Ace Buys Codex Alera

Jim shares this announcement with his fans:
“Well, after a week of competitive bidding between Del Rey and Ace, Ace has purchased my fantasy series, currently titled Codex Alera. They’ve bought the first three books and are planning to publish them in hardback, starting sometime next year [2004].
“This represents a REALLY major step up for me as a writer. This is like winning the lottery, only in slow motion, cause the actual real earning-potential of it won’t be realized for several years. But it’s huge, particularly in today’s genre fiction market. There have been words like ‘publicity tour’ bandied about. Not sure what’s going to happen, but I’ll let you guys know as I learn more.”