A Return to the World of Bartimaeus!

"Here’s some news. I’m working on a new Bartimaeus project. Actually, I’ve been working on it, off and on, for about a year now, with a big break in the middle to do the Heroes tours. I’ve kept pretty quiet about it up until now for a variety of reasons, partly because I wanted to be sure it was going to work, and partly because I wanted to get the contractual side of things sorted. But (at long last) I think the time’s right to go on the record about it here. The current plan is to aim for an autumn 2010 publication, both in the US and UK, which would be fantastic, and also match up nicely with the proposed publication of the Amulet graphic novel, about the same time. If this is going to work out, though, I’m going to have to write my socks off for the next six months or so, because there’s still a LOT of work to do. Currently Bart resides in two slightly garish pink ring- binders, one comprising text and the other notes. The aim is to turn all this into a nice, neatly stacked pile of manuscript by the spring.

As for the details of the book… small things like plot and structure are still proving slightly fluid, so I won’t make any public predictions just yet. But I’ll let you know more right here, just as soon as I can. In the meantime, I suppose I’d better get back to work. I’ve got a djinni waiting."

Found here, dated September 4. Excellent news for any fan of the Bartimaeus Trilogy! I for one am extremely excited, though I wonder what exactly it will be about. The trilogy itself was rather perfect--Indeed, I often describe it as the only perfect trilogy I have ever read apart from "The Lord of the Rings" (which isn't even really a trilogy at all, but I'll pass that issue over for now), although the "Space Trilogy" is also very good (hush, Linden!). So I don't see how Stroud would continue the story. I can only assume that he would write an entirely different story, and merely set it in the same world. Presumably Bartimaeus will again be a main character. Without Nat and Kitty, however, will he still have the appeal as he did in the trilogy? Only time--and Stroud himself, of course--will tell, but as of this moment I am both apprehensive and delighted ^_^

(Oh, and for the record: Nathaniel is miles awesomer and better than Harry. I just found the depiction in the above pic (source here) too funny and well-done to resist.)