-fall10.pdf

[Voland]

Release date is now March 1 2011 as per Pat's blog. He sounds pretty certain now so hopefully it'll stick. Nice to finally have a date, even if I would've wanted it to come out sooner. Yay Pat :cheers:

I said I’d tell you when I knew….

So my editor has finished reading the great beastly draft of The Wise Man’s Fear I sent her a while back.

It’s the third draft she’s read, but it’s the first one I’ve really had any confidence in. The first one was pure crap. The second one was mostly complete but still pretty shaky in parts.

This draft was good. I’m verging on being proud of it. It still has a few problems, but they’re manageable problems. They’re problems I can percieve and get my head around, and that means they’re problems I can solve.

So Betsy got back to me with her feedback on the manuscript: a list of 27 things she felt needed attention in the book, arranged in nicely worded bullet points. (The formatting was at my request. I’m fond of bullet points.)

Some of her 27 points are small things. Some are bigger issues. We agree about most of them. Two or three will require a bit of negotiation.

It’s really not a long list, especially when you consider that my own list of things-that-need-fixing-in-book-two currently stands at about 50 or 60 items.

Every time I sit down to work on the book, I try to resolve a few of those issues. Sometimes I fix something and cross it off the list. Other times, a beta reader will bring something to my attention and I add it to the list. As I work, sometimes new problems occur to me, and I add those to the list as well. Sometimes I fix something, and that causes a new problem. So I cross something off and add something at the same time.

It’s kinda like trying to iron all the wrinkles out of a shirt. A huge, living, n-dimentional shirt.

As an example: tonight I worked on the book for about 9 hours. I crossed off four things on my list and added six things. But most of those six things are small, while two of the things I fixed were moderately big and complicated. So it was a good day’s work. (Unfortunately, because one problem tangled me up for four hours, I didn’t get home until 1:30 AM, which means I didn’t get to say goodnight to Oot, which sucks.)

Anyway, earlier today I talked on the phone with my editor about the book. We talked about her 27 points.

My editor asked me if I could have the book done by September.

I thought about it. I thought about her 27 points and my ever-changing 50-60 points. I thought about who I can still use as beta readers, and how many drafts I’ll be able go through in four months. I thought about how many times I will personally be able to read the book in four months.

I said I was sure I could finish it by September.

She asked me if I was sure. Really sure.

I thought about it. Back in 2007, I was sure I’d have the book done by 2008. But I was hugely ignorant and optimistic back then. So I was dead fucking wrong. That caused a lot of grief.

I told her I was really sure I could have it finished by September.

Come hell or high water? She asked me.

Come hell or high water, I said.

So we agreed that I’d have the book finished by September. It was nice. It made us both happy.

So that’s part of the news, that I’ll be finished writing The Wise Man’s Fear by September.

But here’s the rest of the news: that means that the book can’t come out until March of 2011.

Why? Well, for a bunch of reasons. Mostly because there are a lot of things that have to happen before a mass of text becomes a printed book on a shelf. It needs to be copyedited. The edits need to be confirmed. It needs to be proofed, checked for consistency, fiddled with. Fonts need to be chosen. It needs to go through layout. Then it needs to be proofed again. Marketing needs to happen. It needs to be sent to reviewers, and the reviewers need to have time to read it before they write the reviews. It needs to be put into catalogs of to-be-published-books so people who run bookstores can learn about it and order copies for their stores. It needs to be printed, boxed, warehoused, shipped. We need to sacrifice a black she-goat and pray to strange and terrible gods. Then we need to proofread again.

A lot of these steps are going to take longer than normal because my book is 2-3 times longer than most ordinary novels. Other things are going to take longer because this book is kinda important to a lot of people, and we want to make sure everything gets done just right.

The simple truth of the matter is this: that’s just the way it is. I wish it could be sooner, and I’m guessing many of you feel the same. Believe it or not, if the publisher could wave a magic wand and make that happen, they would. (Remember, they don’t make money on the book until they can sell it.)

But there’s no way the book can come out earlier and still have it be the best book possible.

So that’s what happened today: I found out the publication date for The Wise Man’s Fear – March 1st 2011.

Honestly, it would be way easier for me to sit on this information for a while. I could wait until the date was a little closer, thereby avoid some of the great wailing and gnashing of teeth I expect will follow this announcement. That shit brings me no joy. It damages my calm and makes it harder for me to write.

But I promised y’all I would pass along the *real* publication date as soon as I knew it. So that’s what I’m doing.

March 1st 2011.

pat

[Renasko]

Only 4 years after his last book, but hey: glad it's done and on the way.

[Mexal]

Only 4 years after his last book, but hey: glad it's done and on the way.

Oh well. I've waited this long. I'm getting used to it with Martin and to be honest, there are other things to read in the mean time.

[TBBX]

Aww I was hoping for the end of this year but I guess March isn't too bad :)

[pika]

I am so glad I didn't sink the 8$ in Name of the Wind at Borders.. Will keep it added to my " I'll read it if and when its actually finished " list.. Got two "unfinished" epics going.. that have been going for years.. I don't need anymore..

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

I'm pleased we have a solid release date. Isn't March 2011 when RoT is due out as well. As such it should be a good month.

:)

[Jussi]

New DAW catalog says March 2011:

http://booksellers.penguin.com/static/pdf/berkley-winter11.pdf

[Jussi]

Sorry, double post.

[Emery Silverstein]

New DAW catalog says March 2011:

http://booksellers.penguin.com/static/pdf/berkley-winter11.pdf

:cheers:

I am giddy.

[jamesM]

Also: don't forget to order your copy of the title on page 111.

[Jussi]

Brandon Sanderson in Twitter:

Wise Man's Fear comes out next April. For real this time, I'm told.

By the way, the section from Wise Man's Fear I read was as awesome as you're all hoping it will be. Very impressed.

http://twitter.com/BrandonSandrson