The last week or so has been very painful.

On one hand, I have tremendous sympathy for the many good folks at Tor, some of whom I have known for 30 years.

On the other hand, I also have tremendous sympathy for the fans—a few of whom are veterans who fought actual Nazis—who feel they are tired of being heckled and humiliated by a very few Tor employees, who have been behaving in a less than professional manner.

Many of these readers are people I know, people I interact with online, or fans of John’s who have written us thoughtful letters explaining why they regretfully feel they must stop buying Tor book, despite their desire to keep reading John’s latest series.

I was thus appalled to see posts suggesting that the emails to Tor—many of which, I am led to understand, are arriving with photos of the reader’s Tor book collections, in some cases, collections worth thousands of dollars—were not legitimate but were sent from automated bots.

Tor Folks:  You may disagree with the Sad/Rabid Puppies, or feel loyalty to your co-workers—but please! Don’t insult our readers by claiming they don’t exist!

Readers:  I realize that, in the age of electronics,this is an unprecedented request, but: if you have a strong opinion that you wish to be heard, it might help if you committed it to physical paper—perhaps along with a printout of your photo of your Tor book collection—and snail mailed it to Tor and Macmillan.

Also, feel free to send me your photo of your Tor books. I will post any photos or links I receive on my website, so everyone can see that you are a real person with real books. (If possible, include in

For my part, I shall continue to pray that these differences can be resolved,