Co-written with Nik Vincent for Abaddon Books Fiefdom is set 100 years after the events in Kingdom, Dan Abnett’s story of the battle between Gene The Hackman, a genetically modified Dog-Soldier and the insect-like creatures that destroyed the word of men.
This is one of my favourite ‘new’ 2000AD series. Kingdom premiered in Prog 2007 in December 2006; which to me still counts as new as I’ve been reading 2000AD since Prog 1 in February 1977.
Kingdom has been collected in two trade paperbacks, Promised Land, which collects the first two story arcs, and Call of The Wild. I’ll be doing a more detailed review of Kingdom: Promised Land this weekend.
A novel set in this world co-written by the creator of the comic strip and his wife sounds rather good to me. It is already a well fleshed out setting and given that the two collected editions are already out it is easy to get a feel for it even if you missed it in 2000AD. Though I’m assuming the story will work alone.
I’ve not been an avid reader of 2000AD spin off novels in the past, I’ve been a bit wary of licensed versions… But these days this is all ‘in house’ as it were, Abaddon Books is part of Rebellion Publishing the parent publisher of 2000AD, everything is so much safer. I’ve recently reviewed the two Judge Dredd Year One e-books City Fathers and Cold Light of Day. Both of those books were excellent.
In this case the book will be paper, I prefer paper… I wouldn’t be surprised if there is an e-book version too.
In the words of Abaddon’s PR Michael Molcher:
“In the isolated wastelands of the southern hemisphere, Gene the Hackman and his fellow Aux listen to the voices of The Masters as humanity hibernates, awaiting the destruction of the indescribably alien Them. In Fiefdom, the action moves into the future and into the northern hemisphere, where Them are a folk memory and the Aux have interbred, creating clans and families that war with one another in the ruins of what was once Berlin. Inspired by the legendary tales of Gene, young Evelyn War begins to question the Aux’s situation as she hears the first rumours about the return of Them.”
Abaddon commissioning editor David Moore said:
“I can’t stress enough how exciting this is! Abaddon’s new forays into the many worlds of 2000 AD have done brilliantly, both in terms of the stories we’ve produced and the readers’ responses to them, and Dan Abnett’s something of a legend, and Nik and Dan are extraordinarily talented storytellers to boot. If you’re not as thrilled as I am right now, you should probably be a little tiny bit ashamed.”
About the authors
“Dan Abnett is an NYT best-selling novelist and award-winning comic book writer. He has written dozens of novels for the Black Library, including the acclaimed Gaunt’s Ghosts series. His novel Horus Rising and his Doctor Who and Torchwood books were all bestsellers. He has written Judge Dredd comics for 2000 AD and also created many long-running characters for that anthology, including Gene the Hackman, as well as writing Guardians of the Galaxy and many other series for Marvel and DC. He lives and works in Maidstone, Kent, England.
Nik Vincent has written Black Libary books with Abnett, including the celebrated Gilead’s Blood and Gilead’s Curse, as well as her own novels, one of which was runner-up for the Mslexia prize 2012. She too lives in Maidstone, Kent, England, surprisingly close to Mr Abnett.”
Judge-Tutor Semple 