In April, editor Kathryn Cramer announced the table of contents for Year’s Best Fantasy 9 (see this article), which she co-edits with David G. Hartwell. At the time, we assumed Tor Books would be publishing it.
Now Amy Greko, Digital Marketing Manager for Macmillan (Tor’s parent company) tells us that the books is available right now, but not quite as we expected it. Year’s Best Fantasy 9 marks “Tor.com‘s debut as a publishing entity, distinct from Tor Books and as a separate imprint under our shared corporate overlords at Macmillan.
“YBF 9 is available only as a print-on-demand book, in keeping with our mission of always exploring alternative forms of publishing. Similar to the launch of the Tor.com Store, this title is one of our various publishing projects that seek to experiment with the available alternatives to publishing’s traditional sales, distribution, and delivery mechanisms.”
The $15.95 trade paperback is now available from the Tor.com store, from Amazon.com, from Barnesandnoble.com, and probably every other online bookseller. Apparently, the only places it isn’t available are physical bookstores.
As far as I have been told, there will also later be an electronic book of Year’s Best Fantasy 9, but it has been much delayed, so the only edition presently available is the POD.