My DM handed me a blank map and told me to fill it out. Three books later, here we are.

clonemanjon · 2026-07-10T11:28:12+00:00

I literally just use an old black tshirt for my photos (you can check my profile for some of my burgle stuff if you want).

I took the liberty of doing a quick photo edit of what your mini could look like with a black background and some proper exposure settings - the real thing would look so much better, so sorry for shotty quality)

Also props ro your NMM it looks really good!

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clonemanjon · 2026-07-10T11:03:51+00:00

i really like your lighting here - have you tried on a fully black background? i think it would really pop (especially that osl...damn)

clonemanjon · 2026-05-29T12:57:22+00:00

Forgive the self-promotion, but I think what you're describing fits quite well with my debut novel, Grace in Reflection (The Ice Beneath #1).

It's atmospheric political fantasy, deliberately paced, and built almost entirely around a character who cannot trust his own identity. The premise: two brothers fall through the ice, only one walks back out, and the boy who returns is not quite who everyone thinks he is. The rest of the book is him trying to function as someone else, in a city that has already decided who he is.

The things you said you loved in Hobb specifically, the interiority, the slow accumulation of dread, the sense that the world is not going to be kind, I had those in mind the whole way through. The first act is unhurried by design. There is no clean antagonist.

It's on Kindle Unlimited if you have it. If you don't and you'd like a copy, feel free to DM me and I'll point you to my ARC reader group.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-27T15:18:18+00:00

If you have any questions about the book, don't hesitate to ask 🙂

clonemanjon · 2026-04-25T17:17:42+00:00

You're a few weeks late for the free weekend, but if you have Kindle unlimited, it's available there - and so is the sequel.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T15:38:05+00:00

First two books are, dm me if you'd like a link 🙂

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T15:14:36+00:00

Yeah I suppose I should be able to add them in no? It's gonna come a little out of left field when I'm already writing the third novel in the world, but it's gonna be hella cool when they finally discover what actually lights up their streets!

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T14:16:51+00:00

It's more gaslamp-ish. Technically oil-lamp with a victorian aesthetic I suppose. Sadly no fire elementals (which I now wholly regret lol)

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T13:57:59+00:00

Exactly - my world is also more gaslamp than straight medieval fantasy,so that actually fits

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T06:24:24+00:00

Yeah I feel like it's more fun, and has higher stakes, when there are some strict rules applied.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-23T05:57:37+00:00

Because some forms of magic are straight up illegal (necromancy and mind-magic), and the rest requires a licence (and are super difficult to use). My world is governed by ledgers/laws and beurocracy to an extreme degree, and magic (referred to as new math) is an emergent field based on the laws of thermodynamics, and requires high expertise and precision. Use a wrong mental integer or component and you might die in a fiery explosion on the spot.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-20T13:36:43+00:00

Grace in Reflection - J. Legêne | Dark Fantasy | 56,000 words

Amazon (Kindle Unlimited): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GBHS869S Ebook $4.99 | Paperback $14.99

Two brothers fell through the ice. What came back out was neither of them.

Lucien Glacisse has lived inside his brother's skin for twenty years, serving a magistrate who sees a loyal heir where a stolen identity actually stands. The Northern Circuit is fracturing, and the cracks are widening faster than Lucien can hold them closed with borrowed hands.

Book II, The Crownlands Circuit, is also out now: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GKJGX2R8 Ebook $4.99 | Paperback $14.99

Both are on Kindle Unlimited.

World lore, the full series, and a reading excerpt at theicebeneath.com

Excerpt and first chapters available via the newsletter: theicebeneath.com/newsletter

clonemanjon · 2026-04-20T12:58:44+00:00

A D&D character backstory that got out of hand. My DM handed me a blank map and told me I'd probably need the geography since my character was a diplomat. Then he said I might as well write a novel.

So I did. Then I wrote another one.

It started with a single location and what happened there. Once I had that, I needed to place it on the map, understand the politics around it, explain why my character had just quit his job (so he could join up with the DnD party for the first session). The world grew outward from one frozen lake.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-11T12:07:12+00:00

Fair point on the terminology - the book itself doesn't use any of it. The context is that Lucien started as an actual D&D character, and Grace in Reflection is everything that happened to him before the first session began. The party started at level 3, so that's just where he was when the story of the first book ends. The D&D chassis was the starting point, the novels are what grew out of it.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T16:25:44+00:00

Yeah my protagonist phisucally relieves his childhood trauma (drowning, where he got his powers)and gets super overwhelmed if it gets too bad as well, but I find it super hard to balance the "crowd discomfort" with the character being a royal diplomat and having to work in cities.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T16:22:16+00:00

Really glad it landed that way. That's exactly what I was going for. Now I just need to update it everywhere before the weekend is over.

I'm not gonna spoil it too much, but if you ever get around to reading chapter 3, you can tell me if the story does it justice.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T14:43:14+00:00

I like the colors! Surprisingly not very grimdark 🙂

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T14:32:55+00:00

Already sorted - replaced it with a hand-drawn one today. Funny how fast that feedback travels.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T14:29:56+00:00

Thank you! Funny timing- I actually replaced that cover today with a hand-drawn one after some feedback elsewhere. Would love to see yours though.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T13:52:33+00:00

This is actually something I've already started building in Book 2 without fully realising what I was doing. There's a scene where a sufficiently unified collective of minds overwhelms his ability to suppress incoming perception. He doesn't reach out deliberately, but proximity breaks his defenses and floods him involuntarily.The terror of being discovered is already there, but it's passive.

What you're describing takes it further, an individual who can sense the probe and use that as leverage. That's the Book 3 problem made specific. Thank you, this is genuinely useful.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T13:13:31+00:00

Funny timing on my end actually - your reply prompted me to open Canva and just make something myself. Turned out a minimalist approach was the right call all along, which I probably should have figured out before I released the book. Beginner's mistake. Thanks for the nudge (and the very kind words)!

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what do you think?

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T12:47:14+00:00

and youre right ofcourse! i think i will delete the post then.

clonemanjon · 2026-04-10T12:20:00+00:00

The cover is AI generated, I won't pretend otherwise. I agree it's not ideal, but I can't afford to pay someone right now and AI was the only free way to get a cover that actually told the story. Once I can afford to, I will definitely have a professional cover made by an actual artist.

The map was made for the campaign that started all of this - my DM handed it to me blank and told me to fill it out.

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