Here is the cover for The Annotated Sword of Shannara: 35th Anniversary Edition. This is the book that Terry and I have worked on the last two months. It will contain at least 200 annotations—commentary on scenes as well as never discussed history behind how Sword came to publication in 1977.
As you can tell, the style of the cover fits that with Wards of Faerie. It is much more iconic. I especially love the colors and the image’s vaulted aspect. I think it is a worthy cover for a great novel.
More information when we can share it!
37 responses to “Cover: The Annotated Sword of Shannara”
It looks great, can’t wait to read it again and see your annotations!
It will contain at least 200 annotations—commentary on scenes as well as never discussed history behind how Sword came to publication in 1977.
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and i care, why? just like those folks that have to show you behind the scenes of how the monster in the movie is made??? no thank you. please do not, repeat, not, ruin the magic for me. i don’t wanna know who did what or why. leave me to my fantasy.
i will NOT look at or buy this. this is the only thing the author has done to ruin my respect thereof.
one black mark on his name will not stop me from having him as my #1 author, but it sure ruins my fantasy if i have to know all the behind the scenes.
That’s fine, Gary, but you are in the vast minority. Most people love annotated books, getting inside the author’s head and learning how a book came to be.
If you don’t want to know how many times Lester del Rey had Terry rewrite the ending to Sword or where the inspiration for Panamon Creel came from, that’s fine. Don’t buy the book. 🙂 Cheers!
Super excited! I own a copy of Sword, but will want to own this as part of the collection. Very excited. Thanks for the multi-faceted work you’re doing, Shawn!
Welcome, Josh. Gotta admit, I’ve been spread thin recently but almost through the worst of it. 🙂
Looking forward to this. The first version I owned was paperback, but I wore that out. I bought another paperback copy and then discovered a hardback release. I love having hardback books more than paperback versions. Even though my hardback is still as good as new I will be buying this anniversary edition.
Do you know if the cover will be the same for the UK release, as sometimes our UK covers can be a real let down.
To be honest, I don’t know if the UK is getting this book. I’ll ask Terry the next time I talk to him.
Oh no, don’t say that. Oh well, I’ll have to place my order with Amazon.com, then. 😉
I’m very excited about this book I’m getting it for sure.
@ garylee
If you were a big fan of Terry Brooks, it would be VERY INTERESTING!
You can buy it on amazon.co.uk, I just pre-ordered it.:-)
Many thanks Simon. Off I go to pre-order. 🙂
Cannot wait for this to hit the shelves.
I for one am really looking foward to seeing the insight of Terry’s writing. Also how he came up with some of the characters.
Oh master web druid are you going to have signed copies available?
The Signed Page will have copies, yup.
Very cool. Now to make the decision of which to get……. oh heck maybe I will just get two.
Shawn, will you please post here (Terry’s home page) when it is available for ordering from The Signed Page. Thank you.
I will. The pre-order period should open up sometime around July 1st.
Can’t wait!!!
Wow,some people sure can be jackasses huh? Shawn, I commend you on your gracious and polite reply to Gary. Why do some people have to be a jerk just because they dont care for something? Simply keeping your mouth shut and not buying the book would suffice Gary.
Personally I dont care about annotations, and have never been interested in buying one purely for the sake of the annotations,and in this case I still dont. But a new hardcover Sword of Shannara that doesnt cost me $500? Yes please!! What are the odds we can get anniversary editions of Elfstones and Wishsongin the next few years?
I forgot to ask, will this volume include the Hildebrandt illustrations?
Gary is expressing his view and that’s perfectly fine. I wanted him to know he had been heard but that there is a reason why the annotated book is being done — because people want it.
And yes, if The Annotated Sword of Shannara does well, I have no doubt that Random House will hire Terry and me again to do Elfstones and Wishsong. Funny you bring up the $500 thing; I’ve been thinking about asking Terry if I can publish nice leatherbound editions of the the first three books. We’ll see about it.
Not sure if the book will include the Hildebrandt illustrations. Hell, I don’t even know if RH has them anymore. I know their e-files for them are not doing so hot… Hmm. I’ll know more in a week or two.
Excellent thought on leatherbound editions. Not sure of the price point you guys will need to make it worthwhile vis-a-vis volume, but I bet you there would be plenty of interest.
It likely would not be cheap but it wouldn’t be $500 either. haha
Just a little question, Sword of Shannara is over 700 pages but the listing for Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com show the Annotated edition being only 240 pages? Is this an error on Amazon’s part?
Has to be.
I cannot wait for this book to come out, Sword was the first “Big” book I read at the age of 11, and have not looked back since. I share my Birthday with Sword also, both of us being 35 this year. So happy Birthday and thankyou.
This one is awesome. I’m glad the torch is on there, because I don’t remember the torch being on the Sword on the cover of the omnibus edition. I can’t wait to get my hands on it.
Hmmm…. On of my favorite fantasy books, with “behind the scenes” thoughts by Terry Brooks? Sign me up! What a wonderful gift for the 35th anniversary! 😉
Lol, meant to say “one,” too excited to type correctly…
This looks awesome! Cannot wait! The cover is fantastic, the color scheme is perfect… The extra content with comments from Terry has me waiting in eager anticipation!!
I am one of those that only have the frist three books in softcover and look forward to having the hardcover edition on my bookshelf without spending the $500 Brad was talking about.
I think a leatherbound edition sounds great to me. It gives the fans a very nice edition to add to our collection without putting us in debt. I give a vote for the leatherbound copies as well as the annotated editions.
Shawn, what’s the word on your book? Still looking at an April release?
It’s getting too late into March for it to come out in April now. Still waiting on the map from Russ Charpentier. No biggy. He’s busy and I don’t want to add to it by pushing. It will be ready when it’s ready. 🙂
THIS IS SO AWESOME!!!! Another great work from the wonderful minds of Terry Brooks and Shawn Speakman. No wonder I enjoy coming to this site. So many wonderful surprises! Yay! WAY TO GO YOU GUYS!!!! I am so excited!
Great!!! I will have the “Little” big book put aside the “Big” trilogy one!!!!
Wow!!! 35 years… I am feeling like… old… NO!!! I am not old!!!! Despite my 4.1, I am still a juvenile geek fond of The Best of The Best Epic Fantasy Saga ever!!!!
My only wish: that The Void and The Word trilogy will be published in a hardcover edition with a very new cover, just to accompany the hardcover trilogy edition of Genesis!!! 🙂
You and me both, Fred!!
I will most definitely have to buy this book. I read this as a kid, and I would have to say I have read the entire series at least three times. OK, maybe not read, I have listened to the entire series audiobooks at least 3 times. I think I picked this book up for the first time when I was 13 or 14(I am 28 now, and as soon as my kids are old enough, I am sure they will love it too), and loved all of them ever since. I would love to see all of the annotations from Terry. I am very excited.
I will be buying this book asap. I have had at least 10 copies of the original book. Either I loan them out and never see them again, give them away to share the wealth, or in the current edition, it is a paperback that got soaked in transmission fluid in the back of my car. I first started reading my dad’s copy of The Sword in high school. But he was extremely picky about the way you held his books. And god forbid if a page got bent. (This was a paperback copy mind you). So I just gave up. I picked up my own copy years later and I believe I have read that entire original series at least a dozen times since then. As well as the Scions series.
Terry is a machine when it comes to coming out with new Shannara books. I was keeping up for a long time, but fell behind and still haven’t caught back up.
I would also like to see an annotated version of The Landover series of books.