Last week we announced Laini Taylor, author of the Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy, as this month’s NOVLbox curator (if you haven’t entered the giveaway, you can do so here) and teased that we would be sharing news about her new book.
You may remember hearing about The Muse of Nightmares back in May—and friends, we have an update. The book is now two books, a duology! The first will be titled Strange the Dreamer and the second book in the series will be The Muse of Nightmares. So why two books instead of one? And why title the first one Strange the Dreamer instead of The Muse of Nightmares? Laini has the answers to all our questions. Take it away Laini!
From its inception, this story has had co-main characters, and the title “the Muse of Nightmares” describes one of the two—the one I was most focused on at the outset, who I believed to be the more fascinating, and who I thought would carry the story. But stories can be unruly things. Characters can surprise you, and the other character quite spectacularly did: taking over the beginning of the book and sweeping me off my feet.
His name is Lazlo Strange, and he’s a junior librarian at the world’s greatest library. One of the first things that made me fall in love with him was when it came out that his nose had been broken by a falling volume of fairy tales. It was this tiny thing that came from of my fingertips one day (sometimes the words seem just to appear in the space between your fingertips and the keyboard), and suddenly…I had him: “Strange the Dreamer,” so-called by his colleagues, and not always kindly.
Initially I titled a chapter “Strange the Dreamer,” and I hadn’t looked at it more than a couple of times before it struck me that I loved the sound of it beyond reason and that was my book title. I only hoped my editor and publishers would agree, and I was so, so pleased that they did! And because it will be followed by its sequel, The Muse of Nightmares, I didn’t have to sacrifice that title, which I also love.
I can’t tell you how eager I am for readers to meet these two characters, and all the others who people this peculiar new world I’m building. I hope you will love them as much as I do!
Thanks, Laini! We love the new title and we’re glad to hear that the other will be sticking around. And thank you for telling us a little more about this new character! We like Lazlo already. Above all, we’re psyched that we’ll be getting TWO books in this new magical world that you created.
Strange the Dreamer will be released on September 27, 2016, and it is the story of:
the aftermath of a war between gods and men.
a mysterious city stripped of its name.
a mythic hero with blood on his hands.
a young librarian with a singular dream.
a girl every bit as perilous as she is imperiled.
alchemy and blood candy, nightmares and godspawn, moths and monsters, friendship and treachery, love and carnage.