JANNY WURTS - Most under-recognized Fantasy author!

[Quokka]

That's something that's never occurred to me, Teresa, that a pen-name is picked on those sort of grounds.

So if you wrote hard SF, you'd choose one starting with, say, "B", to fall between Asimov and Clarke?

So that's why they're all up there together. Always thought it was strange when I started reading Hard SF it was Baxter, Bear, Benford and Bova.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

So that's why they're all up there together. Always thought it was strange when I started reading Hard SF it was Baxter, Bear, Benford and Bova.

(This is where I would put a smilie if I used them.) Things have changed since the heyday of writers like Baxter, Bear, Benford, and Bova. Things have changed from the way they were 15 or 20 years ago, when you could scan the entire SFF section in the largest bookstores in a matter of minutes.

These days, when I go to Borders or B&N, I may spend an hour searching the SFF shelves for something to read. Most people, though, (I'm not talking about adventurous readers like the folks here, but the readers who actually keep the publishers in business) don't have as much time on their hands as I do, and go for the quick grab. They look up their favorite authors, or they look for the book that everyone is talking about, and then they're gone.

Or they order their books from amazon, which means either typing in the names of specific authors, or going through the books that amazon (in its wisdom) recommends based on their buying history.

If someone falls off the radar, they tend to stay off the radar, unless a whole range of favorable factors (which may or may not include where the books are placed on the shelves) line up.

Anyway, it's beginning to sound like I'm making a big deal out of the alphabet, when I only meant to respond to whoever it was that dismissed the whole idea when somebody else brought it up. It's one little thing that could tip the balance. Particularly, as I said, if there was a gap between books.

 

[Clansman]

Or they order their books from amazon, which means either typing in the names of specific authors, or going through the books that amazon (in its wisdom) recommends based on their buying history.

This is too true. Amazon does it with books and DVDs. I am a fan of British mystery (sorry, but Hollywood just can't do it right) and drama, and have ordered things like Inspector Morse and Prime Suspect from Amazon. Then, Amazon assumes that I'd like any old British mystery schlok that sells, namely the boring, feeble and cliched Midsomer Murders, and decides to e-mail me about it. I am sure that this works, as Teresa pointed out, for the lazy and unadventurous. You order something, and Amazon decides that you will like anything that sells reasonably well in the genre.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Clansman, why don't you or one of your friends write some reviews of Janny's books (particularly the new one) for our Review section?

 

[Clansman]

I would be happy to do so. In fact, I have already done so for another website that is dedicated to posting reviews of fantasy, but I believe that the forum rules in the Chrons (see, I'm already using the local dialect!) do not allow me to post a link or to refer to other websites. Correct me if I am wrong.

So, I will post a review or two, with pleasure.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

There is no rule forbidding links as such, but the software won't allow anyone with less than fifteen posts to post one, and joining up for the sole purpose of dropping a link is frowned on. (Fifteen short posts and then a link generally results in somebody getting the boot.)

So you have enough posts that you could post a link, but only people who read this thread would see it. If you write up something for the review section here, it might get more views in the long run.

 

[Clansman]

Well, the review of Stormed Fortress is posted, as per suggestion. In the meantime, I've had a lot of joy poking around this site. The thread on Tolkien quotes is fun.

Just so all know, Wurts is now well into the next story arc of The Wars of Light and Shadow. She won't, however, (and perhaps quite wisely) won't say when the book will be finished.

I guess I feel kind of like the Bob Geldoff character in The Wall, railing against the publishing industry like I have: "The wall was too high, he could not break free. And the Worms ate into his brain!" They will, like television, continue to push the crap and the fluff, and once in a while a few bright lights will break through.

Thank God for overseas shipping!

 

[GOLLUM]

Interesting review there. I agree that one of the major aspects of Janny's work is her ability to paint grey characters who have to negotiaite so many unexpected twists and turns you can never guess what's going to happen next. I also like Janny's prose, no word in any setence ever seems wasted.

Needles to say Arithon is my favourite character...

 

[Clansman]

I just learned from Janny Wurts' website (Trystane's Website: host for the Janny Wurts Offical Webpage and the Don Maitz Official Webpage) that the first run of Stormed Fortress in trade paperback is almost sold out. Although this was only published in the UK, it bodes well for a US publisher to pick up this series in the foreseeable future. The mass market edition is due out later this year in the UK, so it appears that the publisher has underestimated the numbers on the trade paperback.

Also, she is well into writing the next book in the series, namely Initiate's Trial, so the wait between books will not be unduly horrible (someone say something about A Dance With Dragons???) which is really nice in an epic series.

 

[The Procrastinator]

Excellent news, Clansman. I can well understand and appreciate why it takes writers of epic fantasy so loooooooong to write - especially if they're trying to do a good job - but one thing I have to say for Janny Wurts, she really seems switched on about her story, knows exactly where she's taking it, and gives the reader the feeling that patience really will be rewarded. I'm a willing passenger on the Wurtsbus, and have been for many years.

Having said that I think that there are a few reasons for her being "under-recognised".

One is the fact that the Wars of Light and Shadow is so long and involved. Its up to...er...I can't count that high...and its nature is such that its very difficult to jump in on the 6th floor, for instance, and keep going up. You really need to start with volume 1, which is a big commitment and getting bigger as the series expands further.

Two, I don't think its helped that the whole series has been "split up" into sub-series. It hasn't really been marketed as WOLAS from the word go. When I first bought Curse of the Mistwraith 15 years ago I had no clue what I was getting into, heh. The copies I have of Vols 4 and up are marketed as Alliance of Light, Vols 1 - 5 whereas the first 3 didn't have any "series label". I hope they've done some changes on the reprints but that kind of thing can be confusing for both readers and booksellers.

Three, the alphabet thing - I agree that this is very likely a factor. Exacerbated by the length of the series, and the difficulty of coming at the series from any point in the middle - none of these factors are likely to attract the "grab something off the shelf-ers". And because Janny has been putting such energy and time into this gargantuan undertaking, WOLAS, she kind of drops under the readers' radar unless they're already on the bandwagon, because she's not writing smaller works that are easier to "grab" - with the exception of one stand-alone novel.

Four, the writing style just doesn't appeal to everyone. I wouldn't be surprised if there's heaps of people who would love the story but can't get past the writing style. There's nothing essentially wrong or bad about it, quite the contrary most of the time, but it demands attention from the reader in a way that most styles don't, especially these days. Such things can be down to education, but they can also be a matter of taste - there are lots of people who have trouble with other epics for the same reason, like Dune or LOTR. Whether you love Wurts or not, there's nothing easy about her style. Personally, I love the series and Arithon is one of my all time favourite fantasy characters - outstanding - but style-wise I always get the urge to take to the books with a red pen. Her world-building and descriptive passages are sublime, her characterisation truly wonderful, but there are so many unnecessary adjectives and so much superfluous explanation in there. Its a weird combination of the subtle and the sledgehammer. I love writers who rabbit on when the effect is art (like Bradbury) but art is one of the most personal things - and for me, though I can see and appreciate the art in Janny's writing, its not quite to my taste. Sometimes you can say more with less. And don't I wish she would. But that's the way she is, that's the way she's telling the story, so I just have to lump it if I want to read it - which I do.

 

[Clansman]

I think you can add a fifth item to the list, and that is the difficulty with the publishing industry right now. There have, since this series began, been a number of mergers of publishing houses. Janny Wurts' epic series, The Wars of Light and Shadow, has had at least three different publishers in North America: ROC, Harper Collins, and Meisha Merlin, and there might have been a fourth. The first books in the series sold quite well, and then publisher's support virtually disappeared, as did her books from the stores that I used to frequent in the 1990s. Delays in publication occurred, and as a result, people who were invested in the series stopped reading it. Then, with the last publisher, it went belly up, and left the series high and dry in North America. There wasn't even a mass-market edition of Traitor's Knot.

The entire publishing industry is going through major, fundamental changes at the moment, and retail sales of books are at a very low ebb. Publishers focus on sales rather than quality, and so "lowest common denominator" rules the day, instead of quality literature. It took years for Erikson's stuff to break through, and mostly because of websites like this one, not because of a particular publisher. Until publishers put editors back in control instead of sales and marketing experts, the bad-cover/low-grade fantasy will continue to be shoved at us, and the really good authors will have to be supported by their loyal fans to get through the tough times, because the publishing houses are not backing them well enough with marketing that will sell the books.

I agree about the sub-series business. That created a bit of confusion. Though I understand about the story arcs, the covers of the books and the book catalogues should have made this clear. The most recent book, Stormed Fortress, was confused as the last book in the series, when in fact it was the last book of the third story arc, The Alliance of Light. That whole organization could have been done better. The new UK covers appear to have addressed that concern, and perhaps a North American re-release, when it comes, will deal with that issue. BTW, the new UK covers are very, very cool.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Publishers focus on sales rather than quality, and so "lowest common denominator" rules the day, instead of quality literature.

It's not always about the lowest common denominator -- and certainly not more so than it's been before. The difference is that the really lousy stuff used to be available in cheap, slender paperbacks you could pick up from a spinner rack at the grocery store or the drug store or a newstand (there were good things in there, too, of course) rather than cramming the shelves in the bookstores. Of course bookstores have a lot more shelf space to cram. Still, it makes the good stuff harder to find.

But there is something about the idea of publishers not giving readers what they want and giving them what is good for them instead that I don't quite like. And I don't think that would be particularly good for SFF, either, because it was only when publishers started seeing it as a lucrative market that it began to get any respect.

Until publishers put editors back in control instead of sales and marketing experts, the bad-cover/low-grade fantasy will continue to be shoved at us, and the really good authors will have to be supported by their loyal fans to get through the tough times, because the publishing houses are not backing them well enough with marketing that will sell the books

Except for the fact that you exaggerate the role that marketing plays in genre publishing (where publishers have never put much money into advertising books, certainly not compared to other businesses), I quite agree with you here. Back in the days when editors made the decisions, there really wasn't more in the way of marketing -- that was pretty much where it is now -- but authors had more time to build careers, and one book with poor sales figures wasn't likely to send a career circling down the drain. An author could continue for a long time as a mid-list writer with a small but loyal following.

 

[Pyan]

I
But there is something about the idea of publishers not giving readers what they want and giving them what is good for them instead that I don't quite like.

And if there is a quicker way to economic ruin, I doubt I can imagine it. People, in my experience, tend to be contrary critters, and don't take kindly to being told that they should do something because it's "good for them".

I tried to read Ms Wurts, starting with Curse of the Mistwraith, several times, and stopped every time, chiefly for the reasons Procrastinator mentions in his point four...I felt there was a decent enough story there, but just couldn't get past the style. Loved the collaborations with REF, though....

 

[Clansman]

Except for the fact that you exaggerate the role that marketing plays in genre publishing

I would use the word "over-estimate", instead of "exaggerate", because to be truthful, I am guessing based on my review of different sites online and comments in periodicals. I am glad to see that a published author agrees with me a bit, though.

Pyan, that's cool. You tried a few times, and I will freely admit that Janny's style is not for everyone, so what more can I ask? I like her style a lot, but that's me. I make a point when reading her epic series to hive off at least an hour of reading time, because it needs that kind of attention. It is not bus reading, that is for sure. You might want to try To Ride Hell's Chasm. I think you will find quite a difference with that book, and it is only one book, and a lot of fun.

On the style point, I was reading on her website the other day that she writes not just for words fitting together on the page, but also in a manner that takes into account how the words sound if read aloud. This may be part of the reason why I cannot read her epic books fast. I can breeze through an 800 Jordan door-stopper in 24 hours, but I can't do that with Janny Wurts' epic stuff (I can do it with TRHC, because it's a different kind of story), and for me, that's a good thing. The style really makes me pay attention, instead of having a quick escape.

Pyan, at least I know that you're a Tolkien fan, so you obviously have taste!

 

[The Procrastinator]

Taste - now there's a thing. We all like to think we have it.

There's a way of writing that can make your story accessible to the greatest number of people possible. There's another path a writer can take, a more deliberately individual path, more challenging, more demanding, for both author and audience. This latter path is not taken with the gratification of the masses in mind. The more individual the style, the greater the risk that not all will relate to it - not even all readers of discernment, thus the case of Pyan, who could not relate to Janny's writing, despite being a person of taste.

Please note the above paragraph was written to be read aloud.

And now I've been so silly and its gotten so late that I'm not even sure if this post had a point.

 

[Clansman]

LOL! That post was funny and profound at the same time, which is quite a victory. Procrastinator, have you ever turned your hand to writing? You are an excellent communicator (all joking aside).

I agree with the point which you did make. I makes perfect sense.

 

[The Procrastinator]

Thank you Clanny, and yes I have turned my hand to it, or rather my brain, now and then. A little Jane Austen fanfic - a few scifi/fantasy stories for my own amusement, over the years - but you see, because of my superpower, I never finish anything, ha ha ha.

Writing is very hard work for me because I am not in essence a verbal person, but I am an aesthetic one - bad combination. The result? Hours can be spent staring at the screen while I try to find the best (finest/most aesthetically balanced/most nuanced/I could go on and on) way to say something that probably did not originate in any form approaching that of verbal expression. Painfully slow, as a rule, and rarely satisfying.

So I will stick to what I do best, line art, until the day my hand starts to shake.

Oh, and reading.

 

[Montero]

You might want to try To Ride Hell's Chasm. I think you will find quite a difference with that book, and it is only one book, and a lot of fun.

I read and enjoyed JW collaboration with Feist, then tried one of JW books. Now not sure of the title - might have been Stormwarden. The version I had had a black tower on the cover and it featured three women - blonde, brunette and either black hair or red hair. Gave up quite rapidly as couldn't get into it and three colour coded gorgeous women were a bit annoying.
Anyway, if you can work out which one it was I gave up on , could you tell me if To Ride Hell's Chasm is anything like it?

 

[Grimward]

Hmmm, Monty, that's a tough one. THe cover I've seen of TRHC has a portrait of a woman, with two men standing on either side of the portrait. They quite distinctly weren't "color coded gorgeous women", though...!

Don't know what to tell you about JW's works. Stormwarden and the rest of the Cycle of Fire series are not as structured and granular as the Wars of Light and Shadow; if you couldn't get into Stormwarden, I'm afraid Curse of the Mistwraith will seem like a locked, guarded tower by way of comparison, at least for the first several chapters! You might give TRHC a try, or her earlier work, Sorcerer's Legacy.

 

[Montero]

Hi Grimward

Managed to be a bit unclear. The cover I am remembering was a mauve background, black tower with a bit of a waistline to it, women in sillhouette - black backlit figure. Maybe only one woman. The colour coding of the women was in their description inside the book. Don't know if it was Stormwarden or not, guessed because the tower was on a stormswept coastline.
It was a trade paperback and I suspect it may be up to ten years old, or older. Bought it second hand.

One day I will finish unpacking from the move and find it. Tried looking on Amazon and JW site but not seeing the cover I am remembering.