Thieves' World


Thieves' World is a shared world fantasy series created by Robert Lynn Asprin in 1978. The original series comprised twelve anthologies, including stories by such science fiction authors as Poul Anderson, John Brunner, Andrew J. Offutt, C. J. Cherryh, Janet Morris, and Chris Morris.
Thieves' World is set in the city of Sanctuary, located at the edge of the Rankan Empire. The city is depicted as a place where many are downtrodden and where the invading Rankan gods and the Ilsigi gods they had ousted begin a struggle for primacy. As the series continues, additional invasions occur, and the city is taken over by the snake-worshipping Beysib as the Rankan empire collapses. Over time, a number of the characters in the series are revealed either to be the offspring of or otherwise blessed by various figures in the pantheons of the competing cultures, and they discover or develop various powers as the series progresses.
First published in 1979, the series went on hiatus in 1989 after the twelfth anthology. In addition to the official anthologies, several authors published novels set in the milieu of Thieves' World.
In 2002, Lynn Abbey, who co-edited several of the original anthologies, relaunched the series with the novel Sanctuary. It was followed by the anthologies Turning Points and Enemies of Fortune, which contain some returning authors and several new ones. Abbey also oversaw the republication of the original anthologies in omnibus editions.

Concept and origin

The Thieves' World anthologies were conceived by authors Robert Lynn Asprin, Lynn Abbey, and Gordon R. Dickson during a casual meeting at the Boston science-fiction convention Boskone in 1978. Asprin suggested that the task of world-building was a major hurdle for modern fantasy writers:
"Whenever one set out to write heroic fantasy, it was first necessary to reinvent the universe from scratch regardless of what had gone before. Despite the carefully crafted Hyborean world of Howard or even the delightfully complex town of Lankhmar which Leiber created, every author was expected to beat his head against the writing table and devise a world of his own. Imagine, I proposed, if our favorite sword-and-sorcery characters shared the same settings and time-frames. Imagine the story potentials.”
Abbey described the 1978 meeting as "a casual conversation changed the lives of a couple dozen people who had no idea what they had been missing or what they were getting into."

Geography

Abbey stated that the geography of Sanctuary and its surrounding regions shifted due to each writer's needs. "We had Crom-many drugs, magicians, vices, brothels, dives, haunts, curses, and feuds. Sanctuary wasn't a provincial backwater; it wasn't even the Imperial armpit; it was the Black Hole of not-Calcutta."
The city itself was envisioned as a late medieval town with similarities to the Shambles in York, England, and additional elements of Baghdad. The faraway capital city of Ranke is based on Rome. "Nobody knows how big Sanctuary really is. Anytime any one of us needs a secret meeting place we just create one – Sanctuary is either very large or very cramped."

Storylines and chronology

The dynamics of sharing characters led to occasional conflicts between authors, as referenced by C.J. Cherryh in her afterword to Blood Ties: "You write your first Thieves' World story for pay, you write your second for revenge."
In an interview for Green Ronin's Sanctuary-based roleplaying guides, Abbey explained the increase of interconnected storylines as the series progressed. "The stories of the first few volumes stood by themselves. But starting in about volume three the authors began collaborating… big time. Eventually just about every author worked with the same plot threads, some of which stretched over several volumes."
Asprin addressed the difficulty of the intersecting, overlapping, and diverging timelines in the preface to the fourth collection, Storm Season: "While in earlier volumes I have tried to keep the stories in the order in which they occur, this have proved to be impossible in Storm Season... I've left it to the reader to understand what is happening and construct his/her mental timeline as necessary."
Abbey noted that the interwoven plots eventually hurt the series' readership: "The very plot and character denseness of a Thieves' World volume, while it was eagerly anticipated by long-time readers, was a bit intimidating to anyone who hadn't been following the series from the beginning." Her observation led to a revised approach for the 2002 relaunch. "When we went to work on 'new Thieves' World', we tried to find a happy medium between stand-alone stories and densely interwoven plots. In Turning Points and Enemies of Fortune there are a few events and situations that serve as a backdrop for the stories."

Reception and awards

Industry Reactions

The Thieves' World anthologies are credited as "pioneering and setting the standard for the shared world format", and the Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts cites Thieves' World as the "first and protype of the form".
Science fiction author Cory Doctorow says the series "rocked my world when I was about 13", and author Robin Hobb called its concept of a collective setting and characters "a brilliant idea". Author and game designer Robert J. Schwalb said "Thieves' World is to authors what D&D is to gamers."
Greg Costikyan reviewed Thieves' World in Ares Magazine #1. Costikyan commented that "since fantasy role-playing involves the group production of a multi-hero fantasy story, role-playing fans especially will find Thieves' World enjoyable. The stories themselves range from mediocre to excellent, but all are worth reading."
The Encyclopedia of Fantasy describes the series: "It is in the creation and editorial supervision of the Thieves' World sequence of shared world anthologies... that Robert Lynn Asprin -- in collaboration with Abbey -- has done his most original work."
In the essay included in the second volume, Tales from the Vulgar Unicorn, Asprin noted that, though fan response was mostly positive and high sales had led to sequels and the development of the Chaosium board game, many readers had written to the publisher to comment on the series' overall lack of humor.

Awards

Thieves' World
Tales from the Vulgar Unicorn
Shadows of Sanctuary
Several Thieves' World standalone novels and short stories have been published in addition to the official anthologies.
The Morrises introduced The Sacred Band of Stepsons in Thieves' World and spun off a series of novels about them and their ancient cavalry commander, Tempus. The first three novels in The Sacred Band of Stepsons saga were authorized Thieves' World novels. Marion Zimmer Bradley was an early contributor but spun off her main character in the novel Lythande and did not return for later volumes.
The official novels are:
The first three novels by Janet Morris were published in hardcover by Baen Books and as Science Fiction Book Club Selections. The first six Morris novels were published in mass market paperback by Ace Books and subsequently expanded in Author's Cut trade paper editions by Perseid Press. The first novel, Janet Morris's Beyond Sanctuary combines two stories from the anthologies with additional stories, weaving the whole into novel form. The first part of the novel Dagger appeared in the anthology Aftermath.
Other novels/collections include:
1985. Illustrated by Tim Sale. The art of the original series was produced in black and white except for the covers.
Thieves' World Graphics collects volumes 1 to 3 above, colorized and with a new cover by David A. Cherry

Role playing games