Once again, I’d like to thank everyone who visited and commented, helping make the UK release of The Gathering of the Lost a real celebration!

But as with all really good celebrations, there were giveaways, and here’s the outcome of the draw, which—like the Name/Character draw here—was made by Paul Waterhouse using Random Number Integer.

First up:

(Yes: that was a drum roll you heard! ;-))

 ** The Absolutely Tremendously Fabulous “Helen Lowe” Gift Set Comprising —

• 1 each signed first edition of  Thornspell, The Heir of Night and The Gathering of the Lost

And the winner is: …Jacqui Bennetts

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Secondly:

(Another drum roll!)

** The Absolutely Tremendously Fabulous “Grand Fantasy” Gift Set Comprising —

• 1 x signed first UK (of course!) edition of The Gathering of the Lost
• 1 x copy of NK Jemison’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
• 1 x copy of Brandon Sanderson’s Warbreaker

And the winner is: …Paul (@princejvstin)

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And Finally: (tarantara!)

** 10 x Copies of the UK Launch Day Poster (featured) signed by the artist, Peter Fitzpatrick (who also drew “The Wall of Night” series’ map) and the author (that’s me! ;-)) go to (in order of names drawn):

• Jan Butterworth
• Laura Schreiner
• June Young
• Jess
• Wen Baragrey
• Christopher Parvin
• Megan Norquay
• Paul Lavroff
• Stefan Gore
• Jacqui (the other Jacqui:) )

Winners—if you email me on contact[at]helenlowe[dot]info with your postal address details, I’ll arrange to get your prizes out to you as as possible after Easter!

And thank you again to everyone for participating! Don’t forget to  keep your eye on the Blog Tour for more fun and giveaways! (In fact, there’s one live on Civilian Reader right now!)

And the latest stop on the Tour, live this very day, is an interview with Mary Victoria, here.

USA Cover

UK/AUS/NZ cover

The Gods of Randomness Have Spoken—

& here’s what they say in respect of the draw to “Give Your Name To A Character in “Daughter of Blood, The Wall of Night, Book Three”

This draw was run over both release days for The Gathering of the Lost: 27 March for the USA, Australia and New Zealand; 5 April for the UK.

In terms of eligible entries, 1 comment per person for every distinct blog post published here on either of those two days, counted.

The Draw was made by a friend, neighbour and also reader, Paul Waterhouse (ably assisted by his daughter, Sophia.)

The draw is made--by our independent arbiter, Paul Waterhouse!

And the winning number was:

43

The winning name is:

Cheryl Graham

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Yes, “I know”, quite an FSF challenge for me! 😉

But already I have a glimmering of ideas. In short, I think I’m up to the job—but I guess the only proof will be in the Daughter of Blood reading! 😀

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And just as a reminder, this was the ‘deal’ for (or parameters governing) the draw:

• The successful name must be the real name of the commenter, not a pseudonym;
• The person whose name is drawn will also be recognised in the Acknowledgments to Daughter of Blood (The Wall of Night Book Three) and receive a signed, complimentary copy of that book;
• I reserve the right to adapt the winning name to best fit a fantasy character, e.g. “John the Miller” as opposed to “John Miller”;
• I cannot predetermine how the “Your Name” character will appear in the story and whether he/she will play a positive or negative role.

So, Cheryl Graham—welcome to Daughter of Blood, The Wall of Night Book Three. Please get in touch with me via my website, contact[at]helenlowe[dot]info to confirm that you do wish your name to be in the book.

If I have not received your confirmation by Wednesday 11 April, I will redraw. (Notice of a redraw will be posted here and also via Twitter.)

USA Cover

UK/AUS/NZ cover

The last stop on the Blog Tour was with the excellent and estimable Gillian Polack, talking historical influence in The Gathering of the Lost and The Wall of Night series.

And as of today I’m touching base with Mary Victoria at her Chronicles of the Tree home. Mary is author of the Tree trilogy (Harper Voyager) that began with Tymon’s Flight, a shortlisted work for last year’s Gemmell Morningstar Award.

Mary, Gillian, Karen Healey and I were all on a panel together at Worldcon 68/Aussiecon 4 in 2010, where we had a blast talking about cultural influence in FSF–and it came as absolutely no surprise when Mary had some searching and insightful questions to ask me about The Gathering of the Lost and the character of Malian in particular…

So without further ado, we’d love it if you joined in the conversation here. 🙂

Yes, the sun has indeed set on the UK release day—although the giveaways and name/character draw all remain open until midnight today, April 6, NZ time (to allow a time zone ‘buffer’) so need to pick up all the streamers and confetti quite yet (blows another toot on the vuvuzela!)

And meanwhile, the Blog Tour rolls on:

* Right now I’m with Gillian Polack’s on her blog, Even In A Little Thing where I’m talking historical influences on The Gathering of the Lost and The Wall of Night series, including geography, cultures, heraldry and names! You can check it all out here.

* There is also a report on the “worldwide” realtime launch (which, in fact, it was!), held on Tuesday evening at UBS Canterbury, on Beatties Bookblog today, right here

* My UK publisher, Orbit, also have a nice feature on their blog, here

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And next up on the tour we have:

• 

  USA Cover

  an interview with Mary Victoria tomorrow

• an interview with entertainment site  ismellsheep on April 9

• I’ll also be stopping in on Pip and Tee at A Shared Desk on April 10 to talk about adventure in Fantasy generally and “The Gathering of the Lost” in particular

So there’s plenty still happening on the Tour — & be sure to keep checking in here for updates, particularly on giveaways!

Nine days ago — and already I can’t believe it’s been that long — you joined me here to celebrate the release of The Gathering of the Lost, The Wall of Night Book Two in the USA, Australia and New Zealand. And today it is out in the UK—where of course I hope the story will take wings! 🙂

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But right here, now, today, I would like to celebrate what really does feel like the final milestone in the publication process.

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Here’s what’s happening to do just that:

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First Up — The Draw To Give Your Name To A Character in Daughter of Blood, The Wall of Night, Book Three” Resumes:

Here’s the buzz:

Everyone who has commented on both/either Tuesday 27 (USA/Canada and Australia/New Zealand) and/or April 5 (UK) release days, will go in the draw to give their name to a character in Daughter of Blood, The Wall of Night Book Three.

Provisos include:

• Only 1 comment per every distinct blog post published here on Tuesday 27 and/or April 5 will count as an eligible entry (so you automatically get 1 chance to enter on both March 27 and April 5 respectively, but you will get a further chance if/when I add an additional post today—and there’s already been the Ursula Le Guin quote post earlier);
• The successful name must be the real name of the commenter, not a pseudonym;
• The person whose name is drawn will also be recognised in the Acknowledgments to Daughter of Blood and receive a signed, complimentary copy of that book;
• I reserve the right to adapt the winning name to best fit a fantasy character, e.g. “John the Miller” as opposed to “John Miller”;
• I cannot predetermine how the “Your Name” character will appear in the story and whether he/she will play a positive or negative role.

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UK/AUS/NZ cover

And It’s A Celebration Right—So of Course There’s  Giveaways!

So what have I got for you today:

* An Absolutely Tremendously Fabulous “Helen Lowe” Gift Set Comprising —

• 1 each signed first editions of  Thornspell, The Heir of Night and The Gathering of the Lost

* An Absolutely Tremendously Fabulous “Grand Fantasy” Gift Set Comprising —

• 1 x signed first UK (of course!) edition of The Gathering of the Lost
• 1 x copy of NK Jemison’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
• 1 x copy of Brandon Sanderson’s Warbreaker

* 10 x Copies of the UK Launch Day Poster (featured) signed by the artist, Peter Fitzpatrick (who also drew “The Wall of Night” series map) and the author (that’s me! 😉 ).

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And Here’s How It All Works Again:

•  All you have to do to enter any of the draws is post a comment on this post, or any other posts I may make dated 5 April. But to allow international readers a chance to read and comment, all draws will close off at midnight Friday 6 April, NZ time.
• All giveaways and draws are fully international.
• All draws will be made by Random Number Integer and the “Name/Character” draw will be made by an independent third party to ensure full transparency(!)
• The results will be be posted as Saturday 7 April’s blog post.
• Also—don’t forget to check back to see if you’ve won. And do contact me through my website (details will be part of the April 7 post) to claim your prize!

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Want To Find Out More?

You can check out more details, including reading more of the book, via the links in the side bar — see “The Gathering of the Lost: Read More Here”

And you follow the stops on the Blog Tour to date by clicking on the links below:

• SF Signal — launching the tour in North America with a post “Celebrating Epic Fantasy & Publication of The Gathering of the Lost.”

• Orbit — where I kicked off the Australian tour with a discussion of The Power of Environment in my writing

• John Scalzi’s Whatever — with a guest post on the Big Idea that manifested in The Gathering of the Lost

• Trent Jamieson’s Trentonomicon — with a guest post on “Romance vs Reality: War & Conflict in Epic Fantasy and ‘The Gathering of the Lost.’”

• Galactic Chat — you can check the podcast out here.

• R is for Romance in The Gathering of the Lost on the Supernatural Underground, here.

• And there’s an indepth interview with the Civilian Reader here

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Breaking News:

The next stop on the Blog Tour is now current on Gillian Polack’s blog, Even In A Little Thing where I’m talking historical influences on The Gathering of the Lost and The Wall of Night series, including geography, cultures, heraldry and names!

You can check it all out here.

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And it is UK release day after all, so the celebration is current on Orbit, my UK publisher’s blog with a lovely focus post on The Gathering of the Lost.

Get into the launch day spirit—rock on over and take a look, here! 😉

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… on the UK release day post & launch celebrations due to “technical difficulties” (which I suspect lie chiefly with the technician — moi!) but it should be with you shortly.

Technical difficulties now resolved — with a little help from my friends! — & we are about to launch. Yahoo!

“The story is not in the plot but in the telling.” – Ursula K. Le Guin

I love this quote—and what better way to begin April 5, which is also UK release day for The Gathering of the Lost (yahoo!) than with a quote that so perfectly exemplifies my own feelings about story.

(Although as Paul Mannering from SpecFicNZ observed on Twitter, given received wisdom, shouldn’t it be “in the showing” — he he, thanks Paul 😉 )

But no, entirely in the joy and love of the storytelling, in my humble opinion.

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And speaking of the UK launch, my launch post will go up at 12 noon here, just after the clock ticks over into April 5 in the UK—so watch this space for the celebration.

Also, remember that a comment on any blog post dated April 5 will add a further entry of your name into draw to have a character in Daughter of Blood, The Wall of Night Book Three named after you (yes: you!)— so comment at will! (You know I love to hear from you “anyways.”)

Just a quick note to say that we had an absolutely fabulous realtime launch for The Gathering of the Lost last night—with big thanks to Philip King, Gillian Newman and the University Book Shop for hosting, my NZ publisher Hachette for their support, and to Dr Christina Stachurski, my lead editor Kate Nintzel,  and my partner Andrew for their good words on the occasion.

The gathering crowd

And a huge thank you to everyone who came along and helped make it a great party—you all rock!

'Talking to' the book ...

I will definitely write more later, by meanwhile, here are a few photos just to give you a  flavour ‘in the meantime.’   🙂

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yellow admiral –
……..in the stone garden
……..a leaf falls

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(c) Helen Lowe

Published in the taste of nashi, Windrift, 2008
Submitted by E Berry, NZ selector, for the Red Moon (US) international haiku anthology 2008

* Note: a “yellow admiral” is a rare NZ native butterfly

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To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Hub and other great poems from fellow Tuesday poets from around the world, click here or on the Quill icon in the sidebar.

And it’s the Tuesday Poem’s second birthday today so we’re starting another ‘community’ poem, like the one we did last year: great fun!

Yes, the Blog Tour has taken on whistlestop dimensions today—largely because of time zone complexities—but here is another in-depth interview, this time with bookblog Civilian Reader.

And yes—there’s another chance to win a copy of The Gathering of the Lost, so rock on over and check it out—

Right Here.