Tales of the Emerald Serpent – Shared World Anthology – a Kickstarter Project.

Now it can be told… I’ve been working on this for a while now, alongside and in collaboration with a tremendously talented and amiable group of writers and artists, all directed/cat-herded by R Scott Taylor of Black Gate Publishing.

Set in Art of the Genre’s trademarked universe, The Nameless Realms, this anthology takes readers to the Free City of Taux, a fantasy port of cursed stones, dark plots, and a core of rich characters who share space inside the infamous Black Gate District. This anthology links characters and tales in an interwoven mosaic that helps draw the reader on, and with other authors like Lynn Flewelling, Harry Connolly, Martha Wells, Robert Mancebo, and Julie Czerneda sharing characters with newcomer Michael Tousignant and iconic fantasy artist turned writer Todd Lockwood, the book explores all the paths and back-alleys of city-born fantasy.

Editor and contributor R. Scott Taylor helped create the shadowed metropolis of Taux, where Razor Duelists and mailed and heavily armed Sturgeons try to hold back the tide of ghosts, Moon Cultists, and shadow magic that lurks inside the slithering coils of Wizard’s Mist. Rogues, harlots, and merchant princes share the same streets, and all watch their backs as the stones of the city call out to the living in a never ending game of cat and mouse for the true ownership of the great port. Fantasy artists Jeff Laubenstein and Janet Aulisio bring form to each story with their incredible pen and ink renderings. Contributor Todd Lockwood also lends his artistic vision to an epic cover.

Do you remember those early 80s anthologies like Robert Asprin’s Thieves World? I do and I loved them. I also always found shared world writing great fun and very rewarding when I was writing for table-top and LARP gaming. So I jumped at the chance when I was invited to take part in this anthology, not least for the chance of working alongside some of the finest writers in today’s science fiction, fantasy, and horror markets. As with my other short stories in recent years, I also thoroughly enjoyed working in another milieu to my own books – and I’m already thinking ahead to the next Beyond the Black Gate story I could write… and I really want to write it…

And then there’s the Kickstarter aspect. I’m fascinated to see how this funding system works for projects that don’t quite fit with the traditional publishing models in this time of such flux in our industry. Since I’m based in the UK, this isn’t something I can try for myself as yet, with Kickstarter being US based BUT and this is important, you don’t have to be US based to sign up to support this project.

So click on over and see what’s on offer and what you’d like to sign up for. Remember that you’re not committed unless and until the project reaches its target on April 18th.

This project needs $10,000 to see fruition, but bonus levels for every $10,000 after the first will get EVERYONE in the Kickstarter a digital copy of another anthology in the series. If we get $20,000, that’s 2 anthologies, $30,000 is 3 full anthologies, etc. Let’s show the publishing world that anthology series do matter and that people love evolving story lines with great characters all set in the same city. With each new level of support we’ll also be placing in ‘secret bonus’ rewards for all participants.

And here’s how it’s going so far…

Spread the word!

Author: Juliet

Juliet E McKenna is a British fantasy author living in the Cotswolds, UK. Loving history, myth and other worlds since she first learned to read, she has written fifteen epic fantasy novels so far. Her debut, The Thief’s Gamble, began The Tales of Einarinn in 1999, followed by The Aldabreshin Compass sequence, The Chronicles of the Lescari Revolution, and The Hadrumal Crisis trilogy. The Green Man’s Heir was her first modern fantasy inspired by British folklore in 2018, and The Green Man’s Quarry in 2023 is the sixth title in this ongoing series. Her 2023 novel The Cleaving is a female-centred retelling of the story of King Arthur, while her shorter stories include forays into dark fantasy, steampunk and science fiction. She promotes SF&Fantasy by reviewing, by blogging on book trade issues, attending conventions and teaching creative writing. She has served as a judge for major genre awards. As J M Alvey, she has written historical murder mysteries set in ancient Greece.

2 thoughts on “Tales of the Emerald Serpent – Shared World Anthology – a Kickstarter Project.

  1. That would be an excellent plan. I love reading – and writing – this sort of thing, and have been part of more than one attempt to get such a project off the ground over the years.

    But publishers want either a ‘tent-pole’ name or some other guarantee of success up-front… and they have had a point, in the days of yore, with their up-front printing costs, shipping, so on and so forth.

    It’s all different now, with ebooks and routes like Kickstarter!

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