Wrapping up 2014
The New Year is almost upon us! The past couple of weeks, I’ve been wrapping up the latest issue of Ancient Warfare, on the Roman Conquest of Greece, hence my lack of recent blog posts. I’m happy with how the latest issue has turned out and I’ll tell you more once the thing’s returned from the printer’s, probably early next month.
Looking back, a lot has happened last year, both at Karwansaray Publishers in general and for Ancient Warfare in particular. The first issue that appeared this year was VII.6, on Marcus Aurelius, back in January. As always, we published five more issues, from VIII.1, on betrayal in the ancient world, down to issue VIII.5, about the Roman-Jewish Wars, with issues in between dealing with the Ionian Greeks, the nomadic peoples of the steppes, and the Seleucid Empire.
We also published a new edition of Radu Oltean’s beautiful Dacia: The Roman Wars. And in between all these regular duties, we also moved to a new and more spacious office, located on the Marspoortstraat (‘Street of the Gate of Mars’) in Zutphen, a little further towards the train station when compared to our older office (and therefore just a tad quicker to reach!).
Furthermore, I also wrote about sixty blog post in the course of the past twelve months. Of particular interest are perhaps the posts about how Radu created the centrefold for issue VII.6, my blog posts on Homer and history, a lengthy, three-part review of the movie 300, and a series of posts on Ares, the god of war.
From the very end of July to late September I also wrote a series of posts reviewing movies, comic books, and a monograph about the great hero Heracles. This Summer of Hercules has turned out to be quite well received, so I may do something similar in the future.
Also, don’t forget that issue IX.4, to be published next year, will be the fiftieth issue to have appeared overall. To mark the occasion, we are organizing a historical fiction contest. If you’ve never had a short story of yours published before, now’s your chance. Check out the blog post to read more about the specific rules and get writing! Some of the finest writers of historical fiction today will be reading your work and if you are the winner, your story will get published in issue IX.4.
Looking back, I am happy with the work that I have done with Ancient Warfare, and am grateful to all the talented writers and illustrators that have helped make the magazine a success. Thanks also to you, our readers, for continuing to support us. We have some exciting things lined up for the coming year here at Karwansaray, which I hope to be able to reveal soon, including news about the long-awaited Ancient Warfare special for 2015.
So this is probably it for me until next year. I wish you all a very merry Christmas and an excellent New Year. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact me via email. I now also have an account at Ask.fm, where you can also pose your Ancient Warfare-related questions, anonymously if you so desire.
Best of wishes and see you in 2015!
