It seemed like nearly everyone in New York's science fiction publishing circles came to the Dream Lounge last night to celebrate the American launch of Orbit, the formerly UK-based imprint that Hachette is grooming as a global player. I was able to introduce myself to Del Rey editor Betsy Mitchell and get some details about the new editions of Michael Moorcock's classic Elric fantasies she's putting together, with illustrations by artists like John Picacio and Michael W. Kaluta. Then I ran into Lit Agent X chatting with Miss Snark (Sarah and I have known all along, but we'll never tell!), caught up with our first Hottie of Publishing Liz Scheier, found out about some books Writers House agent Diana Fox sold to Orbit already, and finally met Eos editor Diana Gill in person, months after having spoken to her on the phone for my spring cover story for Publishers Weekly.

Then Orbit publishing director Tim Holman (in the dark-rimmed glasses, white shirt and black tie) introduced the crowd to his editorial team: Devi Pillai, Alaya Johnson, and Darren Nash. When the imprint releases its first batch of US titles in fall 2007, among the 20 titles will be The Electric Church, by Jeff Somers (inset, with his wife, Danette). Holman singled out the novel for praise, declaring it "not so much a breath of fresh air in the SF genre...more like a hurricane." Later, Little, Brown execs Michael Pietsch and Sophie Cottrell, both of whom are taking an active interest in their new imprint, introduced me to Walter Mosley, one of the few major literary writers who's willing to tell you flat out when he's written a science fiction story (although his next book for Little, Brown is actually a writer's guide called This Year You Write Your Novel). Which reminds me how I was chatting with Juliet Ulman of Bantam about a recent acquisition that was described as "a science-fiction Cormac McCarthy," which prompted me to joke about how The Road is a fancypants version of Damnation Alley. (Maybe three readers aren't cocking their head at the screen after that line...and that's okay. I have a quota for the number of sheer geek references I'm allowed to make each month.*)

*To make it even geekier, I'm definitely talking about the Roger Zelazny novel, which is actually a recasting of the story of Balto, as opposed to the godawful Jan-Michael Vincent movie.