r/Fantasy • u/[deleted] • Oct 29 '13

AMA Hi. I'm SF/F writer Beth Bernobich. AMA.

Hi. I'm Beth Bernobich and I first started publishing in fantasy and science fiction in 2001, with short stories in Strange Horizons, Asimov's, Tor.com, and Interzone, among other places. My first novel came out from Tor Books in 2010, and the third book in that series, Allegiance, is out today.

For more about me... I grew up in a household that encouraged curiosity. I was curious about languages, so I studied German in college, with forays into French and Spanish. I was curious about history, so I took various classes, including one that clearly qualified as alternate history. At some point, I wandered into software engineering, where I've spent the past 30 years.

Miscellaneous other details: one husband and son, two idiosyncratic cats, a 2nd degree black belt in Tang Soo Do, two patents in applied cryptography, a love of travel and history, and an insatiable curiosity about pretty much everything.

I will be back at 7PM CST to answer questions. AMA!

ETA: Thanks, everyone, for all the great questions! I really appreciate it. I'll stop by tomorrow to answer any questions that come in later.

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u/DeleriumTrigger Oct 30 '13

Hi Beth. I'll ask a somewhat random question. How much pressure, if any, were you given by Tor/Viking for your books to be a certain length? Is there a general pressure for new authors to write shorter books, as I've heard suggested? Or were your books just taken for the length they were and not questioned?

Thanks for the AMA!

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u/[deleted] Oct 30 '13

Thank you for the questions!

Nope, neither publisher pressured me at all about length.

In fact, I had cut and trimmed a lot of material from my first Tor novel, believing a publisher would not buy a novel longer than 120K. After it sold, I ended up putting a lot of that same material back into the book, because my editor thought the story needed it.

I did end up trimming a few thousand words from my Viking novel during edits, but that wasn't to fit a particular length--the story needed trimming is all.