The Advent of Winter
Last month I mentioned this has been a difficult year, marked by many wonderful highs but also some real lows. One of the things that’s brightened the past 12 months was the opportunity to contribute to The Advent of Winter. 2023 has been my breakthrough year when it’s come to publishing short fiction, since this is another short story anthology.
Dom McDermott, who is better known to many authors and readers as the book reviewer Dominish Books, was the driving force behind the project. The concept he came up with was an alternative version of an Advent calendar, swapping out chocolate for a more satisfying daily treat in the form of 24 individual short stories. Before you read on, pause and reflect on that – this has been a huge undertaking. That means getting 24 individual authors to agree to contribute those stories, each of which had to be written, edited, proof read, formatted and packaged together ready for release by a hard deadline. As anyone who has worked collaboratively with creative folk knows, they are without exception a lovely bunch, but getting two dozen of them lined up and ready to go at the same time was no small feat.
Fortunately, Dom is possibly the most organised person I’ve ever met. All that planning and preparation during the course of the year led to a phenomenally successful Kickstarter crowd funding campaign, which was fully funded within hours of opening. By the end we’d hit every stretch goal we could think of. This is great, since it means our supporters are going to get a really high-quality illustrated hardback via the brilliant indie bookstore The Broken Binding, and there should be interior illustrations for the ebook version as well.
Our supporters also get their hands on the stories before they go on general release, as for each day of Advent from 1st to 24th December they’ll get an exclusive individual ebook with that day’s story. I’d just like to say a huge thank you to all our Kickstarter supporters, without whom this project would never have happened. I hope you enjoy these 24 fantasy tales, all of them drawing their inspiration from the general theme of winter.
I was asked if I wanted to take part in this project back in January 2023. The sensible thing would have been to say no as I was incredibly busy at work, gearing up to launch my latest novel in a few months and I was also part of the team getting ready to run the Kickstarter fundraiser for another anthology, The Anatomy of Fear (see my previous post). Something about the idea, though, just wouldn’t let go. Sometimes as an author, you just know you have to write that story and that’s what happened here.
Because of my other commitments, my focus for The Advent of Winter was just my own story, rather than the wider administrative duties of running the project itself. From that perspective, getting involved was a chance to relax and clear my mind. I wrote the first draft of my story, A Cold Broad River, in April 2023, once my novel had been released and this provided a welcome mental break. I swapped the setting of arid deserts and the hot sun for a cold land in the depths of winter. Returning to the Viking-inspired setting of The Brotherhood of the Eagle felt like the natural choice, but I moved the location, focussing on different clans who only play a minor part in that fantasy saga to provide a fresh perspective.
I’d already written the early version of my horror story for The Anatomy of Fear by the time I started working on The Advent of Winter. I do think that move into fantasy horror influenced my writing when I turned my attention to The Advent of Winter. In some respects, I think A Cold Broad River is my version of a ghost story, where an innocent prank played out by four young children turns into something else entirely.
One of the things that excites me about this project is the calibre of authors Dom has assembled. As a contributor, although I read and provided early feedback on some of the stories, I’ve still to read the full collection. Based on the stories I’ve read so far, anyone who picks up this book is in for a treat. There are lots of authors involved where I’ve not had chance to explore their writing, so I can’t wait to dive into the full anthology. In that respect I feel more like a general member of the reading public, even if my tale is rubbing shoulders with some exalted company.
I’m expecting The Advent of Winter to go on general release in early 2024, although final dates are still to be confirmed at this stage. Since I’m posting this at the start of Advent, I hope all of our supporters enjoy the run up to Christmas as our winter-themed fantasy tales land in your inbox each day. For those of you who celebrate, I wish you a happy and peaceful Christmas and a prosperous New Year.
I’ll leave you with another short passage from the collection, this one taken from LL MacRae’s story.
The wintery excerpt graphics were put together by Tori Tecken and used with her kind permission. The full list of contributing authors are Thiago Abdalla, Kian N Ardalan, Zack Argyle, Cal Black, Ryan Cahill, TL Greylock, Tim Hardie, Natalie Kelda, Christer Lende, LL MacRae, Dom McDermott, Andrew D Meredith, HC Newell, Tatiana Obey, Quenby Olson, Palmer Pickering, JDL Rosell, Kerstin Espinosa Rosero, DW Ross, Karim Soliman, Tori Tecken, HL Tinsley, Jim Wilbourne & AR Witham.
