Gothic Fantasy - Tumblr Posts
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Yule Goat by IrenHorrors
Sketchavember - Day 29
Sammy lent me some Bat For Lashed CDs and I found them very inspiring. Also I drew this in London because I've been visiting my sister for the last couple of days.
Lottie is playing 'funeral'.
Inktober 2017 : Day 25 - cartridge pen
Lottie is fairly sure she shouldn’t be talking to the Crow Boy, but she doesn’t really want him to leave either.
Map illustration for ‘The Foxglove King’ by Hannah Whitten, Orbit Digital, two-page spread 12 x 9.25" (2022) Described as a lush gothic fantasy, this series called for a map that would reflect the opulence of the world that the protagonist, Lore, finds herself in. I knew right away that I wanted to explore stained glass as a style here—more specifically, taking inspiration from the work that illustrator and stained glass master Harry Clarke was doing in Ireland in the early 1900s. I’ve been obsessed with his work ever since I got to see some pieces in person!
The map is framed by the Bleeding God and the Buried Goddess, the two deities whose story sets up the current stakes in the novel. Imagining that this is an actual stained glass window somewhere in the citadel, I also incorporated various symbols mentioned in the book: the candle, roses, sun and crescent moon, golden and silver threads for spiritum and mortem respectively.
Here’s the sketch I sent in for approval, with annotations explaining the visual choices:
Thanks to AD Lauren Panepinto for the creative freedom and also the help with the typefaces!
The book comes out March 7 in the USA. You'll enjoy it if you're a fan of palace intrigue mixed with dark magic and religious institutions. The regular Orbit hardback has the map in black and white while the special Barnes & Noble edition has it in colour on the endpapers. Prints available in my INPRNT store with white and dark backgrounds!
Excerpt from Enchanted Illusions:
@lassiesandiego @rickie-the-storyteller @writernopal @lyutenw
A little excerpt from my other WIP Enchanted Illusions, a Gothic Victorian Fantasy that follows the misterious lives of a few supernaturally unusual characters. This snippet happens soon in the story, as a young vampire named Clarence Van Sterlling races through the city to escape being caught by a mob of Vampire Hunters.
“[...] The young vampire raced through the cobblestone streets, dimly lit by the flickering amber glow of the street lamps mercilessly hammered by the falling rain. Thankfully, night had already fallen, because he had worse problems than the sun to worry about - like the fact that those Hunters would not stop until they put a stake through his heart, and how he managed to upset the most powerful Vampire Lord in the city. Whatever the hunters had in store for him would be child’s play compared to that man’s wrath. He had no choice but to run away. Though he had no idea what he was doing or what he would find the human world, he preferred it to the other options.
His speed had lost the hunters behind him, but not quite as quickly as he would have liked, a slash in his arm still bled from the attack with a silver knife. Clarence was soaking wet, bleeding, and in a part of town he could not be more clueless as to where he was going. Everything was strange here, it was nothing like Father’s mansion or the vampire neighbourhoods. A gunshot rang in the dark of night, sizzling past his face and hitting a wall in front of him. He startled backwards, his boots skidding to a shaking halt in the wet stone, red eyes scanning for the source of the sound. Far of in the distance, he barely noticed a metallic glint flashing through the night, but that was enough for him to dash on the opposite direction, just as a silver bullet flew right past where he’d just been standing.
Almost tripping on his own legs as he made a sharp turn, shakily searching for somewhere to hide - if he kept running, those guys would catch him eventually, he thought, racing through the night with the last of his inhuman speed. All of the buildings around him where locked, he noted as he sped through the street, nearly toppling quite a few unlucky passerbies, leaving them a polite string of “excuse me” and “i’m so sorry”, as he looked over his shoulder to see the hunters gaining on him.
Thankfully, he was reaching a more populated area, as the streets grew more crowded and the buildings became almost all lit - in another occasion, he might have find it beautiful, now, he was just thankful for the obstacles on the way of his pursuers. He almost smiled as he saw the Hunters struggling to push through the crowd, cursing him with their every breath. Everything was too loud, and bright, too strange and full of human people, and dear lords he was scared, but he had to keep running. Scrambling past a passing carriage, he took the chance to use it as the distraction he needed slide into an alleyway, dodging into the side and hiding by a pile of boxes as he watched the Hunters race past him. This wouldn’t last long.
In an act of desperation, he looked to the alley behind him. It was dirty, and full of buildings squeezed precariously on top of each other. Almost all of it was pitch black, except for one. There were people gathered there, and there were sounds he could only describe as a mix of laughter and a strange song. He supposed it was some kind of inn, he’d read about those in Father’s library.
It looked unassuming enough, he figured, but still, he hesitated for a moment, stuck in place at the thought of entering a place filled to the brim with unknown humans, and looked around as if trying to find another option. That is, until a hauntingly close shout by one of the Hunters echoed in the street behind him, the silver cut on his arm flaring up almost as a warning. His blood ran cold. Clarence didn’t even think as he raced towards the strange building and all but threw open the door. Almost immediately, conversations ceased and the song came to a halt. All eyes were on him. He wanted to shrivel up and die as he closed the door behind him. He must make for quite a sight, he mused - his thoroughly rain soaked clothes already making a pool beneath his boots where he was standing, eyes frazzled like a deer in the lions den, long black hair clinging to his face awkwardly.
Whispers slowly replaced the former conversations, and he stood by the wall peeking out of the window beside the door, as if waiting for the Hunters to barge in, but eventually, they never did. Pointedly, he avoided any eye contact with the humans surrounding him as he walked further in, bombarded by strange sights, sounds and smells, and settled in the furthest corner of the inn like a little ghost. At this point, he just prayed to whomever was up there, if there was anyone up there in the sky like the humans used to think, that the people here hadn’t stared at him because they knew he was a vampire. He needed a plan, one that didn’t involve running around on a wild goose chase, because he didn’t want to die just yet.
On the other side of the inn, the strange, blond haired young girl disguised as a boy would soon become his only hope and he her only clue on her strange mystery, but first, they’d have to meet. [...]”
Last Line Tag Game:
Tagged by @writernopal for this one, (go check out her blog!)
Tagging: @lassiesandiego , @rickie-the-storyteller , @lyutenw
Rules: Post the Last Line you wrote.
(For my Gothic Victorian Fantasy WIP, Enchanted Illusions)
“[...] On the other side of the inn, the strange, blond haired young girl disguised as a boy would soon become his only hope and he her only clue on her strange mystery, but first, they’d have to meet [...]”
(For my Medieval Dark Fantasy WIP, The Last Wrath)
[...] “The most deadly piece in the chessboard is the one your opponent never saw coming,” Her adoptive father gazed steadily ahead, speaking calmly as they walked side by side through the old palace’s moonlit gardens, “Never forget that, child.” Ellinor nodded. [...]
(I am well aware that the second last line bit is more of a “last paragraph”, but the actual last line, “Ellinor nodded”, would be completely out of context without it, lol)