Mark Lawrence's IMPOSSIBLE TIMES trilogy optioned for television

Production companies Synchronicity Films and Wild Sheep have optioned Mark Lawrence's Impossible Times trilogy for television.

Writer-producer Holly Phillips is developing the project for the small screen. Phillips previously steered Get Even to television with the BBC and Netflix, and has previously worked on Millie Inbetween, Robin Hood, Nearly Famous and Sugar Rush. She was also the creator of The Athena.

Impossible Times consists of the novels One Word Kill, Limited Wish and Dispel Illusion (all published in 2019) and tells the story of a 15-year-old boy and his tabletop RPG-playing friends when a new girl joins the group and brings a whole heap of trouble with her.

The TV version is being developed under the name One Word Kill, which seems to have been decided on as a more striking and memorable title.

This is only an option at this stage, and no streamer or TV network is currently attached.

Mark Lawrence's BROKEN EMPIRE trilogy optioned for TV

Mark Lawrence's Broken Empire trilogy has been optioned for television.

Lawrence declined to name the production company involved, but notes at length on his blog that the optioning process is long and rarely results in a finished TV show hitting the air (especially if, as this sounds, this is a speculative option from a TV production company without a studio or streaming service already backing them). It is a more significant option, however, because money has exchanged hands, which was not the case for previous deals.

Lawrence's Broken Empire trilogy consists of Prince of Thorns (2011), King of Thorns (2012) and Emperor of Thorns (2013). It attracted critical acclaim and some strong sales on release.

Lawrence also confirmed that his unrelated fantasy trilogy, Book of the Ancestor, and his Impossible Times SF trilogy have also had some TV interest.

Emperor of Thorns by Mark Lawrence

Jorg of Ancrath now rules seven kingdoms and is one of the most powerful rulers on the continent. The time is coming when he will make his claim to the throne of the Broken Empire and try to unite the nations behind him. But there are forces gathering in the world which want to stop him. Powerful, ancient machines, like those that broke the world with their weapons of fire, are debating whether to scour the world of life and start again from scratch. The enigmatic Dead King has conquered the islands of Brettan and now marches on the mainland. This time, Jorg faces enemies that even he may struggle to master.

Emperor of Thorns concludes the Broken Empire series that started with Prince of Thorns and continued with King of Thorns. This trilogy tells the story of Jorg, a young man with the quick wits of Locke Lamora, the charm and resourcefulness of Kvothe but (to start with, anyway) the moral compass of Gregor Clegane. He has a rough loyalty to his men and those members of his family he doesn't want to actively murder, an unhealthy obsession with his young aunt and an inability to let any insult, challenge or threat pass unmolested.

Emperor of Thorns presents Jorg with his biggest challenge yet, although it's also one he's rather well-prepared to face. When Frodo Baggins reached Mount Doom, he didn't really have much more to hand than the clothes he left the Shire in, and had to face his destiny alone, apart from his plucky sidekick Sam. By contrast, Jorg of Ancrath reaches his fate in this book equipped with a neural link to a sophisticated AI and an orbiting array of satellites, in-depth knowledge of the world before the breaking and a magic sword. Although the odds are still against Jorg, I felt a surprising lack of tension in this novel, despite Lawrence's track record with both murdering major characters without much warning and throwing in interesting curveballs to the narrative. Some of these things happen here as well, but for the most part Jorg has a smooth ride across the continent to Vyene, and his ultimate destiny.

The novel alternates sections set in the present day, chronicling Jorg's ride across post-apocalyptic Europe, with sections set in the past, as Jorg has to travel deep into Africa to confront an old enemy and try to woo an ally. There's some interesting twists and turns here, but ultimately the flashbacks slow down the main narrative (this problem also afflicted King of Thorns). A "special edition Godfather" version of this trilogy which re-orders the flashbacks and present-day storyline into a linear sequence of events may be a worthwhile endeavour, and prevent the issue of Jorg apparently being out of his depth and incapable of handling the next challenge, but then a flashback reveals he picked up some awesome knowledge or ability four years earlier which means he can now deal with the problem.

At the same time, Lawrence remains one of epic fantasy's most interesting writers, of both prose and character, and Jorg develops in interesting ways in this book, leading to the conclusion being both logical and appropriate. A sequence set in a town that's been stripped of life is creepy and eerie and the concluding sequence in Vyene is appropriately blood-splattered, giving us back the uber-ruthless Jorg of the first novel. The first-person narrative means that some of the secondary characters are not as fleshed out as perhaps they could be (getting someone else's opinion of Jorg's activities from the outside would be interesting), but we do get to learn more about recurring semi-enemy Chella as we get chapters from her POV as well and discover more about the Dead King and his plans.

Emperor of Thorns (****) concludes one of the more narratively interesting epic fantasies of recent years with fire and wit, but it's grasp of structure and tension is not as effective as it could be. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Mark Lawrence sells his millionth novel

British fantasy author Mark Lawrence has confirmed that his book sales have now passed one million copies sold.

He also receives some interesting additional data, such as that his UK and US sales are almost directly comparable (despite the USA's larger population and readership size) and he has sold over 11,000 books in Hungary.

This is impressive going given that Lawrence's first novel, Prince of Thorns, was only published five years ago. Since then he has released two additional novels in The Broken Empire Trilogy (King of Thorns and Emperor of Thorns) and the first two books in The Red Queen's War (Prince of Fools and The Liar's Key). The concluding volume in that trilogy, The Wheel of Osheim, is due for release in June. He has already completed the the first two volumes of his next trilogy, The Red Sister, which will be set in a whole new world.

Congratulations to Mark. I guess this means I should finally get around to updating the SFF All-Time Sales List from last year.

A History of Epic Fantasy - Part 34

In 2015 epic fantasy is in the best health it's been for a long time. Game of Thrones is the most popular drama in the world, publishers are putting out more books and series than ever before and fantasy video games are shifting vast quantities. Even better, the genre is evolving and getting more original, casting aside the trappings of the past to explore ever more interesting ideas about people, magic and worlds.

God's War & The Mirror Empire

Few authors have arrived with such ferocity as Kameron Hurley. Her first novel, God's War (2010), is an SF-fantasy hybrid where technology is replaced by the use of magically-controlled, genetically-engineered bugs, who are manipulated and directed by wizards. Her world is gripped in a centuries-long war between two rival cultures both following radically different, differently-descended versions of Islam (one male-dominated, the other female). Cultural and gender issues are explored against the backdrop of an action-packed, well-realised story featuring Nyx, the most conflicted and amoral protagonist to be seen in many a year. Two sequels followed.

More traditional in its epic fantasy construction - if only nominally - is The Worldbreaker Saga, which commenced with The Mirror Empire (2014). This chronicles a fantasy world that is being invaded by forces from its own parallel universe, where invaders can only cross over if their counterpart in the other timeline is dead or never existed in the first place. Angry matriarchs do battle, armies clash and massive plant-monsters abound. It's a fantasy series that does things differently to the norm whilst also ensuring the more basic tropes of the genre are engaged with.

In between, Hurley has found time to write insightful and passionate essays on the nature of genre fiction. The most notable of these is the Hugh Award-winning "We Have Always Fought: Challenging the Women, Cattle and Slaves Narrative", which argues for a more nuanced and complex view of the role of women in history, and in genre fiction which apes it.

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms & The Killing Moon

Nora Jemisin exploded onto the scene in 2010 with The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, a mind-bending story of floating cities, gods imprisoned to be used as weapons, and a young woman searching for her destiny. Original and thought-provoking, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and its two sequels in The Inheritance Trilogy (2010-11) are representative of a new breed of epic fantasy which is more bizarre, strange and original whilst also delivering fascinating characters and a well-described secondary world.

Jemisin's second published work (although written earlier), The Dreamblood duology (2012), is set in a fantasy kingdom heavily inspired by Ancient Egypt but which also steers clear of cliche: no pyramids or mummies here. The duology revolves around a form of magic that is drawn from people when they sleep, but when a contagion is relased that kills people as they sleep the sect known as the Gatherers must investigate. The result is a more traditional epic fantasy (if only relatively) than The Inheritance Trilogy but one that still riffs of different cultures and fuses elements of religion and war to a murder mystery investigation.

Jemisin's latest work is The Broken Earth Trilogy.

Prince of Thorns

Released in 2011, Prince of Thorns achieved almost immediate success. The UK publishers packaged free copies of the book alongside George R.R. Martin's A Dance with Dragons and canny use of social media was made to promote the novel. The book gained an unfair degree of notoriety when on early review criticised it for graphic sexual violence which simply does not exist in the novel, but it went on to become hugely successful.

The novel is set in a post-apocalyptic future where Europe has been partially drowned by rising sea levels. Magic exists, but is apparently a form of highly advanced technology. Computer AIs play a key role in the story. At a key point, a horrific magical weapon turns out to be nuclear device. This is the traditional "rationalised fantasy" story, where the magic is actually explained by science. But the setting takes a back seat compared to the thorough exploration of the main character, Jorg Ancrath.

Jorg is an unapologetically amoral murdering prince who holds no qualms about killing those who stand between him and his goals. He has a rough loyalty to his men and a highly idealised obsession with the woman he loves. As the initial Broken Empire trilogy (2011-13) progresses, Jorg seems to learn and grow, but not necessarily in the healthiest or most positive of ways. His politicking, ruthlessness and military acumen leads to success, of sorts. He is an easy character to despise, even if you admire his ingenuity. It's a difficult balancing act with Mark Lawrence pulls off with huge success.

His subsequent series, The Red Queen's War (2014-16), follows a Flashman-esque coward and fop who is thrust into the middle of epic events (some of them crossing over with the Broken Empire series) against his will. His next series, The Red Sister, will be set in a new world with a female protagonist.

Range of Ghosts

Elizabeth Bear published her first SF novel, Hammerhead, in 2005, after several years of writing acclaimed short fiction. She won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 2005 and has gone to win many further awards, including three Hugos. She has written in multiple generes, including science fiction, cyberpunk and general fantasy, but her most notable work of epic fantasy is The Eternal Sky Trilogy (2012-14).

This trilogy is set in a world that echoes the Middle and Near East during the Middle Ages, revolving around the struggle for power and dominance in a Mongol-esque horde. At the same time, events are unfolding beyond the Khaganate's borders which gradually engulf multiple people from radically different cultures. As epic fantasy set-ups go, it's a fairly standard. However, the author uses excellent, original prose and vivid characters to create a story about different cultural groups learning to work together for a common goal. The setting, with a sky that shifts depending on the dominant socio-religious make-up of the land, is original and interesting despite its echoes from our own history.

Blood Song

One of the biggest shifts in writing in the 2010s has been the explosion of self-publishing. At the vanguard of this in genre fiction were SF author Hugh Howey (writer of the Silo series starting with Wool) and fantasy author Michael J. Sullivan, whose Ririya Revelations series, throwing back to an older, more traditional form of fantasy, was a major success.

The success of the Ririya series inspired the publishers, Orbit, to take another look at the self-publishing sphere. With collaborative websites where self-publishing writers could look for feedback and Amazon providing avenues for self-publishing to work, there was lots to choose from but one book stood out. Blood Song (2012) by Anthony Ryan is a fairly traditional epic fantasy, with a band of brother warriors, feuding empires, massive battles and so on, but it is notable for its above-average prose and rich characterisation. The perceived wisdom about self-publishing was that books that couldn't get a publishing deal were inevitably rubbish, badly-written or self-indulgent. Blood Song proved this was not the case, and along with its sequels in the Raven's Shadow series has been a huge success.


Other recent fantasy series of note include Helen Lowe's Wall of Night series, John Gwynne's Faithful and the Fallen quartet, Brian McCellan's Powder Mage series, Luke Scull's Grim Company, Sam Sykes's Aeon's Gate trilogy and Brian Staveley's Chronicles of the Unhewn Throne.

If the way epic fantasy writers release their series is changing, so is the way fantasy readers are consuming them. Forums and blogs drove a lot of readers to good new books in the 2000s, but this decade social media has come to the fore. Thriving communities on Facebook, Twitter and Reddit allow readers to find recommendations and pick up books, and the Goodreads site has been hugely successful in getting readers to compare their bookshelves and talk about their finds. Writers of all stripes need to engage with these resources to publicise their books and spread the word, and fantasy writers in particular seem to be very adept at this.

From the dawn of the modern genre of epic fantasy over a century ago to the current explosion of creativity, epic fantasy has always been a hugely popular but critically under-appreciated genre, despite the creativity and intelligence many writers have brought to it (others, who have just wanted to ape Tolkien or Martin, not so much). But today it feels like the genre has finally come of age, no longer shackled to just retelling the same story of farmboys and kings and wizards in a vaguely medieval world again and again. In print, in the cinema, on TV screens and in video games, the genre is being used to tell increasingly interesting and challenging stories. Long may this continue.

King of Thorns by Mark Lawrence

Jorg of Ancrath has seized the throne of Renar and now rules the Highlands as a king and a sworn enemy to his father. When one of his companions is consumed by fire magic, Jorg resolves to take him across the Broken Empire to a distant volcano where he might find help. But this is the beginning of a longer journey across the continent as Jorg seeks new allies to stand against another king who may be able to unite the Empire...a king more noble and honourable than Jorg.

King of Thorns is the middle volume of The Broken Empire trilogy and the sequel to 2011's Prince of Thorns. Like its predecessor, it is an at-times uneasy and bleak read but also one that is interesting, broodingly atmospheric and fairly well-written.

As with before, the focus is on Jorg and his band of not-so-merry cutthroats and pillagers. The events of Prince of Thorns have, if not mellowed Jorg, than certainly caused him to re-appraise his life. The result is a less amoral and ruthless Jorg than before and one who is more introspective. Whilst there's still plenty of mayhem in the book, Jorg is less likely to cause it (at least not without more convincing need than before).

The book is structured as two narratives unfolding simultaneously: a flashback set four years in the past (picking up just after the end of Prince of Thorns) and a present-day storyline focused on a massive battle as Jorg's kingdom comes under attack. This structure is the book's biggest weakness: the battle takes place over a short period of time but the flashbacks are much longer and dozens of pages pass between each present-day interlude. Each interlude also relies on events from the flashback to make sense, meaning that we are in the dark about Jorg's plans until he reveals a new weapon, tactic or group of allies that was explored in the preceding flashback sequence. The structure means that the battle feels like a sequence of amazing coincidences and turns of fate which have only just been set up a few pages earlier (so whilst not technically a series of deus ex machina, they do feel a bit like them). What would have worked better (and fortunately the book can be read this way) is if the flashbacks had been one continuous narrative, followed by the present-day storyline taking all of the revelations from the flashbacks and letting them unfold in one go.

Moving beyond that issue, King of Thorns is mostly a success: the characterisation is stronger, the prose is better and the book is more nuanced than its predecessor in terms of morality and consequences. There are also some outstanding sequences, such as a creepy encounter with the undead in a swamp and what appears to be a typical heroic quest which goes rather badly wrong at the end. The book asks some hard questions about rulership and ambition, but on occasion the novel feels like a retreat from Prince of Thorns's hard-edged ruthlessness. A key conflict in the novel is that Jorg's enemy is, in many ways (well, almost all ways), a better man than Jorg and Jorg himself wonders if he should be opposing him or become allied to him. This conflict is all-too-neatly undone by a plot twist revealed quite late in the novel that confirms if this other force wins, the consequences will be horrendous. This feels like the author giving his character too easy of an 'out' of his moral dilemma. The novel also handles its main female character, Katherine, rather oddly. After giving her quite a lot of development through the book (her letters are the only part of the novel not from Jorg's POV, giving her an interesting perspective on events) she vanishes in a rather confused and muddled way in the finale. Hopefully this will be clarified in the final novel in the series.

King of Thorns (****) is a highly intriguing novel, though it can be bleak and hard-going. The structure is problematic and some character arcs are better-handled than others. Those who had a hard time time believing that a 14-year-old could do all the things he did in Prince of Thorns won't find much more plausibility here (though Lawrence amusingly subverts Jorg's occasionally-threatened Gary Stuness several times). However, the novel is also well-written with some excellent turns of phrase and features some memorable setpiece moments. The overall direction of the series remains compelling, even if this is a slight step back from Prince of Thorns in quality. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence

A hundred petty warlords are struggling to carve their own pieces out of the Broken Empire, the divided remnants of a glorious, high-technology society obliterated in a monstrous war. Little has survived from before that time aside from a few books of philosophy and war, and religion.


Prince Jorg, the son of King Olidan of Ancrath, is a boy of nine when he sees his mother and brother brutally murdered by agents of Count Renar. When Olidan makes peace with Renar in return for a few paltry treaties and goods, Jorg runs away from home in the company of a band of mercenaries. As the years pass, Jorg becomes cruel, merciless and ruthless. He sees his destiny is to reunite the Broken Empire and rule as the first Emperor in a thousand years, and nothing and no-one will deny him this destiny.

Prince of Thorns is the first novel in The Broken Empire, a trilogy which was fiercely bidded over by several publishers before HarperCollins Voyager won the publishing rights in the UK. It's being touted by Voyager as 'the big new thing' for 2011, to the extent where they are even giving away copies to people who have pre-ordered A Dance with Dragons from certain UK bookstores.

This faith is mostly justified. Prince of Thorns is a remarkable read. Well-written and compelling, it is also disturbing. Anyone who's ever bailed on reading Donaldson's Thomas Covenant books because of a horrific thing the main character does a couple of chapters in will probably not enjoy this book either. Jorg is a protagonist with the quick wits of Locke Lamora, the charm and resourcefulness of Kvothe but the moral compass of Gregor Clegane. The book has the protagonists (the word 'hero' is completely incompatible with Jorg or his merry band of psychopaths and lunatics) doing things that even the bad guys in most fantasy novels would balk at, and for this reason it is going to be a challenging sell to some readers.

Lawrence writes vividly and well. The dark and horrible things that Jorg and his crew get up to are mostly inferred rather than outright-described, which is just as well. Lawrence also avoids dwelling on Jorg's physical actions too much in favour of delving into his psyche, working out what makes him tick, presenting these ideas to the reader, and then subverting them. As the book unfolds and we learn more about Jorg's hideous experiences, we realise why he is the way he is, though at almost every turn Jorg also chides the reader for thinking he is trying to excuse himself or beg for forgiveness. He is simply presenting the facts and the context and leaves them to decide whether he is the logical result of circumstance or someone who could have saved himself from this dark path if he had chosen to do so. Lawrence's aptitude with the other characters is no less accomplished, with deft strokes used to create vivid secondary roles concisely and with skill.

Outside of the excellent characterisation, Lawrence paints a vivid picture of a post-apocalyptic world. The ruins of an earlier, technological age (probably our one, though the map suggests that if it is, the geography of the world has been radically transformed, at least in the area the story takes place) paint the landscape, and it's interesting to see references to familiar names and places. The works of Plutarch, Socrates and Sun Tzu have survived, as has the Christian faith, and in the distant east place-names sound more familiar (Indus, Persia). This evokes the feeling of a world broken and twisted, the new rammed in with the old, the effect of which is unsettling (I think it might be what Paul Hoffman was going for in The Left Hand of God, but Prince of Thorns does it much better). I assume more about the world and the history will be revealed in the inevitable sequels. Whilst Prince of Thorns is the opening volume in a trilogy, but also works well as a stand-alone work. Whilst there is clearly more to come, it ends on a natural pause, not a cliffhanger, which is welcome.

This is a blood-soaked, cynical and unrelentingly bleak novel, but it also has a rich vein of humour, and there are a few 'good' (well, relatively) characters to show that there is still hope in the world. There are some minor downsides: a few times Jorg seems to 'win' due his bloody-minded attitude overcoming situations where he is phyiscally or magically outclassed, and there's a few too many happy coincidences which allow Jorg and his men to beat the odds, especially right at the end. There's also an event about three-quarters of the way through the novel which is highly impressive, but may be a bit hard for some fantasy fans to swallow.

Prince of Thorns (****½) is a page-turning, compelling and well-written novel, but some may be put off by its harsher, colder aspects. Those can overcome this issue will find the most impressively ruthless and hard-edged fantasy debut since Bakker's Darkness That Came Before. The novel will be published on 2 August in the USA and two days later in the UK.

EDIT: Interesting. Updating labels seems to have caused the whole post to be republished. Odd.

Mark Lawrence interviews me

Mark Lawrence, the author of Prince of Thorns and its forthcoming sequel, King of Thorns, has published an interview with me on his blog which may be of interest.

Pre-order DANCE WITH DRAGONS and get PRINCE OF THORNS for free

In the UK, Waterstones are offering a cool deal. Pre-order A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin and get Mark Lawrence's well-received debut novel, Prince of Thorns, for free. The deal is running from now to presumably when ADWD hits the shelves (on July 12th).


An interesting promotion. Prince of Thorns is next up on the review pile after the second Hunger Games novel, so I'll let you all know what I make of it.