Original artist: Frenzied Chimera

This is an amazing first: Unsolicited fan art of The Afflicted/The Poison Skies! I've had pictures of my novel's characters here before, but they were all either commissions or gifts from friends/family/loved ones who knew me well. This is the first time a complete stranger happened to find our work, decide she was now in the Afflicted fandom, and draw this lovely piece to celebrate it. I didn't even realize this had happened until DavidN stumbled across it on a random vanity search, and it took this long to post because we had to overcome a language barrier first; I didn't want to put it here without her permission, and I couldn't ask her for permission until I went through all my friends and had them go through all their friends until we finally found someone who spoke Russian.

I can't begin to tell you how delighted I am to share this with you now that that's resolved.

This is Frenzied Chimera's interpretation of the song "Rescue Me" off the Posion Skies album, which is the song for Celine Coral in the novel. (Listen here | Lyrics | Directors' commentary) I feel particularly honored that she chose this one as the one that resonated with her and the one she wanted to illustrate, because it's the only song on the album whose lyrics and original melody I composed (as opposed to helping out with David's compositions.) And it almost wasn't even on the album in this form! But here it is, and this interpretation of it is stunning. Everything I was trying to convey with this song, everything about Celine's hopes and desires and struggles, the artist captured and conveyed brilliantly. The piece is largely symbolic (she doesn't actually have a long flowing dress and a sword in the book, though there is a metaphorical sword in the song lyrics,) but the symbolism is perfect.