Storytellersunplugged

My editors almost never call. Most of them, I’ve never met. Often our only contact is via e-mail and Federal Express. It can go on that way for years, and has.

As long as everything’s fine, there’s no need to talk. I land an assignment for a novel, I’m thrilled. I turn it in on time and it rocks, the editor’s even happier. And it’s all done in the most efficient way possible for busy people racing around the dawn of the 21st century. No time for chats with people we don’t really know.

So, when the phone rings, you know it’s trouble.

Last week, I didn’t even hear the ringtone on my cell phone. (It’s the opening bars of the freelancer’s rock anthem: “Taking Care of Business” by Bachman-Turner Overdrive.) It wasn’t until I heard my editor talking on my voice mail I knew something was wrong. I called her back despite that.

Erin Evans is probably a wonderful lady. She’s never been anything but kind to me. Hell, she commissioned a fantasy novel from me for Wizards of the Coast.

But sometimes circumstances force wonderful people to do rotten things—things that, while they may kick you in the teeth personally, are for the greater good. It does suck, but I have to respect people brave and classy enough to do it over the phone. Giving bad news via the written word is too easy. The right thing to do is to call someone up, talk them through it, and risk having him bite your head off, and it takes guts to pull it off right.

Politely and professionally, Erin informed me Wizards was sadly no longer interested in publishing the novel she’d commissioned from me. This decision did not reflect upon me at all. The entire subline of which the novel was to have been a part had been killed. Not too surprised (the phone call had tipped me off, after all) I took it pretty well, and both Erin and I left the door open to work on another project together at some future date.

Management at Wizards apparently wants to do something different with the book department, although I’m not privy to what it is. They’ve removed a number of books from their schedule recently, including (others have told me) a subline of Dragonlance novels and their entire Wizards of the Coast Discoveries line of original fiction.

This is the second time I’ve gotten news like this from Wizards. The last time one of my editors called me, it was Nina Hess telling me that their Knights of the Silver Dragon line had been canceled. I’d already written three books in that series (which I’d created for them) and had been contracted for two more when that axe fell.

Nina was just as fantastic and regretful about it as Erin. While I may not always agree with the decisions the managers at Wizards makes, they sure do hire good people.

Honestly, this wasn’t horrible news for me. I’ve had too much to do lately to spend any time on the book. It wasn’t due until December, but Erin had been asking me for a full outline for much of the spring.

All I ever put on paper for the book was the initial pitch, which ran about three pages. Despite that, Wizards kindly asked me to keep my initial advance, so I really can’t complain. It’s decent money for a few pages worth of work, and I now have a bit more time to tackle more pressing things without feeling guilty about pushing that outline off.

The news is a bit sadder for the people who’d gotten farther along on their work, like Jeff LaSala, Marcy Rockwell, Paul Kemp, and Ari Marmell, plus Steve and Melanie Tem and many others I probably don’t know about yet. They all have my sympathies.

Still, I’m confident we’ll all live to write another day. Nobody broke our fingers. Our word processors still work. And our imaginations burn brighter than ever.

No matter how much it may hurt to land on your rump when the rug gets yanked out from under you, we’ll all dust ourselves off and continue on.

Look for new and better books from every one of us—soon.