Lone Wolf is a series currently consisting of 32 gamebooks, created by Joe Dever and initially illustrated (books 1–8) by Gary Chalk. Dever wrote the first 29 books of the series before his son Ben, with help from French author Vincent Lazzari, took over writing duty upon his father's death. The first book was published in July 1984 and the series has sold more than 12 million copies worldwide. a fan-operated organisation called Project Aon was established in 1999 which has subsequently converted many of the books to HTML format. Joe Dever first gave his permission for Project Aon to distribute the Lone Wolf books (1 to 20) online via the internet before eventually also giving the rights for the New Order series (21 to 28).

Mantikore-Verlag (2013–2015)

In February 2013, after Mongoose had released 17 of the 28 original books, the publication of the rest of the series was transferred to a German publisher, Mantikore-Verlag. A prequel to this series, titled Shadows over Fire, is available to play for free online.

Megara Entertainment (2014)

In September 2014, the publisher Megara Entertainment announces the publication of a spinoff, Autumn Snow, approved by Joe Dever and written by Martin Charbonneau, and calls for a crowdfunding to finance original illustrations from Gary Chalk. On October 31, 2021, it was announced that the first three books of the Definitive Edition were to be launched together in January 2022, but delays pushed the release to March 2022. The first three paperbacks were published in the US in January 2023.

As of February 2026, the first twenty books have been released.

Reprint edition details

Extended version of Flight from the Dark and The Hunger of Sejanoz

When Flight from the Dark was released by Mongoose Publishing in the Collector's Edition format, it was partially rewritten and extended by Joe Dever to 550 sections instead of the original 350. It features a retcon of the opening of the book, where instead of Lone Wolf waking to find everyone at his monastery dead, he joins the fight.

Differences between the various editions

Holmgard Press makes a difference between the first republication of the series by various publishers, their own second republication and the first publication of gamebooks 29 to 32.

The first republication of the first 28 gamebooks (made by Mongoose, Mantikore-Verlag and Holmgard Press) are called Collector's Edition. They have a hardcover and contain a bonus mini-adventure added at the end of each book (except book 1) featuring a character that is encountered during the main adventure or that lives events linked to it, although some of them are not linked to the main story whatsoever (like the various instalments of the Dire series). These bonus adventures were written by various authors under the supervision of Dever or the staff of Holmgard Press after his death and don't have the same amount of sections than the main adventure.

Gamebooks 29 to 31 have been published for the very first time by Holmgard Press between 2016 and 2020 and are called First Edition by the publisher. The three books share common elements with the Collector's Edition of the other gamebooks, with a hardcover and a bonus adventure for books 29 and 30. However, they lack the Collector's Edition tag on the cover and book 31 doesn't have a bonus adventure like the other ones.

The second republication of the full series started in March 2022, which is also made by Holmgard Press, and is called the Definitive Edition. It doesn't have the bonus adventures like the Collector's Edition but features encyclopedic entries about different characters, places and artefacts that the player came across during the main adventure. Some adjustments have also been made to the main story of each book, with changes to some enemy stats, new powers granted by certain items and corrections to the text and some of the links of the previous editions. New sets of rules for advanced players are also offered. As of April 2023, the first seven books are available in hardcover and the first five in softcover, while ebook versions are due to be published at a later date. The chief differences between the hardbacks and the paperback books are the maps (in colours in the hardbacks, black and white in the paperback) and the 350 section 'classic' version of Flight from the Dark in the paperback versus its 550 section version in the hardbacks.

The Limited Edition is the signed and numbered to 350 version of the Definitive Edition. Only books 6 & 7 have been published so far in that edition.

Internal artwork

The Collector's Edition of the books feature new internal artwork by Richard Longmore (books 1 to 12, 17 and 20), Nathan Furman (books 13 and 18), Pascal Quidault (books 14 to 16), Hauke Kock (book 19 and 21) and Stephanie Böhm (book 21). However, the original illustrations by the late Brian Williams were reused for books 22 to 28.

For the First Edition of gamebooks 29 to 31, Giuseppe Camuncoli was hired to illustrate book 29, while Richard "Nerdgore" Sampson did the illustrations for books 30 and 31. Gary Chalk will return to the series by illustrating Light of the Kai. while its German version won the 2010 RPC Game Award in the "Gamebook" category.

Adaptations

Film

Three scripts were developed for a potential Lone Wolf film release but they did not proceed beyond the pre-production phase.

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  • Project Aon - Free downloadable Internet editions of the Lone Wolf gamebooks
  • Seventh Sense - computerized play aids for Lone Wolf gamebooks
  • Heros - online playable Lone Wolf gamebooks
  • Linked 'walk-throughs' of the first twenty-two Lone Wolf gamebooks
  • Official website of the Lone Wolf D20 Tabletop Game
  • Lone Wolf translation to Russian