I noticed on the web this weekend that Locus shows for its August issue that Cruel Zinc Melodies was the best selling mass market paperback Sci Fi/Fantasy title in the reporting bookstores for the previous data collecting time (probably June, realistically). This makes sense when you consider that the book has quickly gone to a 2nd printing (you can tell a book's printing at the bottom of the copyright page, unless the book is a rare example of a mistake, such as current copies of Sweet Silver Blues, which show themselves as 1st printings from 1987!).
Cruel Zince Melodies was released in early May this year, even though copies were on the shelf in late April (like many of you, I spotted copies for sale as early as April 25 or so). For various reasons, I didn't purchase a copy until early August. I got it at a Borders, and it is a 2nd printing with a sticker on the back indicating that Borders accepted it as inventory on July 9. The book was of course printed at least a couple of weeks earlier, so the 2nd printing was made less than 2 months after the books debut, which is quite impressive for a 21 year old series!
FWIW, I see that The Tyranny of the Night mass market edition and the trade paperback of A Cruel Wind have both gone to 2nd printings, and the first Black Company omnibus is on to a 5th printing in less than a year! So Glen Cook is moving a lot of books these days, and good for him!
I'm really happy to hear that his books are selling so well! Does anyone have an idea on how large the print runs are for his books? I'm sure it varies widely depending on the book. Perhaps it would be a good question for Glen the next time someone runs into him at a book show. Steve