cassandra clare tour 2023

Cassandra Clare

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• July 29, 2024 in Book News // Cassandra Clare shares new snippet and art from her Kickstarter project
• June 21, 2024 in Book News // Cover Reveal: ‘The Ragpicker King’ coming on March 4, 2025!
• April 10, 2024 in Book News // ‘The Last King of Faerie’ is coming in Spring 2026!
• December 6, 2023 in Book News // Cassandra Clare shares ‘The Wicked Powers’ book titles
• November 10, 2023 in Book News // Recap of Cassandra Clare’s London event

Recap of Cassandra Clare’s London event

Posted on November 10, 2023 by Cathrin in Book News , Cassandra Clare , Sword Catcher // 1 Comment

Happy Friday! While on her UK tour to promote Sword Catcher , Cassandra Clare naturally stopped in London for an event. On 25th October she was at St James’s Church once again and talked about Sword Catcher , her writing process, the Mortal Instruments character she feels particularly connected to, and much more. I of course had to travel to London to see Cassie and I have written another recap of this event (apologies for the lateness, life happened). Beware of mild spoilers.

• In about 2017 Cassie was travelling through southeast Asia, Turkey, and Europe with her husband and she was reading the book ‘The Silk Roads’ by Peter Frankopan. Cassie was fascinated by the cultural exchange because cultures do mix and it’s not actually a modern thing, but people have been travelling and exchanging ideas and thoughts for millennia. This gave her “the idea for a fantasy setting of a city where everybody comes.” Cassie was fascinated by big cities of the Silk Roads like Venice or Istanbul, which were centres of trade and culture and where everybody from all over the world came. Many cities in fantasy novels are monocultural, but Cassie wanted to mix cultures in one big city that also happened to have magic.
• Castellane was inspired by Venice and Castellane’s political system was based on Venice’s. She read a book called ‘City of Fortune’, about the history of the city, and “it was just so interesting to me”. A couple of things were taken from Venetian history. There were stone lions in Venice with open mouths and the Venetian people could report their neighbours doing something shady or committing a crime by putting a piece of paper into the mouths. The government would pick up the paper and the people would get investigated.
• We also found out that Cassie had a hamster called ‘Hamster’ as a child. 😀
• Cassie had the idea for the setting and the idea for a ‘Sword Catcher’ and she then realised that these two ideas belonged together. She watched a documentary about Saddam Hussein’s son’s body double: he was resembling Udai so his looks were surgically changed to make him look like Hussein. He was taught to walk and talk like Udai and he was doing public events where Udai might get assassinated because the latter wasn’t very popular in his country. The body double hated Udai, but he was pulled from poverty to live in this fancy situation. He had anything he wanted, except an identity. Cassie wondered what it would be like to be in that person’s head. Nobody ever uses Kel’s real name in the book, he’s either pretending to be Conor or Conor’s cousin. No one knows Kel’s real name, his history, he’s not allowed to want anything. Kel’s life is both privileged and limited. He doesn’t have an identity on his own and “he doesn’t even know who he is without Conor.” Then Kel meets the Ragpicker King who offers him a job (to spy on the palace) and the question of whether there could be more to Kel’s life arises.
• Cassie usually starts with characters when she is creating, and the story builds around them. It was more interesting to have Kel as the ‘Sword Catcher’ to somebody that he loved instead of somebody that he hated. The stories that Cassie read about body doubles were different, they were not fond of the person they were pretending to be. Kel was taken as a child, though, and he grew up with Conor, they slept in the same room, so he would love him and consider him more than family. The relationship between Kel and Conor became a big focus. Conor also has been brought up by terrible or neglectful people. There are things he cannot do, but he also hasn’t been given a lot of guidance about how to be a good person. The best thing about him is that he loves Kel. It has made him more human. “Lin’s goal in life is to be a doctor in a society that doesn’t believe women should be allowed to be doctors. So they are all tied in one way or another, but these are all very adult ways to be fettered. Conor is fettered in the manner that he is going to be forced to marry someone he doesn’t want to marry. Lin’s stuff is about her career and her job. There was no way that Lin has gone to six years of magical medical school, but she is only sixteen years old. She would have had to start when she was ten, so she’s clearly not a teenager.” As the characters evolved, Cassie realised that they are older. The things they are interested in are not the things Cassie’s teenage characters are interested in. “When you’re writing YA there’s often a lot of firsts. There’s first kiss, first love, first loss, first grief, first moral conundrum.” This was not the case for the Sword Catcher characters, they face more challenges, but they have lived more life.
• The Ashkar and their magic were always part of the world-building. They have this power, but they are not the most powerful people in this world, it’s actually the opposite. There are restrictions and the Ashkar are oppressed, because the majority culture fears them.
• Sword Catcher addresses lots of different concepts (prejudice, misogyny and more), but then there is also the modern concept of “love is love”. Conor can marry anyone he likes, a princess or a prince. He only rejects a prince because he is too tall, not because he is a guy. Sexuality is a non-issue in the book.
• Was plotting an adult book different? Cassie asked herself what everybody wanted more than anything else. The answer was power, which comes from trade. The city is run by twelve Charter families and each has a different charter that entitles them to the money that is made by trading (silk, spice, wine, etc.). Power is always moving, so the families can never feel completely secure.
• We’re quite far along into The Ragpicker King because the original version of Sword Catcher was actually 430,000 words long, so Cassie had to make a decision what’s in book one and what’s in the next book. The Ragpicker King is meant to be published “at the very beginning of 2025.”

Audience Q&A

• The different cultures in the book have different naming conventions. Castellan is based on Occitan, so it’s based on medieval French naming conventions. There are also analogues to Korea, China, ancient Persia and they all have their own specific naming conventions and honorifics. Cassie enjoys watching K-dramas and there are many different ways of addressing somebody. It tells you a lot about that culture.
• How did it happen that Cassie named a character after a Rick Riordan character? (Nico di Angelo & Filomena di Angelo) First it was Rick Riordan who asked Cassie to use Magnus’s name for his title character Magnus Chase and he actually dedicated the first book to Cassie. Later when Cassie was creating an Italian character [in The Last Hours ], she thought he’d enjoy it if Cassie used Nico’s last name. Before the book was published, she actually told Rick what was going to happen to this particular character and Rick laughed.
• Does Cassie approach characters or worldbuilding first? Cassie starts with a contrast in a character first. The character goes one way, but there is also another direction they are going to. There is Jem, he is a sweet and kind person, but he is also a drug addict. Julian loves his brothers and sisters, he is like their father, but he is also a pathological liar. Matthew is fun, he tells amazing stories, Matthew is an alcoholic. “There is always something that takes the character in this other contrasting direction.” Those are the things that interest Cassie and people.
• Sword Catcher cover by Jim Tierney: the top of the cover shows Marivent, the palace up on the Hill, over the rest of the city. The bottom is the Black Mansion, where the Ragpicker King lives, and it’s at the bottom of the city. The mansion is in the so-called Warren, a maze with lots of criminals. The people on the Hill look down upon the city. There is a saying in Sword Catcher : ‘There are two kings, the king on the hill and the king in the city.’ This refers to both the actual king and the Ragpicker King. The cover represents both kings.
• Which character has a really special place in Cassie’s heart? Simon, and not because they share the same last name; that actually came later. Cassie and Simon are both Jewish and she can relate to Simon’s reaction (and enthusiasm) to the Shadow World. She would actually react the same to such a revelation. Just like Simon, since he is a regular person, she would also be killed almost instantly.
• What made you change from YA to adult fantasy? According to Cassie, many people think it was the sexy business, but then they ended up being disappointed because there is not a lot of sexy business in Sword Catcher . So it was not that. “There is lots of sexy business in book two, so something to look forward to.” When Cassie first wrote City of Bones , she did not think of it as YA. At a meeting with a publisher, they told her that young adult fantasy would not sell and to age up the characters. Cassie thought about it, but it seemed “so wrong.” Obviously, she did not listen to them in the end. She enjoys writing about that age group; people figuring out who they are always appealed to Cassie. Sword Catcher was also supposed to be YA, but when Cassie showed Holly [Black] the outline, Holly told her that the characters were adults: “All of their problems are grownup problems.” “You have to go where the story takes you. You never want to change your story based on marketing.”
• A place Cassie would like to visit in Castellane and why? [Question by yours truly] In the harbour of Castellane is an island called Drowned Tyndaris, a city that was once part of Castellane and then a tidal wave wiped out the city. When the tide is low, you can see it and its remains. At high tide, the city disappears. Cassie would like to go there, because she likes the idea that a city appears only sometimes. We do visit Tyndaris in the second book and the things on Tyndaris are really interesting.
• From first to last draft: what was the biggest cut/change Cassie had to make? At the beginning Cassie wrote 100k words, but then realised they were all wrong, so she had to throw them all out. “It was one of the worst things I ever had to do. That’s a whole book, that’s City of Bones .” She still feels sad, but “sometimes you have to murder your story to make it work.” The story ends on a cliffhanger, although Cassie initially wrote more, but her editor told her to make a cut. That last chapter, in which there was a meeting of different characters, is now gone.
• There are so many Jewish ‘easter eggs’/hints/references in Sword Catcher – what did Cassie want to tell with the Ashkar’s story? Jewish history and mythology were handed down to Cassie through her grandparents and her great-grandparents. When writing about the Ashkar, Cassie wanted to convey that “this is a people who are in a place, but they are not of that place. They are in Castellane, but they are not wholly Castellani. They have a different set of rules, a different set of laws that apply to them. They are very aware all of the time that they are a people who live in a precarious situation. This is very much based on my own family’s history as Eastern European Jews, which is that where they go and find a place that is welcoming, and they might wake up the next day and that place might not be welcoming anymore. I think you see that very much with Mariam who comes from Malgasi where it was a place it was fine to be Ashkar until one day she woke up and it wasn’t. She carries that with her into Castellane. One of the most significant relationships for me in the book is the relationship between Lin and her grandfather Mayesh. Mayesh is the counsellor to the king and Lin is angry at him a lot of the time because Mayesh is almost never with the rest of his community. […] He advises the king, and this comes from Andalusian, Spain where they used to have a Jewish advisor to the ruler, because Jews were considered to have a certain kind of wisdom that was valuable. In that context in Castellane there is always an Ashkar advisor to the King and that is Mayesh and he has a kind of freedom that no one else in the walled city has, but he also has this extreme responsibility he is always aware of. So she shouts at him, she is angry with him, “Why are you not here with your people, why are you always with there with the people that are not us?” And he says, “I am not just a counsellor, I am a mirror. I reflect our humanity to the king that he always must remember that we are people.” The Ashkar are not Jews, they are Ashkar, but what I wanted was to create a people that – in the same way that when I was growing up and I read fantasy, I could tell that a lot of it was very ecumenical, but some of it was very based in sort of a kind of Christianity that I didn’t feel that I had access to or was welcome in and I wanted to create a society that would feel welcoming and resonant to people who were Jewish. […] I think the idea of being an oppressed people or the idea being an immigrant is relatable to so many people. I’ve definitely had, mostly Jewish readers come up to me say, “Oh, I recognise this or I recognise that.””
• Who from The Shadowhunter Chronicles would be best friends with the characters from Sword Catcher ? “Jace would do very well in Castellane because he is fairly unflappable. The strange debauched partying wouldn’t really bother him and also he’s good with weapons and that’s very useful in Castellane. […] Conor and Matthew would get along really well. Although Conor kind of has an ongoing drinking problem and Matthew has solved his, so maybe they shouldn’t hang out. But first two books of Last Hours Matthew would have a good time with Conor. […] Lin would get along with Emma or Cordelia. They share the same kind of stubbornness […] Cordelia has this real desire to be a hero and she really sees herself as shouldering this responsibility and this burden to save people and we see that with Lin that expresses herself first in her being a doctor and being like “I will save people, I will save people with medicine” and then by the end of the book, she makes this really big decision that is going to have a lot of ramifications in the second book in which she makes a very conscious choice to do something really big in order to save somebody.”
• Difficult to change from Shadowhunter universe to the Sword Catcher universe? “It is always difficult to start a new world, it’s always for me a challenge to start a new trilogy in Shadowhunters and get used to a whole new group of people and their new relationships with each other and their new story. So this was an even bigger step and I think that part of that that’s probably why I wrote the 100,000 words and threw them out. I also realised that this was a very different kind of book. It has so much political intrigue, it’s so structurally complex that in order to write it, I had to find a new way to write that wasn’t the way I wrote the Shadowhunter books, so I wound up doing a lot of sort of visual stuff. I did cards that I wrote all the different scenes onto and then I would mark the cards with different colours depending on the characters that were in them and sort of where in the narrative the scene was and how it moved the narrative along. Then I imported that into Google slides and then I would keep modularly moving the scenes here and there and trying to figure out like this exact sort of almost mathematical structure and the Shadowhunter books are more sort of free form than that. So yes, it was complicated and I had to kind of teach myself how to write a different kind of book.”
• When Tessa and Jem die, are they going to be reunited with Will in the afterlife? The question is, “Are they ever even going to die?” We don’t know the answer to that, “but I will say that in The Wicked Powers Tessa and Jem have an encounter with Will . (!!!) I’m not going to tell you how or how this is even possible, just know that it is.”
• One particular death that stayed with Cassie? “The only thing that ever made me cry was the end of Clockwork Princess and I cried when I was writing that. And I think it was the part where Tessa realises she can’t remember the colour of Will’s eyes anymore. […] The one [death] that for me was the most visceral is the death in Lord of Shadows . I knew it was going to happen, but I had to write the book as if wasn’t going to happen because it has to be such a shock to the characters. […] The death in Lord of Shadows is someone who’s barely had a chance to live at all and dies in the arms of the person who loves them the most. So that one was pretty bad. That was hard.”

Although the event ended on a somewhat sad note, there was much excitement, especially after the unexpected The Wicked Powers reveal, and I had a fantastic evening! Thank you to Chaya for moderating and thank you to Waterstones. It is always a pleasure to come to St James’s Church for a Cassandra Clare event!

Sword Catcher is now available wherever books are sold. Grab a copy if you haven’t already and happy reading!

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• Wed. Sep 18th, 2024

REGRET NOTHING

Cassandra Clare Announces CHAIN OF GOLD US Tour Dates

Cassandra Clare will soon released the first book in a new Shadowhunters trilogy called The Last Hours and readers are giddily anxious to get their hands on the Edwardian era story of the Carstairs, Herondales, Blackthorns, and more!

The author is also giving fans in the northeast and midwest the chance to interact with her personally on a short tour for the series!

Here’s the full synopsis for Chain of Gold per EW , who released the tour news:

Cordelia Carstairs is a Shadowhunter, a warrior trained since childhood to battle demons. When her father is accused of a terrible crime, she and her brother travel to London in hopes of preventing the family’s ruin. Cordelia’s mother wants to marry her off, but Cordelia is determined to be a hero rather than a bride. Soon Cordelia encounters childhood friends James and Lucie Herondale and is drawn into their world of glittering ballrooms, secret assignations, and supernatural salons, where vampires and warlocks mingle with mermaids and magicians. All the while, she must hide her secret love for James, who is sworn to marry someone else. But Cordelia’s new life is blown apart when a shocking series of demon attacks devastate London. These monsters are nothing like those Shadowhunters have fought before — these demons walk in daylight, strike down the unwary with incurable poison, and seem impossible to kill. London is immediately quarantined. Trapped in the city, Cordelia and her friends discover that their own connection to a dark legacy has gifted them with incredible powers — and forced a brutal choice that will reveal the true cruel price of being a hero.

Check to see if Cassandra Clare will be in your neighborhood!

As noted at the bottom of the graphic, all events are ticketed . Head to the official tour page to find out how to get your tickets!

Chain of Gold hits shelves on March 3, 2020. You can preorder your copy via Amazon , B&N , or Indiebound now!

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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An Evening with Cassandra Clare

Join one of the world’s most successful fantasy fiction authors, Cassandra Clare , for this exclusive live event to celebrate the highly anticipated third and final book of The Last Hours trilogy: Chain of Thorns . 

In conversation with Ciannon Smart , with exclusive Fane editions of Chain of Thorns to purchase with your ticket, Cassandra will look back on the success of her #1 New York Times bestselling trilogy, recounting the inspiration behind Chain of Gold and Chain of Iron , as well as her latest publication. She’ll delve into an in-depth analysis of your favourite characters and plotlines, considering how it feels to end the chapter of her best-loved series, and sharing what’s yet to come from the world of Cassandra Clare. 

Cordelia Carstairs has lost everything that matters to her. In only a few short weeks, she has seen her father murdered, her plans to become parabatai with her best friend, Lucie, destroyed, and her marriage to James Herondale crumble before her eyes. Even worse, she is now bound to an ancient demon, Lilith, stripping her of her power as a Shadowhunter. James and Cordelia must save London — and their marriage — in this thrilling and highly anticipated conclusion to the beloved series.

With the chance to ask the author your own burning questions, this promises to be the perfect evening for super-fans of Cassandra’s magical books.

This event is now available to stream until 7 March 2023.. 

All 'book and ticket' packages for the stream will include an exclusive edition of Chain of Thorns only available to purchase for this Fane event. The first 1000 customers will receive a signed copy. For all customers who purchase tickets to the stream, their exclusive copy of  Chain of Thorns will be dispatched  in publication week. Those who purchase their ticket to the live show will collect their book at the venue on the night of the show.

All customers who purchase a ticket to the live show will have a chance of winning one of the 100 spots available to meet Cassandra after the show. This will be done as a lottery and the names of the list will be announced in the week before the event.

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Breaking news, emma corrin’s deadliest looks from the ‘deadpool & wolverine’ press tour.

Just in time for Emma Corrin’s villainous role in summer blockbuster “Deadpool & Wolverine,” the 28-year-old actor — who uses they/them pronouns — turned out some wicked and wonderful looks.

After a Golden Globe-winning portrayal of the young Princess Diana in Season Four of Netflix’s “The Crown,” Corrin has gotten comfortable at the top of the call sheet: starring in a Netflix adaptation of “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” FX’s limited series “A Murder at the End of the World” and director Robert Eggers’ upcoming “Nosferatu.”

They’ve also scored big on the fashion front. Since 2020, the actor has held the coveted role of brand ambassador for Miu Miu , whose creations they wear consistently across carpets.

Promoting their latest role as telepathic Marvel supervillain Cassandra Nova — who antagonizes Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool and Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine in their dual venture — Corrin and stylist Harry Lambert put together a score of looks so good, they’re downright diabolical.

Kicking off the press tour with a fan event in Berlin, Corrin gave us a preview of the fabulous fashion to follow in a slinky Saint Laurent look from Anthony Vaccarello’s fall 2024 collection, featuring silk, shoulder pads and garters.

A few days later, the star attended a UK “Sneak Peek” for the blockbuster in an oversized, buckle-laden Schiaparelli haute couture look, and seemingly borrowed a belt from their the look to attend a London photo call in full Miu Miu the next day.

The jet-setter’s next stop was Brazil, where a Rio de Janeiro fan event called for nothing short of a fallen-angel feathered dress from Turkish-English designer Dilara Findikoglu’s fall 2024 collection.

Heading to New York for the Big Apple premiere of “Deadpool & Wolverine,” Corrin stepped out in a high-cut bodysuit from Nina Ricci by Harris Reed, with their nails sharpened into talons to highlight their villainous glamor.

The star took a “bow” appearing on “Good Morning America” in a look by up-and-comers Freddy Coomes and Matt Empringham and styled their fall 2024 Joshua Ewusie dress for “Jimmy Kimmel Live” with red tights and heels to chat with co-stars Reynolds and Jackman — who had hijacked the hosting gig — about their talent for catching Skittles in their mouth.

The newly-minted Marvel star capped off a world-class, globe-spanning press tour with a look from Swedish brand Hodakova’s fall 2024 collection, attending a San Diego Comic-Con screening of the blockbuster.

And since we can’t resist Corrin’s collabs with their favorite label, we may as well mention that the star was spotted with boyfriend Rami Malek at the 81st Venice International Film Festival, rocking a shockingly green skirt suit reminiscent of ’60s styles.

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Cassandra Clare

New York Times Bestselling Author of The Mortal Instruments

This page contains the schedule of my upcoming signings and bookstore appearances. Please click on a link (for instance “In conversation with George RR Martin) to be taken to the page where you will find all the information about tickets and timing. I’ll be touring the US and UK for Sword Catcher; can’t wait to see you at an event!

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