As Christian readers of fantasy and science fiction we were taken by shock when Marcher Lord Press owner Jeff Gerke sold to Steve Laube. Personally, I was one of the many skeptics… When it was announced the company would change its name I thought “This straw may break the dragon’s back.” I was wrong.
Steve Laube has vowed to eliminate content that does not meet Enclave’s Christian market audiences. While this means it may lose some of the gritty flavor we came to appreciate in Marcher Lord Press, in the end I believe we will see more focus on classy storytelling especially high fantasy and original science fiction. The focus in narrowed, the writing standard is high, and the number of titles released each year is very few. Due to the excitement around Enclave Publishing’s readership this will lead to many submissions for Enclave editors to choose from, which means (I presume) we will only get the best.
Of the first titles announced, Orphan’s Song really catches my eye. I will be purchasing a copy for my personal library as I did read some of Miss Adams’ writing a few years ago and she is quite the gifted writer.
It looks like Enclave Publishing is going to be strong moving forward and I am excited to watch for new titles from them. We need more selections out there and too many small Christian publishers are producing second-rate covers and generic stories. These covers look awesome!
Question: What books are you looking forward to this year? Are you excited about Enclave Publishing?