I make no secret that Tad Williams is one of my favourite writers, and Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, the fantasy trilogy that put him on the map, is my favourite completed fantasy series. So it was good news when he returned to his roots with Shadowmarch. But, if there’s anything Williams is known for, it’s writing humungous tomes, and it looks like that’s biting him in the ass with the conclusion to the Shadowmarch trilogy.
From Suvudu:
It appears his next conclusive hefty book is getting a different treatment!
Tad returned to “epic” fantasy in 2004 with Shadowmarch. Originally it was an online serialized venture but Tad quickly decided to publish it in book form and write two sequels to tell the entire story—Shadowplay published in 2007 and Shadowrise was to publish later this year or early 2010. An odd beginning, but I was happy to see Tad return to his roots!
And here comes an odd ending for the Shadow trilogy!
Tad wrote this on his Facebook page today:
“Jell-o brain, Night Two. Just got back from New Jersey and a story conferencing day. All good work, but it’s now three a.m. and my brain…well, you know. Wibble-wobble-wibble. However, one piece of news for the Tad readers. Shadowrise is definitely going to have to be two volumes, but only a few months apart.”
So, no longer a trilogy. Kind of like Memory, Sorrow & Thorn shouldn’t have been, I suppose, since that last story could barely handle the physical binding of the book!
It’s nice to see that the novels will be published close together. One has to expect that this split is the result of industry economics (putting out a 1200 page hardcover, like To Green Angel Tower would be very difficult/expenseive these days) rather than any inability on William’s part to finish the book on time. Still, though it’s too bad we’ll have to be shelling out twice the dough to finish off the series, at least we should still see the conclusion to the ‘trilogy’ in 2010.
Argh, not again. Why, oh way didn’t I wait to buy the first volumes until the whole thing was finished. ;)
I actually don’t mind splitting the last volume in two, since I can see the reason, but it pisses me off that they will bring out the paperback only a year or so later, and I’m NOT going to buy TWO hardcover books.