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Cassandra Clare Announces Adult High Fantasy Series SWORD CATCHER In The Works

Shadowhunters author plans move to a new universe, audience with SWORD CATCHER.

Cassandra Clare has been entertaining readers with her Shadowhunters universe for a decade, alongside the middle grade Magisterium series that she co-wrote with Holly Black. Now, Clare is turning her attention to a new universe and an older audience!

TMI Source shared statements from the author that give fans all the details on Sword Catcher, an adult high fantasy duology due out in 2021.

Here’s a description of the series straight from the author:

Sword Catcher will be the first book in my new series written for adults, my first ever high fantasy project. Many of my readers have been with me for years, and have grown along with my characters. And over those years, readers of all ages have come to me both to say that they would like to read books about older characters, and also to say that they’d love to see me build my own new world from the ground up.

So I’m happy to say these books are coming from Del Rey books! I am very excited to be working with Anne Groell, who has edited Naomi Novik and George R. R. Martin among others, and has a sure hand with fantasy worlds. I’m thrilled to be published by Random House, who are excited as I am to bring you the tale of a young man raised to be the body double for an unworthy prince, a young woman destined to change the world, and a host of other characters I cannot wait for you to meet.

In an interview with TMI Source, she gave even more details:

It basically centers on a boy named Kellian, who is kidnapped from his family when he is about five years old. He’s brought to the castle in his city, where the king and queen of his country live. And they have a son and Kel looks a lot like him. They are like, ‘You are going to be the Sword Catcher’, which is a traditional thing, meaning you stand in for the prince at public events so if someone tries to kill him, the prince is safe and the Sword Catcher dies instead … So that’s the beginning of the story and it becomes a larger story, but the initial part is a story about identity and who are you if you really are just standing in for someone else and you’re supposed to take the slings and arrows that come for him. And it doesn’t help at all that as he [Kellian] grows up with the Crown Prince, he discovers that the prince is a terrible person. He has to deal with being in this terrible position—‘My job is to sacrifice my life for this person I don’t like or respect.’ So that’s the beginning of the story.

Cassandra Clare also said that Sword Catcher will not interfere with The Last Hours or her Magnus/Alec series, the latter of which will technically be her first adult series. Sword Catcher will hit sometime in 2021, in the midst of The Wicked Powers series. But the author almost always has at least two series happening at once, so we’re not surprised!

By Kait

Kait is a New Englander, a YA book and adaptation lover, and a Slythindor, as well as a red velvet and red wine enthusiast. She likes to like things. Catch her on Twitter: @kaitmary

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