I like to call these types of work a labor of love, because it takes so much work to do them, but I only make ones for books and stories that won't leave me. Leigh Bardugo's Six of Crows definitely fit the bill, and with the upcoming release of the conclusion, Crooked Kingdoms, it felt like the right time to make it.
I rarely ever plan ahead or go back to change the style I initially used, so making one of these is always an exercise in phrase selection and making the most out of the space. Knowing the amount of detail in the book, I stuck with smaller sizes, and it paid off.
favorite details
“Greed is your god, Kaz."
He almost laughed at that. "No, Inej. Greed bows to me. It is my servant and my lever.”
He almost laughed at that. "No, Inej. Greed bows to me. It is my servant and my lever.”
The quote was one of my favorites from the book, and when I found it as I making my way though the book, I noticed the similar structure of the two statements and had the idea of striking out the latter portion of the first statement.
I really liked how the serifs for "escape" turned out, and the drop line on "Wylan" represents so many things. He's a character who comes from an influential family, but Wylan himself doesn't have such a strong foundation. He can't stand alone, and I always picture Wylan as a little thin in my mind, and the thinness of the lines keep reminding me of his physique (as I remember it).
As for the "Day of Listening," I knew I wanted it to be curved, as a small nod to the way the sun looks on the horizon as its rising and setting.
The way "tips" is colored was my interpretation of "black tips."
The druskelle is a certain group of people in the book whose culture heavily respects and worships nature, so I wanted to write the word with some edged curves, because their religion is so strict about how they perceive the world. At the same time, I kept the curves because religion isn't one standard for everybody. People can believe in one thing in the moment and then stop believing in it in the next.
Another detail I really liked was the "f" for Jesper Fahey, who's a sharpshooter. The elongated "f" looks like the bare structure of a gun to me, which was perfect for the character's name.
"The ice does not forgive."
I mostly used Microns for the piece, but for that quote, I used a different pen that didn't have a uniform size for the downstrokes and upstrokes. But I liked the irregularity it gave for the phrase, especially with the thinner letters and the slant. It's an old saying within the world of the book, and I didn't have a proper rationale for writing it the way I did, but it feels right and it's one of my favorite styles throughout the whole thing.
And this is the final inked piece! I'd love to hear what else are your favorite details.
And this is the digitized version. Six of Crows is a dark story, and I knew from the beginning that I wanted it to be white on black.
if you liked it, i would love to hear what you think!
