Cover detail from Besieged by Kevin Hearne.
Kevin Hearne knows the power of fantasy. In all of its forms.
Hearne is the author of the Iron Druid Chronicles, a nine-book series of urban fantasy novels beginning with 2011’s Hounded and concluding with next year’s Scourged. The series has amazing reviews — a great urban fantasy with fun, memorable characters, mythological conflict spanning centuries, and Oberon, the best Irish Wolfhound in fiction. And lately, when he isn’t writing the story of the long-lived Druid Atticus O’Sullivan, Hearne spends his time with a new epic fantasy series beginning with A Plague of Giants, the first book publishing in October.
But tomorrow, fans of Atticus get a new book, one Hearne calls #8.5 in the series. Besieged is a collection of Iron Druid short stories, several of them taking place after the last book and leading directly into Scourged.
What is in the collection? A secret chamber underneath the library of Alexandria. A Kansas carnival with soul-snatching demons in an all-too-real house of horrors. A friendship with William Shakespeare lands both Atticus and the Bard in boiling hot water with a trio of infamous witches. And the avatar of greed himself turns the streets of San Francisco red with blood. More, you say? Indeed there is — including bogeymen, vampire hordes, wrathful wraiths, and even a journey to the realm of the dead. Prepare to be besieged!
Hearne is no stranger to the power of short story writing and why it is important to him. When I published the anthology Unfettered in 2012, he contributed an Iron Druid Chronicles tale, a wonderful tale of the Holy Grail. He has been writing fantasy short stories ever since. And with Besieged, he has collected a lot of them. Why would he do this? Why are short stories important to him as a writer of a long fantasy series?
“Short stories give me the chance to develop character backstories and origins that I wouldn’t get to explore in the normal story arc of the series,” Hearne said this morning when I asked him. “Especially the very long, personal history of Atticus.”
When I asked him about future short stories, he said, “Sure! There will be another novella from Oberon’s point of view coming out in late November called The Squirrel on the Train — the sequel to The Purloined Poodle — and pre-orders for that are available now from Subterranean Press.”
But you don’t have to wait until October or November for your next Hearne fix. Besieged by Kevin Hearne is in fine bookstores tomorrow!
The world of Atticus is at hand!
The post Kevin Hearne, Besieged, and the Power of Fantasy Short Stories appeared first on Unbound Worlds.
