Tad Williams (and Frankie Beale-Williams).

On Facebook this weekend, Tad Williams, bestselling author of more than a dozen speculative fiction novels, including the classic “Memory, Sorrow and Thorn” series, announced the completion of the first draft of The Witchwood Crown, the first novel in the upcoming sequel series, “The Last King of Osten Ard”.

On the social media platform, Williams wrote:

I’ve finished the (tidied and revised) version of the first draft of The Witchwood Crown. Currently it’s 1071 pages, about 311K words. Yes, I’ve written another not-small book. Surprise!

The writing process has been very fast, with the announcement of the highly-anticipated new series only being made in April of last year. The Witchwood Crown is expected to be published in Spring 2016, with subsequent volumes, tentatively titled Empire of Grass and The Navigator’s Children, published sometime thereafter. Negotiations for foreign-language translations have already been inked.

News of Williams’ return to Osten Ard has readers and critics alike excited, with Daniel Kaszor of The National Post writing that “Memory, Sorrow and Thorn” “redefined what traditional fantasy could be”, while Google calls the series “the trilogy that launched one of the most important fantasy writers of our time.”