Beowulf: An Illuminated Wonder Tale

Fulfillment Continues
2 days ago – Thu, Sep 05, 2024 at 04:58:41 PM

We're coming up on the halfway mark with the fulfillments:

We're packing up and mailing 20-25 a day, so we still have a few weeks to go before everyone gets their copies. Thanks everyone for your patience!
This last weekend we got to show the Beowulf project and some other work at the Appaloosa Music Festival in Front Royal. That was a lot of fun, and a lot of folks were amazed to see old illumination forms being used with modern books - a delightful anachronism! I really appreciate everyone who pitched in to make it happen.

In the meantime, it's onward to the final reward level work - handbinding the goatskin editions. I'm also partnering with Tamburn Woods LLC (the Forest School my wife started last year) helping them with a Kickstarter project starting in a week or so to publish a hand-lettered and illuminated children's book - The Book of Blessed Beasts! This came about after a 100 year flood came through two weeks ago and wiped out all the hand-built structures we had made for the Forest School last year - now we need to rebuild and restructure our ground plan so the kids have the covered work spaces they need this school year. Please check it out and give it a follow if you'd be interested in something like that!

Preview Link:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tamburnwoods/blessed-beasts-illuminated-wonder-tales

Final Stage Underway
18 days ago – Tue, Aug 20, 2024 at 08:51:58 AM

At long last, after one final delay from the freight company, we got all the Beowulf books in yesterday. Now we're rolling into the main fulfillment stage; the first batch of pledged books mailed out this morning. It will take us a few weeks to package and mail out the nearly 800 orders, but we worked out a pretty good system with our little rural post office for sending out large-ish daily batches, so most of y'all should be receiving your copies between now and the middle of September. I'll also be starting on the hand bound leather editions shortly, so those will be going out after the main bulk of the mailings are complete.

Thanks for going with us and supporting us on this journey and bringing a project that is very special to me to life!

Rolling On
about 1 month ago – Wed, Aug 07, 2024 at 07:24:05 PM

We got the update from the freight company handling delivery from the printers; the Beowulf books are scheduled to be delivered on the 12th! We got all the pledges up through the Huscarl level mailed out, so we'll be rolling on mailing those books out to everyone else starting next week. In the meantime, I'm finishing up the videos for the Beowulf course at the moment, and am hoping to send the course access link out to the Aetheling backers in the next 10 days. 

If you're in the Thane and above pledge brackets, please make sure you sent me any shipping address updates if you've moved since filling out the survey.

Onward!

First Look!
3 months ago – Thu, Jun 20, 2024 at 02:56:36 PM

I got the proof copies of the illuminated Beowulf this week. I'm very pleased; they are looking just how I hoped!
 

June Update
3 months ago – Sun, Jun 09, 2024 at 09:19:40 AM

May was very productive with getting this project along! The Saxon coin hoard has arrived, ready to go out with the books when they arrive.

Meanwhile, all the books are at the printers. I'm expecting to get the proof copy of the Marshall children's book in the next two or three days, then I'll be mailing those out to the Huscarl backers in the following 1-2 weeks. 

There was one delay with the leather-bound books; there is a five week printing, processing, and shipping period for those books, which I accounted for, but another five week printing, processing, and shipping period for the proof copies, which I did not account for, but which are in the works now. I should have those on hand in the next couple of weeks, but I won't be getting the main shipment of books for the Thane and above pledge levels until sometime in July, probably.

I don't know that the delay will push the fulfillment timeline for Thane and above back at all, but if it does it should be a fairly mild shift.

Thanks for your patience; I can't wait to share some pictures of the final products in the next few weeks!