Dear Advanced Readers, welcome to your very own page.
We wanted to thank every single advanced readers who has received The Dead Shadow in the post. So this is why we have created this little page to let you know everything we’ve prepared for you.
Thank you, you’re the best!
Who Wrote The Dead Shadow?
First of all, a quick introduction if you don’t know us. The Dead Shadow was written in tandem by a pair of neurodivergent writers: Celine Domenech & Paul Newman.
We are based in Worcestershire in the UK.
You can find us on social media.
Feel free to reach out. We are currently in a position where we can still reply to comments and DMs.
What’s in the ARCs Pack?
You will find a few goodies in your parcel.
Character Cards
There’s a pack of 4 character cards:
- Rhode
- The Shadow
- Pamphilos
- Helena
They are the key characters to the story, and quite honestly, we wanted to give you a high-level summary of their unique abilities, or lack thereof. The more you read, the more you’ll see what those means.
The cards are designed as collectibles. They also double as bookmarks. More importantly, just looking at them makes us smile so we wanted to share the fun with you.
The illustrations are from the very talented Ingloriouse. While you’re at it, we strongly invite you to check the character visions from other artists on the same page. The music from Tom is 100% spot on, for example. And if you prefer more traditional illustrations, Emory is your go-to artist.
An iron-on patch
This is a patch with an illustration of the Shadow. We love that despite his face being feature-less, there is no doubt that he is full of smugness.
If you are unsure how to use the patch, here are some instructions.
Helena’s journal
This one is pretty self-explanatory. This is a little journal that you can use alongside the book. It’s been prepared by Helena, so you can rest assured that it is most likely unpractical and a little over the place.
We hope you’ll have as much fun using it as we had designing it.
The Dead Shadow Crossword
We suggest filling it up as you read the book. There’s also a little nugget of info about Book 2 as part of the crossword.
We will share the answers at a future point, so everyone has a chance to solve it by themselves first.
If you wish to be informed about the answers, please sign up for the newsletter or follow us on social media; that way you’ll get to hear when we plan to reveal them.
Sticker sheet
Our stickers are safe to use on laptops, Kindles, and other devices. We’ve selected a quote from each of the key characters.
A Little About The World of Phaedrus
The Dead Shadow is the first book of a fantasy series, The Shadow of Phaedrus.
You can find out more about some of the important elements of the world on this website.
- The song of Phaedrus (this childish little song hides more truths than you think)
- The magical clans
- The characters
What’s with the star?
The eight-branched star with eight colours represents the different colours of magic in this world: Purple and Black (Dynamis and Nekros, as you will see in The Dead Shadow), but also Blue (Philos) and Red (Ares), Green (Kurios) and Orange (Phroneo), Yellow (Xenia) and Pink (Poeisis)
Old Symbol of Nekros
In the book, and the video below, we talk about the old symbol of Nekros. We thought it might be useful to show you it – so here it is!
Is the world of Phaedrus inclusive?
Yes, as much as we could possibly make it.
We didn’t write it with a list of minority demographics to include. But, once the story was written, we realised that we’ve touched on a lot of topics naturally:
- Is The Dead Shadow LGBTQA-friendly?
- Is The Dead Shadow neurodivergent-friendly?
- Is The Dead Shadow embracing representation diversity? Yes, at many levels and it happens without even trying.
Bonus points if you spot one of the LGBT characters who will become more present in Book 2. They have already been introduced, but there were not allusion made to their preferences, as none of it was relevant at this point.
The Board game To The World of Phaedrus
There’s more to The Dead Shadow than meets the eyes.
Of course, there’s going to be another book (and another one after that, and another one, and some more) but this isn’t what we mean. We’ve been working on creating a board game as a way to introduce the world of Phaedrus to a different demographic. We want to share our latest prototype with you.