Fantasy Book Critic: PRESS RELEASE — Look Who’s Talking Up Pyr!

The conventional wisdom holds that publishers don't have dedicated readerships—authors and subgenres do. Those few publishers that do cultivate a single brand identity tend to concentrate their focus on a particular subgenre, such as military science fiction.

Yet over the last few years, we have begun to hear from readers, critics, chain bookstore buyers, distributors, bloggers and independent bookstores, that Pyr Books is becoming an exception to this notion. It seems a Pyr brand is taking hold—based not on any one niche within the genre, but on the expectation of a general level of extremely high quality.

Every press likes to identify their readership. Whether for epic fantasy, hard science fiction, sci-fantasy blends, space opera or something else, just who thinks of Pyr as a line worth reading?

Junot Díaz, winner of the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, says “Pyr Books has in a few short years become the imprint to beat in the science fiction and fantasy fields.”

Díaz explains, “[With The First Law series, Joe] Abercrombie has written the finest epic fantasy trilogy in recent memory. He's one writer that no one should miss. Ian McDonald’s Brasyl is beyond superb. This novel should have beaten all comers for all the main awards. And who is writing space opera as sharp as Kay Kenyon in her The Entire And The Rose series?”

Barbara Ehrenreich—author of This Land Is Their Land and Nickel and Dimed (Metropolitan Books)—was asked by Time Magazine to name a guilty pleasure, something she reads when she doesn’t want to work. She named River of Gods by Ian McDonald. Ehrenreich said, “There aren't many literary sci-fi thrillers that deliver a mind-expanding metaphysical punch, and this one ended all too soon. But in the afterglow of McDonald's lushly blooming imagination, even the real world is looking better.”

Joseph Mallozzi writes and produces one of television’s hottest science fiction shows, Stargate: Atlantis. During production in Vancouver, Canada, he regularly communicates with the show’s fans through online forums and blogs. Somehow, he also finds time to read for pleasure—and some of his recent favorites come from Pyr.

Mallozzi says, “Pyr continues to impress with its growing line-up of premiere genre fiction. From Justina Robson's mind-bending Quantum Gravity series to Kay Kenyon's thoughtful and provocative Entire and the Rose saga, it's an imprint marked for offering up some of the best Fantasy and SF being written today.”

Apparently, even Stargate: Atlantis characters read Pyr books. In recent episodes, both Chuck the technician and Dusty were seen reading Theodore Judson’s The Martian General’s Daughter.

Lou Anders, Pyr Editorial Director, notes, “Pyr’s goal from day one was to provide books of a consistently high quality, so it is extremely gratifying to hear that readers—famous, fictional, or otherwise—feel that is what they are getting.”

NOTE: All I can say is keep up the great work Pyr!!!

4:00 PM |

Posted by Robert |

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1 comments:

Anonymous said...: pyr, to me, is also a brand of high quality. its original books are each heads and tales above the other publisher/imprints.

Lou is a rare talent and an editor that is going to be known for a long time.; October 3, 2008 at 9:04 PM