It feels like this month was about a year long.

We've had some other great Kickstarters in the past, but they didn't involve me that much. Except for signing pages, which definitely involved me quite a lot.

This time, we were getting reports back from the animation, talking to Lex+Otis, developing new pledges, scheming, strategizing, and sacrificing flamingoes for The Ritual. Busy campaign!

Busy and very cool! One of the things that it's hard to communicate is how much growth and development has happened over here at Hidden Gnome during this Kickstarter campaign. We've learned a lot and developed assets and relationships that will help us in the future, and if we hadn't run a Kickstarter, we wouldn't have done those things.

We'd be lost and alone, weeping in the dark like usual.

And now, as this Kickstarter campaign comes to a close at 5 PM Eastern tonight, it's time for THE FINAL LINKS!

First, the Kickstarter is still up! Check it out here!

Second, I'm streaming tonight at about 4:30 so we can watch the Kickstarter close together! That will be here.

And finally, the ebook collection of Cradle: Foundation (the first three Cradle books) is still free until midnight Pacific tonight! Pick that up right here. 

Once again, thank you all for reading and thanks for sticking with me for so long!

​-Will

It’s nearly enough to bring a tear to my eye. Eventually, every baby lion gets pushed out of the nest and has to learn to fly on its own.

One of my best friends, Lorn Hillaker, has just released his first book on Amazon! It’s about pirates and dragons fighting over gold on a magical sea, because gold is what powers their magic. If that sounds cool to you, check it out!

I’ve made some references to this over the years, but I have a group of close friends that go way back, to when the planet was nothing more than a crust of molten rock. There are nine of us, each of whom secretly rules over 1/9th of the Earth.

We play games together pretty much all the time*, every year we all go on a trip, and every week we select one random stranger to cast through the infinite cosmos on a journey of self-discovery.

Lorn is one of those friends, and in middle school, we actually both tied for first in a writing contest. It was for a history essay, and he won because he knew the history. I won because I pretended to know the history.

He went on to get his PhD in History, and I went on to make up a bunch more stuff. Now he’s muscling in on my turf.

During the pandemic, while he was trapped indoors, he called me and asked for my advice in learning to write a book. I told him if he actually followed through with it, I’d shout him out.

Well, he did it! Way to go, Lorn! You made it!

And now your book has been thrown to the lions. The flying lions. Good luck.

-Will

*I tend to abandon them for months at a time while writing books. Sorry, guys. Blame Devin.