Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene: A Prose Rendering

AND NOW... A WORD FROM THE PUBLISHER.
over 1 year ago – Mon, Dec 09, 2024 at 10:22:22 AM

Hello all, I’m Steve Smith, president of Sky Turtle Press. I just wanted to send a quick update about The Faerie Queene. Our typesetter is still working through final edits on the manuscripts, and we received cover templates from our printer.   We’ve ordered all the bonus items for the campaign and are preparing a space in our warehouse that will allow us to sort, pack and mail those. We hope to get the majority of the non-book items shipped before Christmas. The swords and the fairy crowns will be shipped directly from the artists making them. We know they are hard at work on them. 

I asked Rebecca to allow me this one update to thank you all for your patience, This set of books, this epic poem, has been a tremendous amount of work for her, and for Justin Gerard, the incredible illustrator, and for Ned Bustard, the designer who is laying out and "typesetting" the books. 

I have been in constant touch with the printer, and we have the final printing quotes in-hand. As we approach the day of finally turning over the art files to the printer, I am reminded of the faith you all showed in our project. For this I am truly thankful. I know when you receive the books, and all of the stretch goals and add-ons, you will be pleased. 

If you haven't visited the official website, https://faeriequeene.com/, I encourage you to.

That’s all for now!  On behalf of Rebecca, Justin, Ned, and the entire Faerie Queene team, I wish you all the best of the holiday season. - Steve

Quick Update. :)
over 1 year ago – Fri, Nov 08, 2024 at 07:43:57 AM

I just sent our editor's suggestions for the final volume of The Faerie Queene to the typesetter so he can implement those tweaks. Hurrah!

Volume One is completely finished. Volume Two needs two final type-o's corrected. Want to know what they are?

1. The capitalization of a Muse (vs. invocation to the Muse--nerd joke, sorry.)

2. The removal of an extra single quotation mark. 

Yep, it's that close.

All the fun bonus stuff is ordered except for bookmarks. I have a beautiful idea for making those unique, but I've been scouring the internet to find someone who can do it, and no luck so far. I'll give it one last shot today, then go with Plan B so these are ready to be mailed out with all the other goodies. Either way, they will be lovely.

I'm not sure how things like potential dock worker strikes might impact delivery dates for the books. But as soon as we know something, I'll update you here. I know that MY authorial work will likely be done within weeks now. Well, at least for this first edition. 

After your books arrive, we will open a slot on our website for you to send in suggestions for future editions. With a project this big, there are surely things I missed, despite obsessive efforts to do this perfectly. So when you find a mistake or oversight--whether it's a misplaced comma, or a sentence that could have been rendered more accurately, or a discrepancy in spelling, or a historical fact that I got wrong, please let us know.   Or if you know a pedantic old prof who will rip it up so that we can make it better next run, I'd love to meet him.

I had Covid twice while working on the translation, and I'm one of those people who had neurological effects from the virus. As time has passed, my mind has gotten so much stronger and clearer, but I'm still nervous about mistakes I didn't catch in the months of fog. Thank goodness for mighty editors. And thank goodness for readers who will help us make the next iteration of this project even stronger. There's something marvelous about owning a gorgeous, artistic first edition of a project like this. But my hope is that if I stay  receptive to feedback and prioritize content over my own ego, the text of the second edition will be  better than the first, and the text of the third will be better than the second.  

Anyway, that's the news from Lake Nearlydone.

As happy as I am to send these your way, I betcha I'm even more excited to hold these them than you are!
 
:)

Rebecca




 

Faerie Queene Update: Volume Three is Taking Shape
over 1 year ago – Fri, Oct 18, 2024 at 03:24:07 PM

I hope you're not tired of updates! Since it's been a while, I wanted to give you a peek at a beautiful page and let you know how things are progressing.

Ned is currently working on typesetting the third volume. It's lovely, of course. I'm so excited!

This afternoon, I sent him nine more small tweaks for Volume II. Hopefully, these will be the last changes needed there. Meanwhile, here's a sample page. Gorgeous, right?

I just asked him to change the copyright date and all of our internal footnote self-references to 2025. That was a bit of a gut punch, but it's just a huge project. And I'm still hoping we can at least send to print before the end of the year--even if we don't get the books in our hands until January or early February. Cross your fingers!

Our bonus items for The Faerie Queene have been ordered. Mugs have arrived at our warehouse, and they are gorgous! Hopefully we can get those shipped soon. 

While I wait on typesetting, I'm trying to stay busy with two other projects. one is a young adult folklore horror trilogy written by award-winning author Steven James. It's called Rift, and it's based on the Celtic concept of thin places, though the protagonist lives in the Appalachian Mountains. 
 

The series was inspired by the Unicoi library, a town hit hard by Hurricane Helene. We started this series wanting to honor the rich heritage of storytelling in our region, and we're still hoping to do that. 

I'll include our Rift Halloween bingo board here, just for fun. You can also find it on our social media pages. (Links below.)

Most of our participants are competing for the prizes. But since you have all been so patient with the Kickstarter, if you want to give this a go, just mention in your tag on social media that you're from the Faerie Queene Kickstarter, and we will include a free, vinyl "Lore, the Library Cat" sticker in any package we are sending for this project. (By the way, the Unicoi Library actually keeps a cat! That's a real thing!)

Sky Turtle also has another project in the wings. We've been working on this one for many years, and I can't wait to tell you all about it officially. But we want to pull together a few more details before the reveal. So, I'm going to hold off on sharing that secret. (It's super fun, though. It's even ultra fun.)

Thanks for walking on this journey with us! Somehow we ended up with the best patrons on all of Kickstarter. We're the luckiest.

Take care,

Rebecca

Click here for the Facebook Bingo Board link:

Click here for the Instagram Bingo Board link:






 

Good news that will soon be even better news. :)
over 1 year ago – Fri, Oct 04, 2024 at 11:46:08 AM

A few days ago, I received the first draft of the typesetting for the final book of our project!  The very last one! Hurrah! 

A handful of tweaks still need to be made, but it's nearly there! Ned should be able to finish those by mid October. After that, it's just a matter of doing a final scan, and then off to print! Can you believe it?

Meanwhile, since I can't do anything but wait for typesetting to finish, I'm working on a big hurricane relief project. 

I live very close to the horrific damage done by Helene, and our first week has been mostly focused on rescue and resourcing. 

However, as you know, recovery will take many years, and Sky Turtle has been trying to find a way to utilize our resources to help.  We think we landed on something very late last night. It involves collecting stories from the mountains.

If you're interested in hearing more about our idea, I'll include that below. If not, plan to hear a happy Kickstarter-related update from me in the next few weeks. 

The Faerie Queene is nearly done! At last!
Rebecca

P.S.

About our Appalachian relief project. 
(Also, we are not asking for money, just stories.)

Steven James, the author, graciously offered to let us use energy and funds we would normally apply toward pushing his book toward this cause. (You can find his book here: https://a.co/d/8LzAAWN, if you're interested in reading a story about our region.)

 

Update on The Faerie Queene
over 1 year ago – Thu, Sep 19, 2024 at 06:37:25 AM

Apologies for the delay in this update! We needed to hear back from a few people before sending out new details about the project.

You already know how excited I am about our new typesetter. I've sung his praises in past updates. He's still on board, so don't worry! But because he's a well-known artist, his late summer has been super busy with traveling, working shows, etc. 

However, the main typesetting for the first two volumes is nearly done. Only tiny tweaks remain--the sort that can be wrapped up in a weekend. And Ned said that he can work on the final volume in October when his schedule slows down a bit. After seeing the magic he performed on the first two volumes, I am more than willing to wait another month for his artist's touch on the third. But that does push us back a few more months. 

Here is some good news, however. Behind the scenes, we've been working very hard to try to get all the other hardgoods that were part of our campaign produced so that we can (hopefully!) get them to you before Christmas. 

The mugs are produced and are being sent to our office. The swordmaker and crown maker have been given the green light. And we are pushing forward with art prints, t-shirts, cards, etc. 
We are also working on a little bonus surprise since you've been so patient with us along the way.  

Anyway, that's the update! Thanks for taking this journey with us! We are so grateful for you all!

Rebecca