The World of WarCraft: The Shattering novel is a Cataclysm-expansion tie-in expected on October 19, 2010. While the front cover is not a final artwork, it does impact you to know that Thrall is involved in this novel.

The front cover shows the Doomhammer, Thrall’s weapon. Knowing the track record of New York Times Best Selling author Christie Golden, it’s a sure bet she will highlight all the prowess of Thrall. She was the first to write a novel based on Thrall with WarCraft: Lord of the Clans.

Hardcover: $26.00.
Mass Market Paperbound: $7.99.

World of Warcraft has become a huge part of the pop culture landscape, with a celebrity-driven advertising campaign, a front-page article in The New York Times, and an upcoming live-action feature film directed by Sam Raimi. The previous game expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, shattered records, selling 2.8 million units in the first day alone. Now, New York Times bestselling author Christie Golden does for The Shattering what she did for Arthas in another epic exploration of the key characters from the eleven-million subscriber, massively multiplayer online game.

New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Christie Golden has written over thirty novels and several short stories in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Golden launched the TSR Ravenloft line in 1991 with her first novel, the highly successful Vampire of the Mists, which introduced elven vampire Jander Sunstar. To the best of her knowledge, she is the creator of the elven vampire archetype in fantasy fiction.

She is the author of several original fantasy novels, including On Fire’s Wings, In Stone’s Clasp, and Under Sea’s Shadow (currently available only as an e-book) the first three in her multi-book fantasy series “The Final Dance” from LUNA Books. In Stone’s Clasp won the Colorado Author’s League Award for Best Genre Novel of 2005, the second of Golden’s novels to win the award.

Among Golden’s other projects are over a dozen Star Trek novels and the well-received StarCraft Dark Templar trilogy, Firstborn, Shadow Hunters, and Twilight. An avid player of Blizzard’s MMORPG World of Warcraft, Golden has written several novels in that world (Arthas, Lord of the Clans, Rise of the Horde) with more in the works, including The Shattering: Prelude to Cataclysm, due out in August 2010. She has also written two Warcraft manga stories for Tokyopop, “I Got What Yule Need” and “A Warrior Made.”

Golden is currently hard at work on three books in the major nine-book Star Wars series “Fate of the Jedi,” in collaboration with Aaron Allston and Troy Denning. Her first book in the series, Omen, hit shelves in June of 2009, and her second, Allies, is slated for publication in early summer of 2010.

Golden welcomes visitors to her website, www.christiegolden.com.

Thanks, Lon-Ami