Tom Doherty

Tom Doherty
Tom Doherty in his Tor office, 2019.
Born	Thomas Doherty (1935-04-23) April 23, 1935 (age 90)
Education	Trinity College (Connecticut)
Occupations	Chairman, former President & Publisher
Years active	1958–present[1]
Employer(s)	Tom Doherty Associates, Tor Publishing Group, Macmillan Publishers, Holtzbrinck Publishers
Known for	Tor Books, The Wheel of Time

Thomas Doherty (born April 23, 1935) is an American publisher and the founder of the science fiction and fantasy book publisher Tor Books.^[2][3] He started as a salesman for Pocket Books and rose to be Division Sales Manager. From there, he went to Simon & Schuster as National Sales Manager, then became publisher of paperbacks at Grosset & Dunlap, including Tempo Books, in 1969.^[4] In 1975, he became publisher for Ace Books. In 1979, he left Ace to establish his own company, Tom Doherty Associates (TDA), publishing under the Tor Books imprint starting in 1980, which has grown to become the largest publisher of science fiction and fantasy in North America.^[5]

TDA became a subsidiary of St. Martin's Press in 1987; both are now separate divisions of Macmillan Publishers, ultimately owned by Holtzbrinck Publishers. Doherty continues as Chairman of Tom Doherty Associates (now Tor Publishing Group), publishing under the Tor, Forge, Tordotcom, Bramble, Starscape, Tor Teen, and Nightfire imprints.^[6][7]

Thomas Doherty was born on 23 April 1935 in Hartford, Connecticut, to Thomas Aquinas Doherty (born 1914) and Elizabeth (née Story, born 1914).^[8] His father worked as an engineer for Pratt & Whitney during World War II and was part of the team that designed the United States' first jet engines.^[4][9] After the war, his father worked as a salesman and his mother as a post office clerk.^[10]

From an early age, he developed an interest in reading, especially science fiction. His mother and grandfather bought him a subscription to Astounding Science Fiction as soon as he could read independently, and he later branched out to reading similar magazines like Galaxy Science Fiction.^[9]

Doherty attended Marianapolis Academy (now Marianapolis Preparatory School) before enrolling at Trinity College (Connecticut). His major was initially chemical engineering, but he graduated in 1957 with a degree in philosophy after an abrupt change when he realised he did not want to pursue chemistry as a career.^[4][2] During college, he played guard in football, got tuition money as a "sub-rosa professional boxer", and was a member of the school’s Reserve Officer Training Corps.^[11][2][9]

After graduation, Doherty had initially planned to join the U.S. Air Force, but due to cutbacks in recruiting and being told he needed to lose weight to be a pilot, he was drafted into the U.S. Army and posted at Fort Polk in Louisiana. He spent two years there as an FDC artilleryman and doing a lot of reading in his spare time. His enjoyment of literature prompted him to search for a job in publishing when he got out of the army.^[9]

Doherty was first connected to Mory Solomon, vice-president of sales for Pocket Books through his father, who was now vice-president of Robbins Floor Products, Inc.,^[12] a company doing work in Solomon's building. While Pocket did not employ him directly, he was given a job on recommendation as a sales rep working in the Boston north area for one of their national distributors, Select Magazines.^[13][4] This proved to be short-lived, however, as they were forced to let him go after only seven months due to the loss of a major contract.^[4] After being offered a local sales job for Pocket in Philadelphia, he moved to the city.

Doherty progressed through various promotions in sales positions at Pocket Books, from salesman, to district manager, regional manager, divisional manager and national sales manager. In 1966, Pocket was acquired by Simon & Schuster and Doherty worked out of the New York office. At the time, S&S was also the distributor of Ballantine Books, and Tom became their sales manager. He became friends with Ian Ballantine and his wife Betty Ballantine. Working closely with the pair, he learned a great deal about publishing and editing, considering them "pioneers" in science fiction. During this time, they also published the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, proving that fantasy could be a best-selling genre.

After receiving a call from Harold Roth, a former executive vice-president of Simon & Schuster, now president of Grosset & Dunlap, Doherty could not resist the offer of changing from sales manager to publisher. In his new position, he headed Tempo, a Young Adult line. In 1971, he hired Harriet McDougal as editor in chief. In 1974, Roth persuaded their parent company, Filmways, to purchase Ace Books, one of the leading science fiction publishers, and the mass market publisher of Frank Herbert's Dune series. Doherty became head of both imprints with McDougal as editorial director. In 1977, he hired Jim Baen to head up the Ace science fiction/fantasy program. Also in 1977, McDougal returned to her home town of Charleston to found her own small publisher, Popham Press, which would be distributed by Ace, although she continued to do some editing work for Doherty. While there, she discovered author James Oliver Rigney Jr., more commonly known by his pen name Robert Jordan. In 1978, they published The Fallon Blood, Rigney's first novel, which became an immediate success.

Following Roth's replacement as president to someone who Doherty found much more difficult to work with, he believed it was time for a change and decided to start his own company. Richard Gallen, who had funded McDougal's startup, provided the investment capital to found Tom Doherty Associates (now Tor Publishing Group) in 1979 and its first imprint, Tor Books, in 1980. Tor Books' first published book was released in November of that year. Both McDougal and Baen would come aboard as founding members of the editorial team.

In 1980, Doherty negotiated a mutually beneficial arrangement with Stan Reisner, a former colleague and then president of Pinnacle Books. According to Doherty, "the real value of a publishing company was not much more than the sum of the talents, the staff and the authors they would publish". To this end, Reisner would handle warehousing, paper, printing and binding, while retaining volume benefits, while Doherty and TDA would get a better base contract and concentrate on attracting the best talent.^[14]

Movie tie-ins for Flash Gordon and Popeye were rushed out by the end of 1980. In 1981, Tor published 54 books. Their first original novel, Forerunner by Andre Norton,^[4] came out in May of that year.

Doherty believed that to first achieve the goal of recruiting the best people, he needed to figure out "win-win" situations, which included being flexible about place, time and method of work. Doherty hired Harriet McDougal with the agreement she could work from her home in Charleston, bringing author James Rigney with her. David G. Hartwell, also working from home, brought in authors such as Gene Wolfe, Eric Van Lustbader, L. E. Modesitt Jr., and others. Hartwell also believed his specialist knowledge in science fiction would enable Tor to more effectively sell foreign rights in the genre. Doherty and he agreed upon a mutually profitable contract to expand Tor's rights outside of North America. Ben Bova, then a recipient of multiple Hugo Awards for editing, came to Tor to have more time to write his own novels. These were published by Tor, where Bova further acquired and edited other authors.^[15]

Building of the success of Rigney's The Fallon Blood under Ace, Tor would publish sequels, The Fallon Pride (1981) and The Fallon Legacy (1982). Following the 1982 Arnold Schwarzenegger movie Conan the Barbarian, Rigney would write seven Conan books between 1982-1984 under the pen name Robert Jordan. And when Rigney wanted to write his own fantasy series, Doherty signed him to a six-book contract in 1984 for what would become The Wheel of Time.^[16]

In 1983, Doherty contracted Orson Scott Card to write a sequel to his short story Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead. Instead, Card wanted to expand his short story into a novel. Doherty trusted the relatively unknown Card and agreed a contract on the same terms as Speaker for the Dead. The novel Ender's Game, was published by Tor Books in 1985.^[17]

Also in 1983, Doherty became a co-founder and partner of Baen Books, when Pocket Books offered Jim Baen the chance to start his own science fiction line to compete with Ace, Del Rey and Tor. Doherty counteroffered by creating a line for Pocket to distribute. Initial capital was provided by Dick Gallen, who also funded TDA.^[15][18]

In 1985, Tom Doherty Associates' distributor Pinnacle Books went bankrupt. After large checks to creditors bounced, Doherty decided to go public to raise capital in order to pay off the debts. He received offers from both Simon & Schuster and St. Martin's Press, but ultimately decided to accept the latter offer, despite it being $2 million less, because it allowed Tom Doherty Associates to maintain autonomy.^[16]

In March 2018, Doherty stepped down as president of Tom Doherty Associates. Fritz Foy was appointed president and publisher of Tom Doherty Associates.^[19] Foy retired in April 2021 and was succeeded by Devi Pillai as president and publisher of Tom Doherty Associates.^[20]

In August 2022, Tom Doherty Associates was rebranded as Tor Publishing Group.^[21] As of July 2025, Doherty continues in the capacity of "Chairman Emeritus", employed by Macmillan/Tor in an advisory capacity.^[22]

Doherty has received awards and recognition for his work in publishing across a number of genres, including science fiction, fantasy, westerns, and thrillers.

In 2007, Doherty was honored with a proclamation from Charles B. Rangel, Chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives of the United States Congress, for outstanding leadership to enhance and provide literacy programs throughout the nation.^[39]

Doherty married Barbara Jean Slocum (born 1934, died 1996).^[40] The couple had three children: Thomas, Linda, and Kathleen.^[4][15]

In 1992, Doherty married Tatiana Pashina Doherty. They live in New York City.^[4]