Last month, Sean showed off a fan cover for Eyrie that fans fell in love with. Since Eyrie‘s ebook edition is usually free for some of December, I got to talking with Sean, and… we have a gift for you!
If you’d like a DRM-free version of Eyrie using Sean’s cover, you can grab it now =] This link will work until the first week of January.
All of my gryphon books and Glenn’s dragon books are in the SmashWords 2025 End of Year Sale from now until January 1st, and they’re DRM-free! If you’ve been waiting to pick up Pridelord or Blue Eyes & Other Tales, now’s a good chance to grab them.
I realized there were no ace pride stickers in the Eyrie Hearts pack, so Kittrel aka YoteNotes was kind enough to create ace stickers for Chert and Xin =]
Happy Valentine’s Day! By popular request, Kittrel has added a Whisper and Flicker valentine this year. Aaaaw, look at everyone’s favorite goth/cottagecore lesbian couple.
You can find the other eight previous years’ valentines on the Goodies page. If you click on them, it’ll open a higher resolution version for printing and giving to your friends, sweethearts, pets, strangers, or anyone you’d like to!
Glenn and I both caught a cold, so we’ll be spending Valentine’s Day eating chocolate and watching movies curled up on the couch with NyQuil, but I hope everyone has a great holiday.
I’ll be back in a few days once this cold has passed because there’s new fan art to share! Physical fan art, even. I need to send a thank you note to the artist first =]
Best kittens, Vale
Henders and Foultner
Turresh the Shark and Younce of Snowfall
Turresh the Shark and Rorin the Hunter (for the fanfic writers)
Satra the Kjarr and Mignet of Snowfall
Pink Paw and Xavi
Ninox of the Strix and Cherine Metalbeak
Deracho of Hoarfrost and Thenca of the Kjarr
Askel the Phoenix and Triddle the… Douser? the Wet? the Water Phoenix?
Today’s update to the fan art page is Maeve, AKA the CockatielForger! In this case, her dedication to fan art has produced so many works that only a few show up on the main page, and she gets an entire subpage to herself you can find here.
In addition to having turned the prologue of Starling into a comic, she’s written 19k+ worth of fanfiction retelling the same events from the frame of “What if Ferrick had survived the bog?” You can find that fic, two more GryphIns fanfics, and even some Song of the Summer King fics on her AO3.
If you enjoy her artwork or stories, leave a comment on her AO3 letting her know =] And to close out this update, here’s a few more of my favorites of hers. Though it was hard to pick!
The fan art page is now live! Since Flam Singer was the last person to share fan art, I thought I’d start with all of Flam’s works and go from there. My plan is that when I need a break from writing, I’ll pick an artist and get all of their pieces added. I’ve had a lot of fans ask where the best place to see all of the fan art is, and hopefully, by the end of the year, the answer will be here.
I’ve shared this before, but because I started out in mystery, horror, and literary fiction, I never expected anything I write to inspire fan art. My love of gryphons appears to be infectious, however, and there are well over 100 pieces of fan art and a dozen fanfics. I’ve had the most touching fan letters, and I’ve signed hundreds of books at this point. (Not too shabby for an immunocompromised author who doesn’t get out much!)
I’ve seen artists use GryphIns characters as examples for animation commissions, I’ve seen fan art end up on tie dyed t-shirts, I’ve seen dozens of original characters created set in the world of Belamuria, and I’ve even had artists reach out to say that I was wrong in my author’s note for Crestfall to exclude vampire finch gryphons, and here was art to prove that point.
It’s been a delightful journey, and it’s still going. While all of Flam Singer’s pieces are on the fan art page, linked above, here’s just a few of my favorites from over the years. And if you enjoy them, feel free to stop in and tell him so on Blue Sky or Patreon =]
Flam Singer once asked the important question: What if feathermanes had pony manes instead of lion manes?Flam had the very first fan art of Ninox.
The cave gryphons warn that when you travel deep beneath Belamuria, you should move in groups of no fewer than twenty, and you should never listen to the whispers that tell you to stray from the path…
If you’re a patron at the audiobook tier, you have access to the audiobook today! Go check the post to get your copy =]
The audiobook is currently going through the individual stores’ Quality Assurance departments, so they’ll be up soon. Kobo is up for preorder, Audible and everywhere else it might be a few days.
Amazon’s paperback will be approved soon. For other stores, there was an issue to fix, and the new proofs are in the mail. As soon as they arrive, if they’re good, the paperback will show up in other stores and the hardcovers and large print editions will show up everywhere (even Amazon).
Pridelord releases on Thursday! Of course, I wouldn’t want to show off the interior art early, but… maybe it’s time for a little game of Who’s That Gryphon?
The first interior art piece showcases one of the more unusual denizens of the Emerald Jungle. Known for their sharp beak and swooshy tail, they first appeared in The Crackling Sea, where they dampened the threshold to Nighteyes’ home. Go on, take your best guess. Who’s that gryphon?
I get a lot of emails asking about when Pridelord will be ready, and while the answer is still “soon,” for patrons, the answer is… well, right now =] Patrons at the $3 and up level can grab the ebook edition as of yesterday.
The retail version will go live after the audiobook and print editions are ready. James Scott Spaid is recording the audiobook as we speak, and I just got the final back cover copy and spine dimensions over to Jeff Brown. Soon as Jeff finalizes the cover print files, proofs will be on their way.
Because this book is so long and our printer’s max length is ~930 pages, Glenn and I have been polling fans at conventions who buy the large print editions, and you were all pretty clear: you did not want the font size reduced for any reason on the small print. In fact, for many of you, you’d given up on large print because it wasn’t large enough, and getting to see the GryphIns large print editions is what made you buy them. So we had to make the tough decision to divide the large print edition into parts one and two, around 550 pages each. It was a tough call as we definitely didn’t want people who need (or just enjoy) large print to have to pay more, but I appreciate all the input. And, for what it’s worth, that means that both parts are larger than Crestfall or Eyrie. Pridelord is a bigger than both combined!
I usually devote my time to working on the next book, but in this case, I’m listening to Pridelord’s audiobook as it gets recorded to help cut down on the production time. At the latest, when the audiobook gets finalized, there’ll be a two week preorder window. If things are going smoothly, it might be sooner. As promised, though, the audiobook, print editions, and ebook will release at around the same time. (Audible’s their own beast, so sometimes they release it early and sometimes their strict quality control standards take longer to approve a book.) Patrons in the audiobook tier will get the audiobook as it goes into final proof-listening, then the final version will be available after if you want the retail version.
All-in-all, it’s good to have this book ready to go. 2023 was a wild year without any GryphIns releases, and I’m glad it’s through. Things are still a little rough here (my husband is coming out of all his Long Covid complications, but he’s not at 100% yet). I’m at a point where my entire life isn’t just Covid stuff, though. Not that I ever stopped writing (Saberbeak is almost 40k written), just that I write much faster when my stress level is lower.
And with a book as long as Pridelord, it could have been four romance or cozy mystery novels, which would’ve filled up that 2023 roster nicely =] But I write epic fantasy, and those run long.
That said, while Pridelord needed to be long, the themes and stories that come next lend themselves more into normal length books. I’d considered trying to finish the series with just two more books, both extra long, and it feels forced. So the series may run a little longer, but instead of these 4x-normal-sized novels, they’ll be more like normal Starling-sized novels. It just may take a few more to finish up than expected.
Now, it’s time for me to curl up on the couch and watch the Lou Diamond Phillips episodes of Psych with Glenn, then get some sleep. When I’m not listening through Pridelord’s audiobook, though, I’ll be working hard on Saberbeak. Life’s not quite normal enough that I’d risk putting up a preorder page, but I have dreams of it releasing in December. Who doesn’t want to curl up with a nice warm Hatzel and read gryphon books over the winter? (Sorry, Australians, I know that’s your summer!)
