Ebooks

originally posted by Rhett Jones

I've had GREAT difficulty trying to get Stormed Fortress. I had ordered from Amazon last year and just last week cancelled my order as they couldn't get a copy. So I wonder if there is someplace the series, but especially SF is available? I've checked fictionwise.com and a few others, but no joy.

originally posted by Trys

Rhett,

I suspect you ordered the trade paperback from amazon.co.uk, yes? If so, that edition of the book is out of print but the mass market edition is available from amazon.co.uk at http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alliance-Light-Stormed-Fortress-Shadow/dp/0007217811/ref =sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244914249&sr=1-1

Trys

originally posted by Rhett Jones

Thank you Trys…is this copy one of those small paperback books? I've got the other books in the big editions - I presume they are the trade paperbacks?

originally posted by starstorm

Rhett,
Yes, the large ones are Trade paperbacks; the smaller ones are Mass Market. I was lucky enough to get a copy of the Trade paperback when it was first released, but I happened to be looking around for another copy for a friend, to match her collection of the trades also, and I found some here at ABE Books, which is my favorite place to look for out-of-print books. They do have a small remainder mark (what looks like a swipe of a black marker across the bottom of the book), but if you want that particular edition, it's a deal. The one I ordered was perfect except for that mark. According to the site, there are only 4 copies left, so I don't recommend waiting if you want one :smiley:. Oh, and I did verify that the ISBN in the description is for the Trade, since it doesn't specifically say they are Trade paperbacks, but that is the price I paid for the one I just got about two months ago.

~Anna

originally posted by Rhett Jones

Thanks for that Anna.

It is possible that Galaxy Bookshop in Australia still has a few copies of the trade paperback available. They can be found online. There may be a link about, here, someplace.

Mark??

originally posted by Hunter

http://www.galaxybooks.com.au/items.asp?id=226934

originally posted by Rhett Jones

Alot of books are being given the ebook treatment, fictionwise has a huge collection and my favourite ebook site at Baen. It would be great if Janny's books were released as ebooks. Over the last year I've bought far more ebooks than p-books and thinking of buying a proper ebook reader like the Sony PR505 or some such.

originally posted by Mark Stephen Kominski

Sorry, Hunter beat me to it! Got mine from Amazon UK, which (like Trys says) shows a fair number of copies (42 right now), including one from a seller in Canada called "Bookcloseout" (might be cheaper than shipping from the Isles if you're here in the States, Rhett). You'd have to ask about the trade vs. mass market question. Good Luck!

Rhrett Jones - I believe that the series books are now available as e books - I saw someone on LT who reported getting the later volumes in that format (legally).

originally posted by Mark Timmony

Hi guys, unfortunately we only have the pb edition at Galaxy now. I contacted HarperCollins and they no-longer have any TP stock, nor is it likely that they will republish the TP and the Pb is now available.

If you do find that somewhere like Amazon.co.uk have it in stock still grab it.

I saw that the cheapest used price at Amazon, for the large format version/first printing of Stormed Fortress, was $62.00 - so people still WANT them.

Other news: the books are also in the pipeline for the Kindle, if you are a gadget freak…I have inquired about the release timing, for this format, waiting for answer.

originally posted by Theresa

Wonderful news about the Kindle… as much as Amazon annoys me to death (it's a profound love/hate relationship I have going with Amazon), I am very attached to my Kindle and nothing will make me happier than to be able to carry portable versions of your books. Keep us posted!

originally posted by Phome

OOO - Theresa. I'm very intrigued by the Kindle. You recommend it then?

originally posted by Kevin Lenth

I'm a little late to the party here, but I just noticed that Grand Conspiracy, Peril's Gate, Traitor's Knot, Stormed Fortress, and To Ride Hell's Chasm are finally available in the Kindle store! I looked at a sample of SF, and I'm quite impressed; the maps survived the digital translation uncommonly well, the text seems more or less error-free, and they even included the s'Brydion bull marking chapters. :wink:

Anyway, I will quite happily reinvest in these, my favorite books, in their digital form – but is it known whether the earlier ones will also cross the digital divide? I would dearly love to have the entire series in my pocket library. (And as long as I'm asking, is there any chance for your other non-Atheran books, in particular the Cycle of Fire and the Empire trilogy? My omnibus of the former was lost in a move and the latter books are exploring career options as loose stacks of paper…)

And in response to Phome's query: I can't speak for Theresa of course, but I strongly recommend the Kindle, as long as you don't expect it to do much beyond displaying books (it's really not much of a "gadget" from that perspective!). Its scope is limited, but what it does do it does superbly; reading with it is a joy, and it is simply unbelievably convenient to have everything available in one (tiny!) place for instant access.

originally posted by Theresa

Having thought I responded to Phome, I see now that I in fact did not (and just to make sure since I don't remember responding to another message… Janny, yes, that probably is me you have seen on GoodReads. I am there.). Ah, the joys of a crater-pitted memory. Yes. I deeply and strongly recommend the Kindle. :wink: I've looked at the Sony Reader and played with it, but I decided the Kindle is better and will be better until Sony has theirs equipped with the wireless content delivery. As a very strong example of that, when Janny and Trys were nice enough the other day to announce that some of the books were in fact in the Kindle store, I literally sat in my car in the parking lot at Petsmart and purchased them then and there via the iPhone (yay for email equipped smartphones! Call me obsessive. I won't mind.) For the Sony unit, you have to make your purchases and hook the reader to the computer before you have your books loaded (and I'm not even sure the Sony software works with the Mac, which would make it useless to me). The Kindle downloads content straight on. And if you have an iPhone, the Kindle app is perfect. I used to carry my Kindle (fits in the purse); now I just have the content sent to the iPhone and can read it there, and then resend it to the Kindle itself after the fact. The Kindle is equipped with an SD slot, so you can really expand your memory with the unit… yes, it's a very nice thing. The newer one looks even nicer than my first gen Kindle, but the revamp wasn't sufficient to justify upgrading to the new one. When they go to a touch screen (oh, they must!), then I'm there. :wink: That's one of the reasons I adore reading (despite the small screen) on the iPhone… touch screen.

I was in fact rather puzzled by the release of the last four WoLaS books… and really do hope they are preparing the first four. And a big "good job" to Harper for a nice conversion. On the whole, I've seen very few issues, and it's pleasantly readable. I've seen some genuinely ghastly Kindle conversions–some that are just annoying formatting issues (Sarah Monette's Corambis… an extra space between every single line of text) to others that are rendered nearly unreadable by problems (C. J. Cherryh's Fortress in the Eye of Time… plagued throughout by misspellings, typos, formatting errors, missing punctuation… horrific. Truly unfortunate; one of my all-time favorite books. Reported problems; Amazon's response: "You'll have to give us the location of the errors." Me: "Er… what part of hundreds upon hundreds of errors did you not understand? How much do you intend to pay me to copy edit this for you?"). It's wonderful to have these available and portable and readable… and so nicely done on Harper's part.

More, please? :smiley: Like Kevin, I would be especially glad to have the rest… Cycle of Fire especially.

The earlier books have to be formatted, and I understand it costs more to scan them in. Interest here has put the titles up on the list - but, I have not gotten a release date, yet. I will let you know when my editor answers that query.

Meantime, you can also inquire of HarperCollins, UK, directed to Voyager…this would speed the process as customer interest is driving how fast older titles get translated into e formats.

Cycle of Fire and the earlier titles - e rights are MINE. A publisher would have to buy them up…let's see what happens with the new releases driving up some interest. Alternatively, I could produce these titles, myself. Carolyn Cherry, Jane Fanchur and Lynn Abbey are exploring this. See the notes on Full Circle on Carolyn's website. I will be watching closely to see how they fare.

For the Empire - that is Bantam, and I think our contracts were signed before e rights were an issue. Something I ought to consider looking into…to see where the rights lie. Obviously if Ray and I own the rights, we'd be leaving money on the table if this was not pursued at some point.

originally posted by Kevin Lenth

Oh, that's great to hear; I think I will send a wheedling e-mail to Voyager. Thanks for clearing things up for us!

Kevin Lenth - welcome here, and thanks so much for the vote of support (which is what writing to a publisher of your interests amounts to).

Voyager HC UK also published Empire in Britain, Australia, NZ. They likely do not own rights to e publish (the contracts for that series, while still in force, were early on, and nothing like e books existed) so it's not outside the realm that they might bid to acquire the Empire series in electronic format, too.

originally posted by Kevin Lenth

Here's the response I got back from HarperCollins, for anyone who's interested:

quote:

Thank you so much for your interest in HarperCollins ebooks and also for
your compliments on the quality of our ebooks. We also think this is
really important.

As for the earlier titles in her series, we are planning to create them
but have had a few hitches in the digitisation process because we're
working with older files and we don't want that to impact on the
quality. I hope that we can process them in the next few months though
so please do check back.



A few months seems an awfully long time to wait!