Candlekeep Mysteries

Dungeons and Dragons released its newest book last week, and while all their books are wonderful, this book, Candlekeep Mysteries, is absolutely amazing!  In brief, here is why: 

1. The variant cover is beautiful.  It is a deep red with shiny gold art and lettering.  It has a mystical stamp on the front center with a fairy looking on just to the left and from above the title.  When you flip the book over, there is a terrifyingly beautiful Beholder staring at you with all 11 eyes! The standard-issue cover isn't too shabby either with an image of a couple of adventurers pouring over a book in the library as they attempt to solve some great mystery.  Look carefully, there is danger looming right behind them!  

  

2. There is a great pullout map of Candlekeep that shows the Inner Ward and the Great Library. That's a big deal.  

3.  The book has 15 adventures (there might be one more, it was a quick count) that are "bite-sized" quick adventures for different levels.  What is really cool about the adventures is it appears that each one is based on or revolves around a different book.  How awesome is that?  

4. Let's be real, as a librarian in real life, I have been waiting for something about the greatest library in Faerun!  We get titles and the structure of Candlekeep's curators like The Keeper, The Council of Eight Great Readers, Master Readers, the First Reader, and more.  What may be the best detail is that there are 13 Modrons that escaped from Mechanus who now are part of the library staff.  They catalog and shelve books, but it is noted that they shelve one book at a time.  

This book, upon a quick viewing, is an amazing work.  While I haven't read any of the adventures yet, the description of Candlekeep with its extradimensional meeting rooms and study areas that have permanent silent spells so students aren't disrupted, leave so much to be discovered. I can't wait to dive in to some of these mysteries.  Another aspect of Candlekeep is for characters to gain admittance they must provide a unique book that the librarians of Candlekeep don't already have or it must be a highly valuable and rare copy of something they already have.  It will be fun to send characters on a hunt to find something unique before ever heading there.  This book has so many possibilities and so much fun in store.  

If you make a visit to Candlekeep, let me know in the comments below or tag me on Twitter @draftline