A Conversation With R. Scott Bakker (Fantasy/SF writer)
Interview September 2004

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After all the reviews, after the way both books seem to be selling here in Canada, the temptation is to blame the 'corporate editor' -- you know, risk-averse, enslaved by the bean-counters, all that. But when you talk to editors, you realize they don't have this cookie-cutter template in mind, they just know what they like, and they have a series of hunches about what will and will not sell. And it also tends to be the case that the 'higher' you go career-wise, the busier you become. Editorially speaking, New York is the summit of the publishing mountain, and there's very little in the first 200 pages of The Darkness that Comes Before that shouts commercial viability! It's a hard book.

Lucky for me, fantasy readers are unlike any other reader. Think of how many people reread entire series in preparation for the release of a sequel. It really is quite extraordinary.

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Which kind of demonstrates that editors look very subjectively at new novels; which is a point I've been trying to make...