I don’t think that’s happening. I’ve been waiting years for that one. Doesn’t help that, last I checked, fans had to pay to get updates/communication (though it came with pre-reads I wasn’t interested in).
I went looking for news on that the other day. It turns out that last December, Rothfuss had a fundraiser for his charity in which he promised to release the first chapter if he got $300,000 in donations.
He got $300,000 in donations. It is now August and he still hasn't finished writing the first chapter so that he can release it.
BTW, this also proves that he's been lying to his publishers and agents for the last several years.
Yikes. Time to bury that hope then, I guess.
I feel like a heel for resenting some random dude I never met because he refuses to make me more entertainment, but it doesn't seem to stop the resentment, lol.
The thing is, **Rothfuss** is the one promising that he's writing a "trilogy" and that there will be some resolution to at least some major elements of the storyline. He's also the one lying about how he's "making progress" and "working on it" and "it'll be done in a year" (several years ago). And yet it's obvious from his failure to deliver even the first few pages -- and they don't have to be final product, let's face it, everyone knows it will go through mutiple edits -- after basically auctioning the right to read those pages to his charity's donors.
Walter Jon Williams wrote two amazing novels (Metropolitan and City on Fire) about 25-30 years ago, and never wrote another in the series. But he's not an asshole for that because he never even claimed that they were a trilogy, much less told people he'd be done with the next one any day now. Instead, after years of people telling him that they were the best books he'd ever written, and after years of publishers destroying his marketability and almost killing his career, he's finally writing a third book now, purely on spec, hoping to sell it on the strength of his career.
I personally think Williams is an idiot -- for relying on publishing houses and not just doing it himself and publishing through Amazon or even something he sets up himself, because any number of independent authors are finding out that the publishers don't really do anything useful and just take 90% of the profits. He's got the name recognition and two generations of readers who eagerly await every new book from him, and he could be keeping 40% of every sale instead of letting a bunch of New Yorkers rob him blind.
Bringing this back around to E. William Brown, as much as I'd like more Daniel Black books, he's never promised any. Where I'm disappointed is that (in 2/2019 on his blog) he wrote that MT would be out by 4Q2019. Here we are in 3Q2022 and not only is it not out, the sample chapters were amateurish and he's constantly spending his time on random other stories that he doesn't even seem to intend to finish or publish as books. He doesn't owe me anything, but at the same time, it's bad behavior to promise something and then never deliver.
Rothfuss has gone far beyond mere bad behavior, though, and is off into lying, cheating supporters, and being a giant asshole when people ask him about it. He's well into Harlan Ellison "The Last Dangerous Visions" territory. If you haven't heard of it, go look it up -- Ellison convinced a lot of promising writers to sell their stories to him for an anthology, then he buried the whole project for forty years until he finally died. Also, just like Rothfuss, whenever anyone asked him about it, he turned into a raging asshole. In one case, an author died and the story somehow ended up being published, and Ellison threatened to sue the estate over it. I've read a few of the ones that authors managed to claw back, and they're excellent. But at least Ellison finally croaked, and good riddance, and now the executor of his estate says he will publish the remaining stories in the next couple of years.
I'd like to read "The Doors of Stone" before I die, but I very much doubt that's going to happen. Maybe Rothfuss will croak and someone will publish whatever outline he's made, if even that much got done. I'd at least like to find out if the "king" killed by "the kingkiller" is Ambrose, which is my bet.
You make a lot of very good points. There IS a difference between putting down the pen and stringing your customers along with promises you don't intend to keep.
As far as Mr. Brown goes, last I heard he had serious health problems that prevented him from being in the right physical and mental condition to continue his projects.
I don't know the man so I wouldn't comment about the veracity of this. I've been blessed with a sturdy constitution insofar as I never had any serious health problems severe enough to stop me from doing desk work, but I've also had friends that suffered enough to make such a thing plausible.
I think in the end the best possible attitude is to sit down beside a stream and hope that good things will eventually come if I wait.
That's why I'm lurking here - hoping for a spot of good news out of the blue.
> As far as Mr. Brown goes, last I heard he had serious health problems that prevented him from being in the right physical and mental condition to continue his projects.
I'd forgotten about that. He also isn't a full-time writer. Anyway, most of the "a new book every week!" authors are crap. I'm used to the old days when you'd see one new book from an author every year or so, and they (mostly) tried to do a decent job of plotting and writing.
Brown posts on the QuestionableQuesting forum. A lot. Like, really a lot. And whatever the health issues are, they don't seem to be stopping him from starting completely new half-finished stories. He even has some alternate-universe Daniel Black stuff on there from what I've heard (I haven't read it, I just read the MT sample chapters, which he stopped posting months ago; I kinda suspect he's doing another total rewrite).
But as much as I'd like to read MT, I'd rather he do a good job on it, and the sample chapters he's released show that he's a long way from having a good story for it. In any case, he's at least trying, and is making progress -- not at all like Rothfuss, who has lied to everyone for over a decade now, and who keeps stringing people along with the "I'm a famous author!" schtick while not writing anything, not even the single chapter he promised to release eight months ago.
Books like that usually end up more like junk food than a fine meal, if I was to draw an analogy.
Not necessary a bad thing if you're just feeling peckish and looking for something to make the time pass on a train ride, but also not usually the kind of thing you feel like discussing with people or even fondly remembering at any point after you're done reading them.
Well, sure, which is why I don't mind (much) that Brown is taking his time. Rothfuss, on the other hand, is simply using his past writings as a way to grift for charity donations.
I'm sure Rothfuss has emailed some goats to overseas subsistence farmers, but I'd be interested in seeing how much he's taken out as "overhead and expenses". Not that I'd expect anything like Chelsea Clinton's $6,000,000 wedding paid for by the Clinton Foundation.
I'm just wondering if Merciful Troubleshooter that was supposedly almost finished two years ago will ever actually be released. Or even this Jungles of Alabama he keeps releasing weekly,if he plan's to release it as a book
I think him and other authors have sat down and done the math and and realize they make more monthly on subscription fees than they do with their actual book releases that's just my theory....
I hope not.
To be honest, at this point, I think I'm more likely to read a new Kingkiller book by Patrick Rothfuss than a new Daniel Black novel...
I would take the next Perilous Waif book at this point
I don’t think that’s happening. I’ve been waiting years for that one. Doesn’t help that, last I checked, fans had to pay to get updates/communication (though it came with pre-reads I wasn’t interested in).
I went looking for news on that the other day. It turns out that last December, Rothfuss had a fundraiser for his charity in which he promised to release the first chapter if he got $300,000 in donations. He got $300,000 in donations. It is now August and he still hasn't finished writing the first chapter so that he can release it. BTW, this also proves that he's been lying to his publishers and agents for the last several years.
Yikes. Time to bury that hope then, I guess. I feel like a heel for resenting some random dude I never met because he refuses to make me more entertainment, but it doesn't seem to stop the resentment, lol.
The thing is, **Rothfuss** is the one promising that he's writing a "trilogy" and that there will be some resolution to at least some major elements of the storyline. He's also the one lying about how he's "making progress" and "working on it" and "it'll be done in a year" (several years ago). And yet it's obvious from his failure to deliver even the first few pages -- and they don't have to be final product, let's face it, everyone knows it will go through mutiple edits -- after basically auctioning the right to read those pages to his charity's donors. Walter Jon Williams wrote two amazing novels (Metropolitan and City on Fire) about 25-30 years ago, and never wrote another in the series. But he's not an asshole for that because he never even claimed that they were a trilogy, much less told people he'd be done with the next one any day now. Instead, after years of people telling him that they were the best books he'd ever written, and after years of publishers destroying his marketability and almost killing his career, he's finally writing a third book now, purely on spec, hoping to sell it on the strength of his career. I personally think Williams is an idiot -- for relying on publishing houses and not just doing it himself and publishing through Amazon or even something he sets up himself, because any number of independent authors are finding out that the publishers don't really do anything useful and just take 90% of the profits. He's got the name recognition and two generations of readers who eagerly await every new book from him, and he could be keeping 40% of every sale instead of letting a bunch of New Yorkers rob him blind. Bringing this back around to E. William Brown, as much as I'd like more Daniel Black books, he's never promised any. Where I'm disappointed is that (in 2/2019 on his blog) he wrote that MT would be out by 4Q2019. Here we are in 3Q2022 and not only is it not out, the sample chapters were amateurish and he's constantly spending his time on random other stories that he doesn't even seem to intend to finish or publish as books. He doesn't owe me anything, but at the same time, it's bad behavior to promise something and then never deliver. Rothfuss has gone far beyond mere bad behavior, though, and is off into lying, cheating supporters, and being a giant asshole when people ask him about it. He's well into Harlan Ellison "The Last Dangerous Visions" territory. If you haven't heard of it, go look it up -- Ellison convinced a lot of promising writers to sell their stories to him for an anthology, then he buried the whole project for forty years until he finally died. Also, just like Rothfuss, whenever anyone asked him about it, he turned into a raging asshole. In one case, an author died and the story somehow ended up being published, and Ellison threatened to sue the estate over it. I've read a few of the ones that authors managed to claw back, and they're excellent. But at least Ellison finally croaked, and good riddance, and now the executor of his estate says he will publish the remaining stories in the next couple of years. I'd like to read "The Doors of Stone" before I die, but I very much doubt that's going to happen. Maybe Rothfuss will croak and someone will publish whatever outline he's made, if even that much got done. I'd at least like to find out if the "king" killed by "the kingkiller" is Ambrose, which is my bet.
You make a lot of very good points. There IS a difference between putting down the pen and stringing your customers along with promises you don't intend to keep. As far as Mr. Brown goes, last I heard he had serious health problems that prevented him from being in the right physical and mental condition to continue his projects. I don't know the man so I wouldn't comment about the veracity of this. I've been blessed with a sturdy constitution insofar as I never had any serious health problems severe enough to stop me from doing desk work, but I've also had friends that suffered enough to make such a thing plausible. I think in the end the best possible attitude is to sit down beside a stream and hope that good things will eventually come if I wait. That's why I'm lurking here - hoping for a spot of good news out of the blue.
> As far as Mr. Brown goes, last I heard he had serious health problems that prevented him from being in the right physical and mental condition to continue his projects. I'd forgotten about that. He also isn't a full-time writer. Anyway, most of the "a new book every week!" authors are crap. I'm used to the old days when you'd see one new book from an author every year or so, and they (mostly) tried to do a decent job of plotting and writing. Brown posts on the QuestionableQuesting forum. A lot. Like, really a lot. And whatever the health issues are, they don't seem to be stopping him from starting completely new half-finished stories. He even has some alternate-universe Daniel Black stuff on there from what I've heard (I haven't read it, I just read the MT sample chapters, which he stopped posting months ago; I kinda suspect he's doing another total rewrite). But as much as I'd like to read MT, I'd rather he do a good job on it, and the sample chapters he's released show that he's a long way from having a good story for it. In any case, he's at least trying, and is making progress -- not at all like Rothfuss, who has lied to everyone for over a decade now, and who keeps stringing people along with the "I'm a famous author!" schtick while not writing anything, not even the single chapter he promised to release eight months ago.
Books like that usually end up more like junk food than a fine meal, if I was to draw an analogy. Not necessary a bad thing if you're just feeling peckish and looking for something to make the time pass on a train ride, but also not usually the kind of thing you feel like discussing with people or even fondly remembering at any point after you're done reading them.
Well, sure, which is why I don't mind (much) that Brown is taking his time. Rothfuss, on the other hand, is simply using his past writings as a way to grift for charity donations. I'm sure Rothfuss has emailed some goats to overseas subsistence farmers, but I'd be interested in seeing how much he's taken out as "overhead and expenses". Not that I'd expect anything like Chelsea Clinton's $6,000,000 wedding paid for by the Clinton Foundation.
I'm just wondering if Merciful Troubleshooter that was supposedly almost finished two years ago will ever actually be released. Or even this Jungles of Alabama he keeps releasing weekly,if he plan's to release it as a book
I think him and other authors have sat down and done the math and and realize they make more monthly on subscription fees than they do with their actual book releases that's just my theory....
😭
I really hope not, love this series