Sean Williams

ETA The files have now been removed pending the ebook version, coming soon. Also due soon: the ebook of the final novel in the series, so if you've missed that one, it won't be for much longer. Cheers!

In absolutely outstanding news, Pyr has released the First Book of the Cataclysm onto the web. All you have to do is click the link below and the PDF is yours. Every last word. No questions asked!



The Crooked Letter

For those who aren't familiar with it, The Crooked Letter is kinda urban New Weird on a massive scale. It's been compared to China Mieville, Philip Pullman, Ursula K Le Guin, Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, Michael Moorcock, yada yada, and it won both the Aurealis and Ditmar Awards the year it was released (the first fantasy novel in the history of the awards to do so). Chronologically speaking, it's the first book in my Change series, and stands as a prequel to The Stone Mage & the Sea, The Blood Debt, and The Changeling. It's also my attempt to take all the world's religions and wrap them up in a crazy Darwinian package that even an atheist like me might be tempted to believe. It was the most difficult book I ever wrote, and now it's free. Check it out!

I'm particularly excited about this because I've been wanting to release my novels on the web for as long as the web has existed, and this is the first time one of my publishers has agreed to do it. Huzzah! Tell your friends!

(blurbs)
(reviews)
ETA Mirrors here and here if the Pyr site is running slow.
ETA Kudos to Lou Anders for making it happen!

Another top ten listing, and this time it's huge!

Barnes & Noble has put The Crooked Letter at number four on its Explorations Newsletter's Editor's Choice of 2006, alongside John Scalzi, Rudy Rucker, and many other excellent authors. Hurrah!

Wonderful to see so many other Pyr titles in these lists, too. On this one, in fact, Pyr gets the #1 spot. Lou Anders once again confirms the rumour that he is a legend.

Hot off the press:

Pat's Fantasy Hotlist is giving away two copies of the magnificent Pyr hardcover of The Crooked Letter. Be quick to grab one! (Thanks for the kind words, Pat.)

Well, here I am in San Diego, brain-fogged from jetlag and a 30-hour flight to get here. Security wasn't as bad as I had expected. My new itsy-bitsy laptop proved invaluable on many occasions. That may have been the best purchase I made this year.

No insightful thoughts today, but David Louis Edelman is having some on editing reality and self-censorship. My first reading of it made me think, well, so what? This kind of technology is just giving us a new way to do what we already do with some efficiency but sometimes without out conscious awareness, and which we will continue to do whether the software is in place or not–unless we perform some serious and permanent re-wiring of the human mind, which would be a bold leap forward. But then again, you could say exactly the same thing about the internal combustion engine vs walking, so there's no denying the far-reaching effects it might have on future society. I guess that's the trick with SF: fundamental shifts in thinking often come and go without people noticing, while the details change everything...

There's also a great review of The Crooked Letter here.

"There's nothing new under the sun. At least that's how it sometimes feels with regards to fantasy of the epic variety. However, Australia's prolific Sean Williams seems to genuinely scamper down untrodden roads in The Crooked Letter.

"Mythologies and religious beliefs are melded and warped in a world not unlike our own in many ways. Narration is divided through the separate realms, but manages to weave itself into a wonderful story. The prose is eloquent and the dialogue is flawless."

William Lexner also has great things to say about Greg Bridges' cover and Lou Anders' work at Pyr. Fantastic all round.

Cheryl Morgan favourably reviews The Crooked Letter here.

"...there’s a lot of fun to be had. I was particularly struck by the vivid imagery of Williams’ worlds. I wanted to see the book done as a comic — preferably by someone who has already worked on books like Hellblazer — so I could see all of the weird demons Williams had created."

I am well pleased. Copies of the book itself arrived yesterday, and it is absolutely beautiful. It gets pride of place on my brag shelf, at least until Pyr's edition of The Blood Debt comes out.

Also, Chris Lawson has created a group blog called Talking Squid. Since I'm too distracted to maintain a blog of my own, I'll post material that isn't news-related there and report the postings here.

My first, a small rant on the topic of SF concept albums, went up today.