Thieves' World is a shared world fantasy series created by Robert Lynn Asprin in 1978. The original series comprised twelve anthologies, including stories by science fiction and fantasy authors Poul Anderson, John Brunner, Andrew J. Offutt, C. J. Cherryh, Janet Morris, and Chris Morris.

Thieves' World is set in the city of Sanctuary at the edge of the Rankan Empire. The city is depicted as a place where many are downtrodden and where the invading Rankan gods and the Ilsigi gods they had ousted begin a struggle for dominance. As the series continues, additional invasions occur, and the city is taken over by the snake-worshipping Beysib as the Rankan empire collapses. Over time, a number of the characters in the series are revealed either to be the offspring of or otherwise blessed by various figures in the pantheons of the competing deities, and they discover or develop various powers as the series progresses.

First published in 1979, the series went on hiatus in 1989 after the twelfth anthology. In addition to the official anthologies, several authors published novels set in Thieves' World.

In 2002, Lynn Abbey, who co-edited several of the original anthologies, relaunched the series with the novel Sanctuary. It was followed by the anthologies Turning Points and Enemies of Fortune, which contain some returning authors and several new ones. Abbey also oversaw the republication of the original anthologies in omnibus editions.

Concept and origin

The Thieves' World anthologies were conceived by authors Robert Lynn Asprin, Lynn Abbey, and Gordon R. Dickson during a casual meeting at the Boston science-fiction convention Boskone in 1978. Asprin suggested that the task of world-building was a major hurdle for modern fantasy writers:

"Whenever one set out to write heroic fantasy, it was first necessary to reinvent the universe from scratch regardless of what had gone before. Despite the carefully crafted Hyborean world of Howard or even the delightfully complex town of Lankhmar which Leiber created, every author was expected to beat his head against the writing table and devise a world of his own. Imagine, I proposed, if our favorite sword-and-sorcery characters shared the same settings and time-frames. Imagine the story potentials.”

Abbey described the 1978 meeting as "a casual conversation [that] changed the lives of a couple dozen people who had no idea what they had been missing or what they were getting into." The writers who were recruited for the series saw Thieves' World as both a challenge and an opportunity to bring "new oddments of human behavior, new quirks of character that the authors wouldn't dare put in a universe for which he or she was solely responsible."

The city itself was envisioned as a late medieval town with similarities to the Shambles in York, England, and additional elements of Baghdad. The faraway capital city of Ranke is based on Rome. "Nobody knows how big Sanctuary really is. Anytime any one of us needs a secret meeting place we just create one – Sanctuary is either very large or very cramped."

In an interview for Green Ronin's Sanctuary-based roleplaying guides, Abbey explained the increase of interconnected storylines as the series progressed. "The stories of the first few volumes stood by themselves. But starting in about volume three (Shadows of Sanctuary) the authors began collaborating… big time. Eventually just about every author worked with the same plot threads, some of which stretched over several volumes." Authors would often mine each other's stories for plot ideas, with a minor plot point or piece of dialogue turning into a complete story in a subsequent volume.

Abbey noted that the interwoven plots eventually hurt the series' readership: "The very plot and character denseness of a Thieves' World volume, while it was eagerly anticipated by long-time readers, was a bit intimidating to anyone who hadn't been following the series from the beginning." Her observation led to a revised approach for the 2002 relaunch. "When we went to work on 'new Thieves' World', we tried to find a happy medium between stand-alone stories and densely interwoven plots. In Turning Points and Enemies of Fortune there are a few events and situations that serve as a backdrop for the stories." and the Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts cites Thieves' World as the "first and protype of the form".

Science fiction author Cory Doctorow says the series "rocked my world when I was about 13", and author Robin Hobb called its concept of a collective setting and characters "a brilliant idea". Author and game designer Robert J. Schwalb said "Thieves' World is to authors what D&D is to gamers."

Greg Costikyan reviewed Thieves' World in Ares Magazine #1. Costikyan commented that "since fantasy role-playing involves the group production of a multi-hero fantasy story, role-playing fans especially will find Thieves' World enjoyable. [...] The stories themselves range from mediocre to excellent, but all are worth reading."

The Encyclopedia of Fantasy describes the series: "It is in the creation and editorial supervision of the Thieves' World sequence of shared world anthologies ... that Asprin—in collaboration with Abbey—has done his most original work."

In the editorial essay included in the second volume, Tales from the Vulgar Unicorn, Asprin noted that, though fan response was mostly positive and high sales had led to sequels and the development of the Chaosium board game, many readers had written to the publisher to comment on the series' overall lack of humor.

Awards

Thieves' World

  • Balrog Award 1980: Best Collection/Anthology (nominated)
  • Locus Award 1980: Best Collection/Anthology (nominated)

Tales from the Vulgar Unicorn

  • Balrog Award 1981: Best Collection/Anthology (nominated)
  • Locus Award 1982: Best Collection/Anthology (winner)
  • The Blue Camel (mini-adventure; FASA, 1982)
  • T1 - Traitor (FASA, 1982)
  • T2 - The Spirit Stones (FASA, 1982)
  • T3 - Dark Assassin (FASA, 1982)
  • T4 - Vengeance (FASA, 198?)
  • Sanctuary Under the Beysibs (Chaosium Companion, 1986)
  • Thieves' World Player's Manual (Green Ronin, 2005)
  • Shadowspawn's Guide to Sanctuary (Green Ronin, 2005)
  • Thieves' World Gazetteer (Green Ronin, 2005)
  • Murder at the Vulgar Unicorn (Green Ronin, 2005)
  • Black Snake Dawn (Green Ronin, 2007)

Audiobook

In August 2023, Thieves' World was released as an audiobook on Audible, published by Tantor Media and narrated by Jonathan Johns.

Board game

  • Sanctuary: Thieves' World (Mayfair Games, 1982).

Characters

The fictional shared universe of Thieves' World has many characters. This alphabetic list includes some characters who appear in the anthologies, the comics and the games.

  • Abarsis, Slaughter Priest; high priest of Vashanka. Originally the Sacred Band's commander, Abarsis later became the patron shade of the Sacred Band of Stepsons once Tempus assumed command of the Band upon Abarsis's death.
  • Askelon, entelechy of dreams, regent of the seventh sphere, lord of dream and shadow, ruled in Meridian until defeated by Tempus and the Sacred Band of Stepsons in battle.
  • Bourne, member of the Prince's Bodyguard
  • Cappen Varra, minstrel, lover, and occasional accidental adventurer
  • Cime, sorcerer-slayer. Some say she is Tempus's sister, some his beloved. Tempus and she were lovers when young and have shared curses. She was married for a time to Askelon, lord of dream and shadow.
  • Critias, at one time second-in-command of Tempus's Stepsons and Sacred Band; Crit is Straton's partner and left-side leader or leftman<sup>[check spelling]</sup>.
  • Dubro the Blackmith, husband of Illyra.
  • Enas Yorl, wizard and involuntary shapechanger (he lost a duel with another wizard)
  • Enlil, ancient god of storm and wind, patron god of Tempus and the Sacred Band of Stepsons after Vashanka went missing
  • Hakiem the storyteller, a street dweller who tells tales and trades information in exchange for coins
  • Illyra, half S'danzo seer
  • Ischade, necromant and lover of Straton when he commanded the Sacred Band of Stepsons
  • Jamie the Red, an adventurer who aids Cappen Varra in rescuing his lover from a magical plane.
  • Janni, Niko's right-side partner, killed by the witch Roxanne and made an undead by the necromant Ischade.
  • Jarveena, a Yenized scribe who makes a deal with Enas Yorl to foil the assassination of Prince Kadakithis.
  • Jihan, wind-charmer and supernatural sprite, daughter of Stormbringer, father of all weather gods; sometime consort of Tempus, with whom she had a child.
  • Jubal, ex-gladiator turned slave trader and crime lord
  • Kadakithis, Prince-Governor. Sent to Sanctuary by his half-brother the Emperor in a plot to remove him from power.
  • Kurd the vivisectionist
  • Kama, Tempus's daughter and a member of the Rankan 3rd Commando; she later served in Tempus's forces.
  • Lalo the Limner, a painter who receives the "gift" of being able to paint the souls of his subjects
  • Lythande, a female wizard of the Blue Star order, masquerading in Sanctuary as a man
  • Molin Torchholder, High Priest of Vashanka in Sanctuary
  • MoonFlower, S'danzo seer
  • Myrtis, owner of Aphrodisia House, Sanctuary's longest-standing brothel, who has a close friendship with Lythande
  • Nikodemos, or Niko; most deadly of the Stepsons, Tempus's right-side partner. Always a Sacred Bander, Niko has had several partners, including Janni, who was killed; Randal, the Stepsons' mage, and later Tempus himself. Askelon of Meridian gave him a magical panoply.
  • One-Thumb (Lastel), bartender of the Vulgar Unicorn.
  • Razkuli, member of the Prince's Bodyguard
  • Randal, upwardly-mobile mage with plaguing allergies; at one time, by Tempus's order, rightman of the Stepson and Sacred Bander, Nikodemos. Randal has a kris made for him by the dream-lord, Askelon.
  • Roxane, the fearsome Nisibisi witch who loves Nikodemos
  • Saliman, Jubal's right-hand man
  • The Sacred Band, commanded first by Abarsis and later by Tempus, consisted originally of ten age-weighted couples and became members of Tempus's Stepsons, which initially included thirty single mercenaries and grew to over three hundred and fifty fighters in later novels.
  • Shadowspawn (Hanse), a thief who forms an unlikely friendship with Prince Kadakithis. Later retires due to a stroke and trains a young thief named Lone.
  • The Stepsons, general term for the paired fighters and individual mercenaries commanded by Tempus; later called The Sacred Band of Stepsons. All Stepsons were not required to be Sacred Band couples; some were single mercenaries or Platonic couples.
  • Straton, Critias' right-side partner, onetime commander of the Sacred Band of Stepsons in Sanctuary.
  • Tempus, immortal warrior and leader of the Sacred Band and the Stepsons, his legend says he is a demigod.
  • Vashanka, Rankan God of War
  • Zalbar, Captain of the Prince's Bodyguard
  • Zip, revolutionary and terrorist, sometime lover of Kama

References

  • Interview with Lynn Abbey
  • Interview with several Thieves' World contributors