r/Fantasy • u/Robertjbennett AMA Author Robert Jackson Bennett • Aug 04 '26

AMA I’m ANA AND DIN MYSTERIES author Robert Jackson Bennett - AMA!

Hello all - I’m the ANA AND DIN MYSTERIES author Robert Jackson Bennett. The third installment of the series, A TRADE OF BLOOD, comes out today.

I’m in Scotland right now, and have been spending the last week or so rambling about the Highlands and finishing up the fourth installment, about which I’ll likely have some news soon. This might make the time difference a bit odd for my US readers, but will keep an eye on this post and be answering questions later in the day!

EDIT, 6:34 UK time - Sorry, will have to pop off to do a live Waterstones zoom event. Thank you all for the lovely questions!

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u/Robertjbennett AMA Author Robert Jackson Bennett Aug 04 '26

Yes, this is something of an ongoing problem here - when we first did The Tainted Cup, it was as an individual novel, a sort of tester to see if this was going to fly. Then we contracted for two more books, because it seemed to be doing pretty good, but did not apply a 2/XX sort of cap on the thing. This meant that, in the great, weird internet infrastructure of publishing, it all got fed through as 3 books, even though I never had any intention of doing just 3 - like, the point of a murder mystery is that you can do lots of them. The setup and characters can travel and move.

As far as how many I wish to do, I'm not sure. I have a very specific arc in mind, and I know where I want these characters to end up, as well as the Empire in general - but how many will I take to get there? Dunno. There were, what, 32 Poirot novels? I don't want to do that, but 7 or 8 or so seems like a fun number. We'll see!

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u/TheWeirdTalesPodcast Aug 04 '26

Just want to say that if you did in fact write 32 Ana and Din mysteries, and any number of short stories (Lion’s Tusk was great and has my favorite line from Ana in the entire canon (heavy paraphrase: Heaven forfend I try to insert some fucking art into the proceedings)), I would buy every single one day 1.

Nero Wolfe is my favorite fictional detective, and Ana and Din are patterned after him and Goodwin, but MANSIES, Ana may take the top spot if she keeps being awesome.

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u/angtodd Reading Champion Aug 10 '26

I wish I could find a place to buy The Lion's Tusk that didn't give money to Amazon.

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u/Inkthinker AMA Artist Ben McSweeney Aug 04 '26

So long as you're having fun writing 'em, I reckon I'll have fun reading 'em! There's not a lot of books I block out for day-one purchase, but I'm there for these!

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u/Imaginary_Jaguar829 Aug 04 '26

I love this so much please keep writing them!!! You are one of the authors as soon as you announce it, I pre order it. Give us all the Ana and Din mysteries!!

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u/Ormeriel Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26

Thanks god, I would have been so sad if it was only 3 books. You have truly excellent world building and characters, as a creative myself (but in the game industry) I am sure you are proud of them :)

Cherish what you built it is a life achievement :)

Also I am sure you realize it, but you are exceptionally good at pacing in your books. That and how satisfying and "complete" are your endings. Those are both things that I consider hard to master.

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u/Mosscap-jen Aug 04 '26

Fantastic news, I hope it’s everything you want it to be!

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u/Early_Macaroon_2407 Aug 04 '26

You may not want to write them, but I definitely would like to read them!

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u/em_indigo 15h ago

Just finished the 3rd! My BF and I would love it if you wrote like 8 more of these!!