Heirs of the Blade - further reading. : Shadows of the Apt

Heirs of the Blade — further reading.

Keen-eyed readers may have noticed that Heirs of the Blade brings in a number of characters previously seen in the short stories on this site. This is obviously because of my immense skill in foreshadowing and plotting ahead and not at all because several of those characters just wouldn't leave me alone until they got a serious piece of the action. Anyway, for those wishing to get up to speed, the following is recommended reading. There are no spoilers in these stories, and as they were written ahead of Heirs, while they would work just as well as a retrospective, if you're currently sitting with an unread copy to hand you might want to troll through these first.

Varmen the Sentinel, of course, has his early history played out in Ironclads and The Last Ironclad.

Dal Arche and his little coterie of brigands first meet in An Old Man in a Harsh Season and another of their adventures is told in The Price of Salt.

Lowre Cean has a relatively small role in The Sun of the Morning, but his son, Lowre Darien, who gets some mention in Heirs, has his exploits told in The Prince.

Finally, the ghost story told by Avaris the Spider, towards the end of the book, can be found in its entirety here: The Dreams of Avaris

Enjoy!

Posted by Adrian Tchaikovsky on October 18th, 2011

Posted in Blog, Home, Stories

Tags: Fiction, Rants

20 Comments

20 comments to “Heirs of the Blade — further reading.”

Eric Franklin, October 18th, 2011 at 11:57 pm:

Is there any chance the short stories will be collected and released as a Kindle Single or something similar?
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 19th, 2011 at 12:06 am:

Ah, good question, to which the answer is, I am trying to make this happen. At the moment I have a couple of small presses who seem to be game to produce maybe a paper collection, and I'd guess that would come as a kindle collection also (and, yes, there would be new stuff in there as well, because life's like that) — so it's a somewhat tenuous "watch this space" sort of deal. Release date would probably be at a suitable time relative to the last book of the series.
Eric Franklin, October 19th, 2011 at 12:09 am:

Excellent!

Unrelated follow-up question: Does anyone have the Tabletop RPG rights to the series, yet? Is anyone negotiating for it
Peter Mooney, October 19th, 2011 at 8:35 am:

Funny that, myself & a few friends were discussing last night how awesome it would be if there was a tabletop RPG ruleset for this series.

I'd be interested to hear if it has been remotely considered.
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 19th, 2011 at 11:55 am:

Ah, well, tabletop RPG… I would very much like to see one — and of course there was the age-old original campaign I ran, which was based on a truly unwieldy homegrown (read mostly clumsily borrowed from D&D & Chaosium) system. There have been a few book-based RPGs hitting the market recently — including a Dresden Files, a Stross Laundry, and a rather nice Song of Ice and Fire one, too. The difficulty is that it's a very crowded marketplace with a limited number of actual players, and even the ASOIAF setting, which linked a hugely popular property with a very well considered system, has not flowered as I think it deserved to, and so I'm somewhat leery of the commercial prospects. I know that several groups have developed their own homegrown Shadows of the Apt games, which is great. However, if someone was determined enough to do it, there certainly hasn't been any licensing of the rights as yet.
Moon Kyeom Kim, October 20th, 2011 at 7:53 am:

Lowre Darien and Lowre Cean. Damn I really should have made the connection. Hah so it was Avaris from the short stories, I do hope his character is a Chekhov's gun for later on other then just a cameo and telling spider executions have style. Actually are all your short story characters Chekhov's gun in some way or some of them are just for fleshing out the back story and the culture of the setting? The wasp kinden one comes to mind for the latter point but seeing as how even the beetle alchemist was mentioned…
Joan, October 21st, 2011 at 4:14 pm:

Thanks for the guide! I had noticed some of the connections and familiar names in "Heirs" and I'd like to join the chorus of those who'd like to see the stories collected in one volume.

Any chance of returning to further shorts in the future? I'd enjoy seeing the further adventures of Evandter, Cordwick, and Tesse from "The Prince". Or another one that's made me think: would you ever see writing a bit from the Collegium days of Stenwold et al.? I've always been interested in seeing more of that, and particularly Atryssa since we only hear about her through recollections.
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 21st, 2011 at 7:24 pm:

There will certainly be future stories as and when I ever have time to write them — once I have the first draft of War Master's Gate (book 9) down, I will probably give myself some time off. There is a sequel idea for The Prince, certainly, and some further adventures for Mornen (The Sun of the Morning) and Doctor Phinagler (Cities of Silver). As for Stenwold's College days — not impossible, but I've no current spark of an idea for it (and the horrible idea of insect-kinden frat movies rears its head…), As for other story characters turning up in the books — not impossible, but I'm certainly not on a drive to fit all of them in — that would be unwieldy.
Kevin, October 25th, 2011 at 4:56 am:

This sounds rather great. By the way, when will the Sea Watch by released in the USA?
Cameron, October 25th, 2011 at 6:50 am:

So sad 🙁
Book 7 isn't coming out in NZ till, like december!!! 🙁
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 25th, 2011 at 12:41 pm:

Sea Watch US release hasn't been announced yet. I think the rights haven't been acquired. I'm not sure how things work in the Antipodes — I assume it's the UK edition that turns up there? Not sure why there should be a 2 month delay for book 7, but I'm sure the intricacies of the publishinf industry are involved.
Thomas Beech & Charlotte Davis, October 25th, 2011 at 8:52 pm:

We are both huge fans of the series and would like you to take a look at some cosmetic theories we have about the different kinden. We also have a proposition of a new plot line that you would be able to take and styalise in your own unique way also including two new kinden that we would love to see.

Regards

Thomas and Charlotte
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 25th, 2011 at 9:21 pm:

Theories about kinden always welcome, although I'm likely to respond with "Foip" for much of it (Find Out In Print (1)). As for plotlines and new kinden, I'm knee-deep in book 9 at the moment, so won't have much of a chance to expand on things for a while, but feel free to pitch, new kinden included (be aware that numerous kinden may already be in play, just not yet named in the books, or sometimes not having actually turned up yet — the world goes some way beyond what I've crammed into the book).

(1) Gleefully stolen from Maelstrom LARP's "Find Out In Play"
Steve, October 26th, 2011 at 2:51 pm:

Ok, what you people need, that are unfortunate (or not as the case may be) to not live in the UK, is a friend in the UK lol. That don't mind sending the book on from Amazon or wherever we can get it cheapest! (or get it on kindle — yuk — give me paper anyday)

The great thing about creating 'a whole new world' where some of the groups within it, are wanting to take over and create their own new world, is that it is impossible to run out of new material, new characters and new things for them to do!!

Just have to make sure that Adrian lives to a ripe old age.… has good vision () and don't get RSI…

as regards Lost tales.… I'm sure i've nicked that idea from somewhere / someone else, but, I'm sure a nice little anthology of stories, whether supplementary, complimentary totally separate, but set in the same world or even parody (thinking in particular of a Babylon 5 episode where we saw a day in the life.. of a Maintenance crew!)… would be well received by the increasing fanbase!
impaitent inapt, October 28th, 2011 at 4:17 pm:

BOOK SIX! BOOK SIX!!! BOOK SIX!!!!
Adrian Tchaikovsky, October 28th, 2011 at 4:38 pm:

Well weirdly, Book 6 isn't technically further reading for Book 7, although Book 5 is. Doing a bit of a Martin there, I guess.
jidasfire, October 28th, 2011 at 5:08 pm:

Just finished book 7, and of course it was great. My only problem is the soul-crushing terror that comes from wondering just how the Wasps are ever going to be stopped, what with their clear dominance in both magic and science, their many new allies, the fact that most of the heroes of the Lowlands died in the first war, and Seda has learned from her brother's mistakes. Still, I love the setup of the coming conflict between Che and Seda, and probably Tynisa and Tisamon's ghost. Can't wait for The Air War!
Jarek, November 29th, 2011 at 5:49 am:

I am working on book 7 at the moment translating it into Polish. It is 5:40 in the morning and I cannot stop! I want to sleep! Please! Dear Writer what have you done to your partners in crime?
And workers in the attic will wake me up at 7! Roof tiles! Who needs new roof tiles? No mercy. No rest. AND not even single Kerebroi!

Greetings from Wrocław,

J.
saddened slug, December 5th, 2011 at 10:44 pm:

well, then Adrian, if you put it like that, then i must read the short stories later! you truly are a genus, and i admire your work! i will be getting books six and seven (horay, it's finally out in America!) for Christmas! HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!
amazed ant, December 6th, 2011 at 9:52 pm:

i just finished ironclads. following my previous comment, i WILL be reading the other short stories! you are truly a genus! i cannot wait until i get the next books! (these stories will provide nice filler!)

Shadows of the Apt