#TorChat September 2012 Sweepstakes

Did you participate in today’s #TorChat? We hope you enjoyed it and look forward to chatting with you next month on October 17th!

In the meantime, here’s your chance to win a copy of Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross’s new book! Ten lucky winners will receive a hardcover copy of The Rapture of the Nerds. Leave a comment below to enter.

And again we’d like to thank Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross for joining us on Twitter today for a fascinating discussion about genre fiction, technology, and the future of publishing. Also, special thanks to Tor Senior Editor Patrick Nielsen Hayden for moderating, and adding his considerable insight!

Sweepstakes closes to new entries on September 26th at noon.

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. You must be 18 or older and a legal resident of the 50 United States or D.C. to enter. Promotion begins September 19, 2012 at 4:30 p.m. ET. and ends September 26, 2012, 12:00 p.m. ET. Void in Puerto Rico and wherever prohibited by law. Please see full details and official rules go here. Sponsor: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

Starred Review: The Rapture of the Nerds by Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross

“Doctorow and Stross, two of the SF genre’s more exciting voices, team up to produce a story that is mindbendingly entertaining but almost impossible to explain….Peppered with references to pop-culture staples (The Matrix, Doctor Who, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), and drawing on concepts from hard SF, cyberpunk, and videogames, the novel is a surefire hit for genre fans, especially those familiar with the works of its coauthors. Fans of Adam Roberts’ elegant, intellectually challenging SF will also be on firm ground here.”

The Rapture of the Nerds, by Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross, gets a starred review in Booklist!

Here’s the full review, which is in today’s issue:

 Doctorow and Stross, two of the SF genre’s more exciting voices, team up to produce a story that is mindbendingly entertaining but almost impossible to explain. Near the end of the twenty-first century, Huw Jones, an ordinary man, is called to tech jury duty (tech juries evaluate new technologies to determine if they are safe for use); he winds up in possession of—or perhaps possessed by—an alien entity, on the run from the authorities, and nearly killed by some backwoods religious fundamentalists; eventually, he has his consciousness translated to electronic form, where he battles another iteration of himself in a simulated landscape to save the world. That’s the bare bones of this wildly imaginative story, which plunks readers down in a completely foreign environment and challenges them to assimilate it on the fly, with the story in motion. Peppered with references to pop-culture staples (The Matrix, Doctor Who, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), and drawing on concepts from hard SF, cyberpunk, and videogames, the novel is a surefire hit for genre fans, especially those familiar with the works of its coauthors. Fans of Adam Roberts’ elegant, intellectually challenging SF will also be on firm ground here.

The Rapture of the Nerds will be published on September 4th.

World Book Night U.S. Releases 2012 Picks

WORLD BOOK NIGHT U.S. 2012 ANNOUNCES ANNA QUINDLEN AS NATIONAL CHAIR AND NAMES ITS 30 SELECTIONS FOR FIRST GIVEAWAY OF 1 MILLION FREE BOOKS 

New York City, December 14, 2011 – World Book Night U.S. has announced the selection of its honorary national chairperson, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and bestselling author Anna Quindlen, and revealed the WBN 2012 U.S. book picks. In addition, World Book Night U.S. has opened the registration process for those wishing to become volunteer book givers.

World Book Night is an ambitious campaign to give away a million free books across America all on one day — April 23, 2012 — by enlisting 50,000 volunteer book lovers to help promote reading by going into their communities and distributing free copies of a book they especially enjoy. World Book Night was successfully launched in the UK earlier this year, and now the U.S. is joining the effort, which is supported by American publishers, bookstores and libraries nationwide.

Anna Quindlen has enthusiastically agreed to be the campaign’s Honorary National Chairperson. Quindlen said: “What’s better than a good book?  A whole box of them, and the opportunity to share them with new readers. The idea behind World Book Night is inspired, and as a writer and a reader I’m thrilled to be part of it.”

World Book Night U.S. board chairman Morgan Entrekin added: “We are thrilled and flattered that Anna has agreed to join our cause. Her energy has already been a great asset to the campaign, and we look forward to her being a leading voice among the many for this ambitious effort to promote reading and a love of books across America.”

Volunteer book givers are welcome to apply now. They can go to www.us.worldbooknight.org and register through February 1, 2012, by providing answers to several questions and picking a book to give out from the World Book Night U.S. 2012 list.

World Book Night U.S. Executive Director Carl Lennertz said: “We want the book givers to reach out to new or light readers, especially in underserved places like nursing homes, schools, hospitals and poor neighborhoods, but also in public gathering places like coffee shops and malls. And by offering a range of fiction, non-fiction and books for teens, we believe we have great books that the givers will be passionate about handing out, and will appeal to a wide audience of potential new readers.”

Sherman Alexie, author of the World Book Night U.S. 2012 pick The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, said: “This is a celebration of the individual book and the individual reader. I am honored to take part.”

Also a World Book Night U.S. author, for her book Because of Winn-Dixie, Kate DiCamillo added: “It makes perfect sense to me that World Book Night will take place in spring. Extending your hand to give someone a book, a story, is a gesture of hope and joy. It is a chance for all of us, givers and receivers, to break into blossom.”

The book picks have been finalized and there will be 30 picks printed, rather than 25. Lennertz said: “We decided to expand several categories, notably from three to five YA/middle reader books, due to popular demand from booksellers and librarians, as well as adding a sci-fi novel, an additional mystery, and a surprise classic from an indie press. I am thrilled about this, as it broadens the appeal of the list to our two audiences: the 50,000 book givers and the million new readers we want to reach.”

The books were chosen by a panel of independent booksellers, Barnes & Noble buyers, and librarians through several rounds of voting. Thirty-five thousand copies of each World Book Night title will be printed as special, not-for-resale paperbacks, totaling over a million copies to be distributed nationwide. Copies of several of the picks will be shipped directly to military bases, and there will be an outreach to prison libraries.

Lennertz added: “We didn’t ask the panel to come up with a best-books-of-all-time list. I asked that they envision themselves handing out the book in a public or social services setting, and to imagine that book getting someone excited about reading. This is a beautiful mix of books.”

The 30 World Book Night U.S. titles for 2012, alphabetical by author, are:

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers)
Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson (Speak)
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou (Ballantine)
Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger (Da Capo)
Kindred by Octavia E. Butler (Beacon Press)
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (Tor)
Little Bee by Chris Cleave (Simon & Schuster)
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (Scholastic)
Blood Work by Michael Connelly (Grand Central)
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz (Riverhead); a Spanish-language edition, La breve y maravillosa vida de Óscar Wao (Vintage Espanol), will also be made available.
Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo (Candlewick)
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers (Vintage)
Peace Like a River by Leif Enger (Grove Atlantic)
A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick (Algonquin)
Q is for Quarry by Sue Grafton (Berkley)
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (Riverhead)
A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving (Ballantine)
The Stand by Stephen King (Anchor)
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (Perennial)
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss (W.W. Norton)
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri (Mariner)
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien (Mariner)
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (Perennial)
My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult (Atria)
Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (Picador)
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold (Back Bay)
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot (Broadway)
Just Kids by Patti Smith (Ecco)
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls (Scribner)
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (Knopf Books for Young Readers)

World Book Night will take place on April 23, 2012, in the U.K. and U.S., with thousands of volunteers going out into their communities to give away special World Book Night free paperbacks. World Book Night in the U.S. is a non-profit organization, and has filed for 501(c)3 charitable status. World Book Night U.S. is supported by publishers, Barnes & Noble, the American Booksellers Association, the Association of American Publishers, the American Library Association, and Ingram Content Group.

www.us.worldbooknight.org   www.twitter.com/wbnamerica      http://www.facebook.com/worldbooknightusa

Tor/Forge Books and NASA Jointly Announce Publishing Collaboration

In an effort to educate and encourage math and science education Tor/Forge Books, an imprint of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC, and NASA have embarked on a collaboration to publish a series of science based, commercial fiction books, referred to as “NASA inspired Works of Fiction” around concepts pertinent to the current and future work of NASA.  NASA will allow existing and new Tor/Forge authors to team up with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center’s (GSFC) Subject Matter Experts (SME) to create scientifically accurate and entertaining novels in a distinctly unique way.

Tor/Forge and NASA hope that pairing scientists and engineers with the imprints’ award-winning roster of writers will raise awareness and inspire the study of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), in line with the President’s Technology Agenda.  They also hope to contribute towards the goal of attracting and retaining students in the above fields, thereby strengthening NASA and the nation’s future workforce in a compelling manner.

“When I was a boy, books by Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein and their colleagues excited me, inspiring a lifelong fascination with space and the science and technology that would get us there,” said Tom Doherty. “From Fulton and his steamboat, through Alexander Graham Bell and Edison, to Silicon Valley and the advent of the internet, innovative Americans have built a future in which we lead the world.”

GSFC’s Innovative Partnerships Program (IPP) Office will host a select group of Tor/Forge authors – some of whom already write science based fiction – to learn more about science and space exploration. Authors will visit GSFC for a two day workshop in November consisting of presentations, facility tours and one-on-one sessions with SMEs. NASA contributions to the project will also provide access to their data, facilities, and educational design and evaluation experts.

“Ultimately this agreement will benefit taxpayers as we look for innovative ways to train students for the science challenges of the future,” said Nona Cheeks, Chief of GSFC’s IPP Office, which is managing the project’s implementation.

The enormous popularity of science fiction is a key element in this collaboration to make these NASA inspired Works of Fiction a gateway to reach the general public and to generate awareness of the significant role NASA plays in everyday lives. Many people who work in the fields of science and technology credit science fiction as a significant inspiration for their career choice.

“It is my hope that in working with NASA in the creation of new stories of science and discovery we will inspire the next generation of explorers and inventors, because it all starts with the imagination – with stories and dreams of better things to come,” said Doherty.

###

About Tor and Forge Books

Tor Books, an imprint of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC, is a New York-based publisher of hardcover and softcover books, founded in 1980 and committed (although not limited) to arguably the largest and most diverse line of science fiction and fantasy ever produced by a single English-language publisher. Tom Doherty Associates, LLC, is also the home of award-winning Forge Books, founded in 1993 and committed (although not limited) to thrillers, mysteries, historical fiction and general fiction. Forge includes books by bestselling and critically acclaimed authors such as Douglas Preston, Eric Van Lustbader, W. Bruce Cameron and Former Secretary of Defense, William S. Cohen. Together, the imprints garnered 20 New York Times bestsellers in 2010.

Goodreads First Reads: 7th Sigma

Enter for a chance to win a copy on Goodreads!

About 7th Sigma: Welcome to the territory. Leave your metal behind, all of it. The bugs will eat it, and they’ll go right through you to get it…Don’t carry it, don’t wear it, and for god’s sake don’t come here if you’ve got a pacemaker.

The bugs showed up about fifty years ago–self-replicating, solar-powered, metal-eating machines. No one knows where they came from. They don’t like water, though, so they’ve stayed in the desert Southwest. The territory. People still live here, but they do it without metal. Log cabins, ceramics, what plastic they can get that will survive the sun and heat. Technology has adapted, and so have the people.

Kimble Monroe has chosen to live in the territory. He was born here, and he is extraordinarily well adapted to it. He’s one in a million. Maybe one in a billion.

In 7th Sigma, Gould builds an extraordinary SF novel of survival and personal triumph against all the odds. 7th Sigma releases July 5th, 2011.

(Ends July 11)

More giveaways:

• A Game of Lies by Rebecca Cantrell (Ends 7/11)
• A Trace of Smoke by Rebecca Cantrell (Ends 7/11)
• Awakenings by Edward Lazellari (Ends 7/13)

Wild Cards edited by George R. R. Martin on Goodreads!

In 1946, an alien virus that rewrites human DNA was accidentally unleashed in the skies over New York City. It killed ninety percent of those it infected. Nine percent survived to mutate into tragically deformed creatures. And one percent gained superpowers. The Wild Cards shared-universe series, created and edited since 1987 by New York Times #1 bestseller George R. R. Martin (“The American Tolkien”—Time magazine) along with Melinda Snodgrass, is the tale of the history of the world since then—and of the heroes among the one percent.

For a limited time, you can enter on Goodreads for the chance to win these anthologies of fiction from The Wild Cards universe.

More giveaways:

• Kitty’s Greates Hits by Carrie Vaughn (Ends 6/10)
• Original Sin by Lisa Desrochers (Ends 6/10)
• Abyss by David Hagberg (Ends 6/10)
• Dry Ice by Bill Evans and Marianna Jameson(Ends 6/13)
• Inside Straight edited by George R. R. Martin (6/13)
• Busted Flush edited by George R. R. Martin
• Suicide Kings edited by George R. R. Martin  (6/13)
• Warriors 1 edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois (6/13)
• Warriors 2 edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois (6/13)
• Songs of the Dying Earth edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois (6/13)
• Bye Bye, Baby by Max Allan Collins (Ends 6/13)
• Awakenings by Edward Lazellari (Ends 7/13)

Author Spotlight: John Scalzi on #TorChat!

This Wednesday, 5/18, at 4 PM Eastern, fans will have a chance to chat with author John Scalzi while he’s on tour for FUZZY NATION!

Tor Books is excited to announce that this month’s #TorChat will feature author John Scalzi! #TorChat is a monthly series of twitter chats, in which guest authors join fans in a lively, informative and entertaining discussion of all that’s hot in genre fiction, 140 characters at a time. The chat will take place on Wednesday, May 18th, from 4 – 5 PM Eastern.

This Wednesday’s #Torchat will be with New York Times bestselling author John Scalzi (@scalzi), who is currently on tour for his brand new novel, FUZZY NATION (May 10, 2011). John will be participating, barring any complications with travel, from his hotel in Salt Lake City. John will be available to answer fan questions and to talk about his new novel and its inspiration (the 1962 Hugo-nominated novel Little Fuzzy), his long running blog, Whatever, and what it’s like to be on tour.

The chat will be introduced and (loosely) moderated by Tor publicist Cassie Ammerman (@leanoir), with giveaways of advance copies of upcoming genre releases from @TorBooks following the 4 PM chat.

Keep an eye on the @TorBooks account, as well as that of the moderator, @leanoir, for updates on the chat’s start time, which is fluid due to the fact that John is on the road.

Our Author guest:

JOHN SCALZI is the author of several SF novels, including the bestselling “Old Man’s War” sequence, comprising Old Man’s War, The Ghost Brigades, and The Last Colony. He is a winner of the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and he won the Hugo Award for Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded, a collection of essays from his wildly popular blog Whatever. He lives in Ohio with his wife and daughter.

About Tor Books
Tor Books, an imprint of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC, is a New York-based publisher of hardcover and softcover books, founded in 1980 and committed (although not limited) to SF and fantasy literature. In 2002, Tor launched Starscape, an imprint dedicated to publishing quality science fiction and fantasy for young readers, including books by critically acclaimed and award winning authors such as Cory Doctorow, Orson Scott Card, and David Lubar. Between an extensive hardcover and trade-softcover line, an Orb backlist program, and a stronghold in mass-market paperback, Tor annually publishes what is arguably the largest and most diverse line of science fiction and fantasy ever produced by a single English-language publisher. Books from Tor have won every major award in the SF and fantasy fields, and for the last twenty-three years the company has been named Best Publisher in the Locus Poll, the largest consumer poll in SF.

Giveaway: Fuzzy Nation on Goodreads!

Enter for a chance to win a copy on Goodreads!

About Fuzzy Nation: Jack Holloway works alone, for reasons he doesn’t care to talk about. Hundreds of miles from ZaraCorp’s headquarters on planet, 178 light-years from the corporation’s headquarters on Earth, Jack is content as an independent contractor, prospecting and surveying at his own pace. As for his past, that’s not up for discussion.

Then, in the wake of an accidental cliff collapse, Jack discovers a seam of unimaginably valuable jewels, to which he manages to lay legal claim just as ZaraCorp is cancelling their contract with him for his part in causing the collapse. Briefly in the catbird seat, legally speaking, Jack pressures ZaraCorp into recognizing his claim, and cuts them in as partners to help extract the wealth.

But there’s another wrinkle to ZaraCorp’s relationship with the planet Zarathustra. Their entire legal right to exploit the verdant Earth-like planet, the basis of the wealth they derive from extracting its resources, is based on being able to certify to the authorities on Earth that Zarathustra is home to no sentient species.

Then a small furry biped—trusting, appealing, and ridiculously cute—shows up at Jack’s outback home. Followed by its family. As it dawns on Jack that despite their stature, these are people, he begins to suspect that ZaraCorp’s claim to a planet’s worth of wealth is very flimsy indeed…and that ZaraCorp may stop at nothing to eliminate the “fuzzys” before their existence becomes more widely known.

Enter for a chance to win here!

(Ends April 10) Open to US and Canada only.

More giveaways:

• Shadow Prowler by Alexey Pehov (Ends 4/1)
• Dark Jenny by Alex Bledsoe (Ends 4/09)
• Fuzzy Nation by John Scalzi (Ends 4/10)
• The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi (Ends 4/11)
• Hybrids by Whitley Strieber (Ends 4/12)
• The Fund by H.T. Narea (Ends 4/13)
• Deathless by Catherine M. Valente (Ends 4/15)

Giveaway: Hybrids on Goodreads!

Enter for a chance to win a copy on Goodreads!

About Hybrids: For years, people have feared that sexual material removed from victims of alien abductions might lead to the creation of something that modern science considers impossible: hybrids of the alien and the human.

They would think like aliens, but appear human, and be able to do something that full-blooded aliens can’t–walk the earth freely.

In Hybrids, Whitley Strieber unleashes his unparalleled skills as a thriller writer and his unique knowledge of the abduction phenomenon to explore, what might happen if hybrids invaded the earth–not from the stars, but from exactly where the aliens told him they would emerge, when one of them said, “We will come from within you.”

Enter for a chance to win here!

(Ends April 12) Open to US and Canada only.

More giveaways:

• The Pirate Hunters by Mack Maloney (Ends 3/17)
• The Court of the Air by Stephen Hunt (Ends 3/20)
• The Kingdom Beyond the Waves by H.T. Stephen Hunt (Ends 3/20)
• The Rise of the Iron Moon by Stephen Hunt (Ends 3/20)
• A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah! by Harry Harrison (Ends 3/20)
• The Beloved Dead by Tony Hays (Ends 3/22)
• Shadow Prowler by Alexey Pehov (Ends 4/1)
• Blood Trust by Eric Van Lustbader (Ends 4/14)
• The Fund by H.T. Narea (Ends 4/14)

New Releases: 3/15

See what titles are releasing over the next 3 months.