The Dark Thorn by Shawn Speakman

Hi Backers of The Dark Thorn!

Wow, the project launches tomorrow and we have over 1100 people already signed up via pre-launch. That's amazing! Thank you for joining us early.

This morning, we realized that we hadn't officially announced our interior artist on The Dark Thorn. We have to remedy that because he's just too great and deserving not to. His name is Don Maitz. He's won ten Chesley Awards and two Hugo Awards for his art. His work has graced book covers for authors like Piers Anthony, Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury, Orson Scott Card, Stephen King, Raymond E. Feist, etc. You get the picture. And he even created the first artwork for the Captain Morgan rum pirate. He's a great guy, is married to author Janny Wurts, and together they might be the cutest couple ever.

Don has done a lot of work for Grim Oak Press over the years, most recently on our special edition of Prince of the Blood by Raymond E. Feist. Author Shawn Speakman commissioned Don for a painting last year, and Don produced one after reading The Dark Thorn. It is below:



If you look closely at the Stretch Goals, there is the chance that there will be a full-color tip placed within the S&N, S&L, and Rare editions. The art for that tip will come from the painting above.

Don will be producing ten (10) black and white interiors. But there is also a Stretch Goal for an additional five (5). We sure hope we hit that because more art is always better!

Follow Don on social media if you don't already. And we will be sharing some of his interiors on The Dark Thorn once we receive them in.

See you tomorrow!

- The Grim Oak Press Team

Hi Everyone,

The BackerKit for The Dark Thorn Preferred Editions launches in two days! It has been approved!

Tomorrow, I should receive final cover artwork from Magali Villeneuve, which will be wonderful. Don Maitz has begun interior illustration work for the book, to produce TEN black and white illustrations that will go into every edition. And cartographer Jared Blando is waiting in the wings to produce a beautiful new map of Annwn if we hit that stretch goal.

Well, what are the stretch goals? For that matter, what are the tiers? And add-ons? Well, I'm going to post some information below and I'll answer any questions that arise so you have the most current information for when the project launches on June 12th at 11AM PT.

Here are the Tiers:

These should seem fairly obvious to those of you who have followed me for a while. The tiers match up pretty closely with what I did on The King-Killing Queen Kickstarter. Ignore the black and white artwork. I'll update that once I receive the finished artwork from Magali.

ALSO—I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH—BE SURE TO BACK in the first 48 hours! Those of you who do will receive an additional tarot card as well as the first chapter of The King-Killing Queen's sequel, The Witch-Wiled Wizard. And the ability to have me personalize your books if you like. Only good through the first 48 hours!

How can YOU help make the editions more awesome? That's where the Stretch Goals come in:



And what add-ons can you buy? As an example, a slipcase you can house your Signed & Numbered book in? Well, here is an image that illustrates some of them. Not featured on the graphic is a slipcase and an extra trade hardcover book for gift-giving purposes.




If you have any questions, do let me know! I'm always around. I'll also take some of those questions and add them to the FAQ. Thank you for partaking in this. It's going to be fun! 

With Magic,
Shawn Speakman

Hi Everyone,

The project is up to 934 people following the pre-launch of The Dark Thorn Preferred Edition! That's better than when The King-Killing Queen launched. And if you haven't joined yet, hope you'll consider doing so given the FREE tarot card and the incentives I have planned for the first 48 hours beginning June 12th. You won't want to miss out! I'll talk more about those incentives early next week.

I just finished the professional edit on The Dark Thorn. Yay! So the hard part is done. The book now goes to the copyeditor, who will quibble over my use of em-dashes and commas and the like. Once returned, I'll go over the book one more time and it will be finished. Meanwhile, artist Magali Villeneuve continues her work painting the cover. It's going to be gorgeous.

Today, I have another poll for you. It's a fun one, I think. I haven't talked a lot about this yet, but here is something fun I am going to do. When the BackerKit launches on June 12th, I'll be conducting a "Choose Your Own Adventure" scenario on the project community. Essentially, anyone who backs the project will be able to read the opening of a new short story from me -- and then select where the story goes after that! Every day I'll write a few hundred words and give people the option of choosing where it goes next. By the end of the campaign, we should have a pretty wonderful finished story. Or a strange mess of words. Ha!

But it begs the question: Where in the Annwn Cycle's canon should the story be set?

I had originally thought to do an epilogue to The Dark Thorn, one I could include in the final book as a Stretch Goal during the campaign. Then I realized some of you haven't read the book yet and such an epilogue would be filled with spoilers. Ugh.

So I thought, "I'd better poll people and see what YOU ALL want!"

So which would you prefer? Vote and be heard!

Off to write on the short story, The Unavowed Light-Weaver. It's almost finished too. Woo!

With Friday Magic,
Shawn

Hi Everyone,

Thank you for joining me on this journey. Things are beginning to ramp up here!

First off, the amazing Magali Villeneuve has begun work on the new cover for The Dark Thorn. She painted the artwork on The King-Killing Queen and I'm so fortunate she had the time to tackle Richard and his sword Arondight once held by Lancelot.

That said, she sent me an email this morning with two choices. I do want your feedback since it is ultimately all of you who will be buying the book. You should have a say, right? Hence, today, I am conducting our first poll. Take a look at the image below and then vote on the direction you'd like Magali to take. I think this is a fun way to get you involved as well as get your valuable insight.

As you can see, the cover design will mirror what we did on The King-Killing Queen. Richard will be aged up a bit, but otherwise I'm pretty happy with this direction. And for those of you who have read The Dark Thorn already, please don't mention the lack of the staff in this painting. I'm doing this for a reason. I don't want spoilers posted. Ha!

Feel free to post your thoughts below after you vote! Let's have some fun!

With Thorny Magic,
Shawn

PS: To vote, you do have to Follow the project on BackerKit, I believe.

Hi Everyone,

How many of you have seen The Lord of the Rings movies directed by Peter Jackson?

A great many of you, I bet. If you are like me, you've seen them hundreds of times. And love them. From the faithfulness of the adaptation to its adult themes to its acting performances, dialog, and CGI. Jackson and his team managed to produce Tolkien movies that will withstand the test of time.

About a decade ago, when friend and author Terry Brooks began writing the climax story for his Shannara series, I wrote swordsmith Peter Lyon with a question. Peter produced the weapons used in The Lord of the Rings movies, and I asked him if the original Hildebrandt Bros. design for the Sword of Shannara could be produced as a congratulatory gift to Terry. While Peter informed me that the Hildebrandt design would be very difficult to produce and I decided on a different gift for Terry, Peter and I became online and email friends.

Then two years ago, when I was writing The King-Killing Queen, I received that book's cover art from artist Magali Villeneuve and absolutely fell in love with it. I also loved her design of the sword Lumiere so much that I forwarded it to Peter, hoping it was something that could be forged.

Peter wrote me back, asked some clarifying questions, and then accepted the project. He doesn't do a lot of commission work as Weta Workshop keeps him quite busy, so I was absolutely befuddled to learn The Lord of the Rings swordsmith would be forging a sword based on an idea I created.

Here is the Magali Villeneuve cover that inspired Peter's hand-drawn designs for Lumiere:

To view over a dozen photos of Peter's work as he forged and put together Lumiere, be sure to follow this BackerKit project. And if you already follow it, the photos should be below!

If you have any questions, I'd love to answer them. This process was super fun! A big thank you to Peter for his work and professionalism! 

With Magic,
Shawn Speakman