Today is release day for The Emperor’s Wolves.
As of today, the book should be available in print, audio and ebook.
I love the cover. I love one small element in the print version – not the title page, but the blank page that follows a title page – it’s not entirely blank.
Three years ago, give or take a few months, I was one of the authors featured at the pixel project. One of the things I offered to encourage donation was a short story prompt. I was willing to write about either a familiar character, or a single word prompt — like, say, Dragon. The person who donated could choose.
The person chose Severn. So I sat down to write a short story. Or rather, a novella. If I miraculously ended up with a short story, I’d be fine, but I didn’t really think that was likely; I thought I’d end up with a novella.
The donor had to wait. She waited with angelic patience until I had both time and inspiration between all the other deadlines, and I finally sat down, with a clear end-goal in mind, and began to write.
…and reached Chapter Seven, at the end of which it was pretty clear that I had pushed the bounds of novella. I had a choice: I could try to cut it back and tie it up, or I could continue to write toward the end I hadn’t reached yet. Which meant I had a novel. Which meant I couldn’t just try to fit it into the writing schedule. And it also meant that I had to submit it to Mira, home of the Cast novels, because of the option clause. When I first started writing for Luna, the one thing – the only thing – that was considered necessary was: female protagonist.
Severn is not a female protagonist. So I assumed that the book would be declined, not on the basis that it was terrible, but on the basis that it didn’t meet the criterion.
The criterion, however, had disappeared between the first Cast novel and now, and Mira did want the Severn novel. (Once I finished it, I sent it to the donor, so she saw the submission version, which is a bit different, especially at the beginning). Which meant, years after I’d committed to write a short story about Severn, I had finally fulfilled that donation pledge. T_T. And honestly, she was great about the time it took and the fact that it was getting farther and farther away from the charity drive. I was less fine because it was an obligation I couldn’t fulfill immediately.
And now, the book is real, it is done, and I’m excited to be able to send it off into the world!
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If you’ve read The Emperor’s Wolves already, I ask you not to post spoilers on this page – I will start a spoiler thread post that readers can entirely avoid until they’ve read the book later.
KW McCabe 
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Be still, my heart!
Everything to do with Severn makes my soul sing. Thank you for giving him a chance to have his story told.