Leif & Thorn

The construction is finished, deliveries have resumed, and the boxes of Leif & Thorn Volume 6 have arrived!

I know you can't tell at this resolution, but the edits I made to the cover art look much better, and I'm really glad I put in the effort.

What happens next? I'm trying something a little different this year...



Backers have been split into two groups: my fellow USians, and everyone else.

Backers from the US: you just got a "time to finalize your shipping address" email! If your location has changed since filling out the survey, you have 48 hours to update it. Once addresses are locked, I'll start packing and shipping.

International backers: you have not gotten the email yet. In practice, I always get to you folks later, so locking your addresses right now would be jumping the gun, you know? Hang in there while I get most of the cheap-and-easy packages out of the house, then I'll circle back to you.

It's been a weird one this year, but we're getting there!

- Erin Ptah

A few days after I made that last "almost ready to order the books" post...a construction project started on the front of my building.

The reason this is relevant to you folks is, they're blocking the mail! Obviously I'm not going to have several thousand dollars' worth of Leif & Thorn books shipped to a building that isn't getting most deliveries.

At first I figured this would only hold us up by a few days. Now we're a week and a half later, and the construction crew is still working, and I figured y'all deserved a status report about that.

Leif & Thorn Volume 6 will be ordered once I'm getting mail again. Hopefully the next post you see will be the "books are here!" update.

In the meantime, enjoy this photo of my Executive Assistant hard at work:

The promised update about the real-world proof copy of Leif & Thorn Volume 6!

As usual, the printer doesn't do all the extra setup to bind these. They just send me a big sheaf of paper, mostly so I can make sure the colors look right:



Which they do!

I'm planning to tweak the cover art, just a little, and send the printer an updated file for that. No need to change the interior, it all looks great.



In particular, a certain print-specific effect came out really well. Noticeable, but soft and subtle:



If all goes well, the next update will be to show you the stack of Volume 6 boxes in my living room. Stick around.

- Erin Ptah

Short updates:

1) Thanks and kudos to Hela for catching an error in the ebook file -- Final Rest 2/20 was missing! Not only that, it's a full-page comic, which means I had to cut a whole page somewhere else.

Good news, there are lots of Sunday one-shots that are easy to move around. So I dropped one of the standalone bonuses about the Neineikuras, and you'll see that reappear in a later volume.

After I get the paperback proof, I'll see if I need to make any more edits based on that, then make the new ebook PDF and re-upload it for you.



2) The mini-prints have arrived! Still wrapped in plastic, to protect them from dangers like "the cat sneezing on them" before it's time to start shipping. (Pictured: the prints + the sneezer.)

3) The paperback files are ready for the printer. Next update will probably be the "here's the proof copy, check it out" post.

In the meantime, I jumped ahead to make the fresh new InDesign document for Volume 7, and to start adding high-res strips.

...and it's basically full? Including a buffer for some planned-but-not-finished comic images, it's currently 184 pages. A couple weeks from now, what I post will have to become the first strips of Volume 8.

We might eventually get a Leif & Thorn book where I don't have all the strips finished months before I start the crowdfunding campaign! But it's definitely not a risk with Volume 7.

- Erin

The Volume 6: Forget Me Not ebook has hit the digital shelves!

Backers who got the ebook, look out for an email from BackerKit with your discount coupon for 100% off.

If you spot any typos, duplicate strips, or other issues in Volume 6, please let me know! The high-resolution files have not been sent to the printer yet -- there's still time to fix any issues before the paperbacks happen.

If you got multiple ebooks, all your coupons will be bundled together in the same email. Any issues with those, just let me know.

You might notice that I uploaded new versions of the ebooks for Leif & Thorn 1-5. The latest files have some typos fixed, and include the remastered "Magical Thorn" strips. The original ebook files are still there, in case you're a completist -- but it's not like I deleted anything inside them, so you can just download the most recent version, you won't be missing out.

Bonus tip: If you've been following Leif & Thorn since the beginning, you might not bother reading the "Previously On..." recap pages at the start of every book. This time? Don't skip the Previously On.

- Erin