How are you supposed to pronounce the name "Hiero" from "Hiero's Journey"?

Question

As a non-native English speaker I've often wondered how you are supposed to pronounce "Hiero", the main character from the eponymous Hiero's Journey by Sterling Lanier: to my unlearned ear "HEE-ro" (just like "hero") sounds fine but it occurred to me that the name could also be spoken as "HI-ro" (like "hieroglyph", for example), so I'm uncertain which one is the correct pronunciation.
Could you help me solve this doubt?

Valorum · Answer

"Hee-eh-ro" (probably).
The Appendix N book club added Hiero's Journey to their list of must-read authors in 2017. As part of their research they evidently spoke to several of Lanier's publishers to glean stories and info about his biography. This footnote is found at the end of the article.

Incidentally, Lanier insisted that Hiero is pronounced “Hee-eh-ro” and not “Hero” or “Hyro”, but he was also tweaking his final publisher Donald M. Grant at the time.

How are you supposed to pronounce the name "Hiero" from "Hiero's Journey"?

One Answer

"Hee-eh-ro" (probably).

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