Hehe, many thanks. :)
It's still a while until the finished book, but I am cautiously optimistic that we will see the first longer preview in December or January, probably, even as part of another publication. (No, not the LFC Companion, as I am very careful not to mix Blackmoor and Mordred, but I am trying to hammer out a preview deal with a magazine.)
Probably, a comment on the map, though. This is a cut-out part of the map of the Kingdom of Angria - not the entire kingdom, just the part that would make people here smirk. And not ready, of course, given that I simply bastardized an existing map with a bit of Photoshop.
(The name "Angria" should give you an idea from where I took the model for this map. :o )
Essentially, the setting will be divided into four areas, and probably a fifth, that just now has spawned from the writing.
Angria, containing the clearest hommage to my own Dungeons & Dragons. Another, still very S&S-heavy area, set in a giant swamp - not so much "Blackmoor", more like "Captain Blood". Then, another, an Elven Realm, that goes after Philip José Farmer and, mainly, Edgar Rice Burroughs.
And, then, two areas where the characters go to die, the true core of the setting. One, "The Navel of the World". (No info on that one yet, sorry. That's the reason why I want people to buy the book. :twisted: ) Another, "Iram of the Pillars", and you can think what you will find there.
Even though the map snapshot suggests otherwise, the bigger influence than D&D might just have been Adventures in Fantasy, and, specifically, Dragon Warriors, the old UK RPG that I play. In that the setting is not poor man's Lankhmar, but rather to the "grim fairy tale" motif we find other authors. I think Melanie Rawn's book might have somewhat influenced my choice for the setting, even though it's been nearly two decades since I read those books.
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