Middle Kingdoms Map by Diane Duane

[DrWho42]

author diane duane recently tweeted her maps for the novels the door into fire (1979), the door into shadow (1984), and the door into sunset (1992).

 

Because some folks are interested in process, I may as well document this here.

I'm updating a map: this one, from the 1979 Dell SF paperback edition of the first #MiddleKingdoms novel, THE DOOR INTO FIRE.

It was done on illo board with Rapidograph pen and Letraset.

A version used in THE DOOR INTO SHADOW and THE DOOR INTO SUNSET was produced in a very early version of CorelDraw/Photopaint.

...I think it's fair to say that it's time for something a little less '80s/'90s and, well, more polished.

Probably I should make it plain that my preferences for fantasy maps do not run to pointy triangular mountains, calligraphic penwork and sea monsters sticking up out of the ocean in picturesque loops. I am a USGS-style mapmaker by preference: cf this from THE DOOR INTO SHADOW.

So with this in mind -- and the publication of the fourth book starting to loom over the near-ish horizon -- it's time to produce a version of the main map that gives a much cleaner and more modern view of the area in which the first three books take place.

The design of the new map is inevitably going to be affected by the realities (or meta-realities, from the creative end) of the world it's describing. One important factor mandating this is the course of events following the ones in the third book.

for more, check out @dduane on Twitter

[Tiana]

I don't like her attitude towards picturesque sea monsters (which I love), but it's cool that she's presumably making her own maps using her preferences. I haven't read these particular books of hers (I've read some of them), but the updated map is a definite improvement on the old one!

[Eilathen]

While one can't argue about taste, I think these kinds of maps just don't fit into a fantasy world novel. So yeah, hard disagreement with Ms. Duane. I like when a map conveys the matching feeling for the world it is set in. And height map mountains just don't say "medieval fantasy, yo" *shrugs*