Hi, my name is Fred Van Lente, writer of comics and prose (my latest novel, Never Sleep, debuted a few weeks ago: check it out if you like historical thrillers about America's first female private detectives). The fine folks at Paizo asked me to drop by to tell you a little bit about my new Pathfinder comics series, Wake the Dead, premiering from Dynamite in May. This is volume eight of the long-running Pathfinder series, and we're doing something a little different this time out.

Dynamite Entertainment is proud to debut the long-anticipated next Pathfinder comic book series! Tabletop RPG connoisseur and fan-favorite writer Fred Van Lente is revving up an all-new party and campaign for Wake the Dead, kicking off this May!

Today the skies are shining overhead in Redmond, where in the Paizo office we've been recovering from a busy and exciting convention season. But we all know and feel the loom of pumpkin spice, sweaters, and clouds that's ahead from our respective desks. And if your group is anything like mine, the end of September marks the start of regular game nights. And what better to kick off this glorious season by revisiting the Pathfinder related releases headed your way?

Of the many pleasant surprises we at Paizo have run into since Pathfinder's inception, one of the biggest remains the popularity of our iconic characters. Perhaps we shouldn't have been surprised—after all, when Wayne Reynolds is doing the art, it's hard to not fall in love with whoever's getting painted. But when you get right down to it, the iconics were created to be tools. (And one might argue that some of them still are—we're looking at you, Alain!) The whole reason for their existence was to keep us from having to explain to each new artist what made a ranger a ranger and a rogue a rogue—we could just hold up Merisiel and say “draw her.” But people started asking questions about the backstories, and before long we were writing Meet the Iconics blogs and seeding little bits of iconic fiction in the hardcover chapter introductions. Yet we held off on doing more, always feeling like the time wasn't yet right.