Almanac – Saps
June 22nd, 2012Hello, Diane here. Sorry for the late update – since Eric and Brit are off to HeroesCon, they left me in charge yesterday, but I got an emergency call late in the night and went to the hospital for a close friend. I dropped straight into bed when I got home, and completely forgot the update until Eric texted me this morning.
So, here we present our next Almanac entry: Saps. I’ve known what a lot of the weapons on our Weapons page are ever since I started playing D&D in elementary school, but reading the details and history about each one always absorbs me. Eric’s a fanatic about research, and it really shows in his writing. Take a look for yourself!
Almanac – Tuque
June 14th, 2012Notice the cool knit caps that Blaise and Jassart are wearing? That style of hat is called a tuque, and it’s the subject of this week’s Almanac entry. In real life, these wonderfully warm and incredibly practical hats were used by the voyageurs to keep their heads roasty and toasty as they traveled the cold lake lands of Canada. They’re so good that we use them to this day, and they’re pretty much the official hat of Canada.
Almanac – Global Maps
June 7th, 2012This week’s almanac entry is a pair of maps that show the geographic regions of Corthis. Corthis has a total of eight continents – each one filing one of the temperate regions between the Torrid Zone at the equator and the Arctic and Antarctic zones at the poles. The continents are separated from the others in their temperate zone by the meridian seas. Well, most of the time they don’t. In the case of Japethe and Shamach, the land narrows to an isthmus at the meridian.
So this does mean that, unlike our world, the explorers from Japethe expected to find a continent on their way to Catai. Because according to geographic philosophy, there had to be a continent there.
Almanac – Japethe
May 31st, 2012This week’s Almanac entry is Japethe – the home continent of the colonists of Aradie. Since we’re discussing Seigneur Foucault and his return back to Saronne, it seemed a good time to give a little bit of information about the homeland of all these newcomers to the New World.
Oh, I had the pleasure of meeting Taylor of Xander Comic a couple weeks ago. He’s got a fantastic story going over there that centers on a boy wandering a dreamscape with one fantastic adventure after another. The storytelling is tight and the art is superb. I highly recommend you give it a read.
Almanac – Cape Adamant
May 25th, 2012This week’s Almanac entry is Cape Adamant. This massive rock formation dominates Sherbourg’s skyline and separates the upper city from the lower. This is the cliff that Jassart and Blaise are climbing with the help of Snow-by-Night.
Almanac – Architect of the City
May 17th, 2012This week’s Almanac entry is the Architect of the City. This important official designs all the civic and military buildings. He also keeps all the architectural records of the city, which makes him very important to Blaise and Jassart.
Almanac – Gendarmerie
May 10th, 2012This week’s Almanac entry is the Gendarmerie. This is the police force of Sherbourg and the role of our dear friend Ald. In the real world, the term gendarmerie (and gendarme) did not get the paramilitary police connotation until the French Revolution. I’m speeding that up by a century for my purposes.
You may notice that we’ve reorganized the Almanac a little bit. We added another book, much to Diane’s anguish. I’ve created Government to handle things like the Gendarmerie. The balance of books will be restored when I add our 8th book which will be the Atlas.
Almanac – Pénélope Gâteau
May 3rd, 2012This week’s Almanac entry is Pénélope Gâteau, the maid of Cienan yr Tuathal. She is a spunky young woman who was teasing Blaise back in chapter 2 and then appeared on pages 2 and 3 of this chapter. I was going to post her entry last week, but discussing the pillory seemed more important.
If you live up in New England, I have good news. Snow by Night got a table in the Artist Colony at Connecticon on July 13-14. Yes, Connecticon’s artist alley is called an artist colony. Since we’re colonial fantasy, I had to go.
