Meet the CARRY ON Bookshelf Edition!

I am thrilled to share this — my publisher has put together a hardcover edition of Carry On to match the other hardcovers in the Simon Snow Trilogy. 

When Carry On first came out in hardcover, we wanted the cover to be very modern and bold, to signal that this wasn’t a straightforward Chosen One story. Olga Grlic at Wednesday Books designed that cover — and even illustrated it herself. I still love it. It reminds me of a French New Wave movie poster.

But after Carry On came out, we realized that people didn’t get that the book was a fantasy. And lots of people still weren’t sure what to make of it. Was this some sort of elaborate prank? Had I written Fangirl fanfiction? We wanted the paperback cover to better communicate what the book was — an actual fantasy novel, a passionate romance, and very much its own story.

We sought out one of my favorite illustrators, Kevin Wada, and asked him to help us do something completely different from the hardcover. What I love about Kevin’s style, aside from how gorgeous it is, is that it feels vital and electric. In Kevin’s hands and with Olga still designing, Simon and Baz looked like they were going to charge right off the page.

For the first time, Carry On looked like itself.

When I decided to keep Simon and Baz’s story going with Wayward Son and Any Way the Wind Blows, everyone on the team knew we wanted Kevin to illustrate the covers. But we also knew how frustrating that would be for matching-book purists!

My editor, Sara Goodman, and I have been hoping for a matching edition ever since.

AND HERE IT IS.

We call it the Bookshelf Edition — because it looks good on the shelf next to its siblings. But this isn’t just a new dustjacket. The whole book got shined up. Check out the silver embossed stamp on the cover:

This coat-of-arms style logo was designed by my friends at Oxide Design in Omaha. Oxide also designed a more formal Watford crest. This one is the sports logo, like the one that would show up on Baz’s football shirt. (There are no filters on these photos, so the colors are pretty accurate, but you can’t quite see the silver.)

These new endpapers were illustrated by my husband, Kai. This was a map he drew for me in pencil when we were publishing the first edition. We needed to give something to Jim Tierney — who does all of the interior illustrations in the trilogy — to show him how Watford was laid out.

For that first edition, we really wanted a modern map. Carry On takes place in the modern world. The magicians don’t wear robes. They don’t use quills. We didn’t want that book to look whimsical; it needed to feel like a new and different world.

Now I feel like readers understand Simon and his world, and we can afford a little whimsy.

Look at that! There’s a “1” on the spine! It makes me happy to see Carry On take its place in the trilogy — and to think about how it was the start of something totally new for me, as an author.

The Bookshelf Edition, with all of its different artists and pieces, was brilliantly put together by designer Devan Norman at Wednesday Books.

It will be available in stores July 6, 2021, the same day that Any Way the Wind Blows comes out.

PREORDER LINKS HERE.

PREORDER FROM MY LOCAL BOOKSTORE BY JUNE 11, AND GET A SIGNED AND PERSONALIZED COPY.