Contest closed!
Thanks so much for all the creativity, hard work, fun and book dust.
Thanks so much for all the creativity, hard work, fun and book dust.
Our tiniest foe has us holed up in our homes, feeling bored and nervous. In such trouble times books can provide a much needed distraction. Not usually as play-blocks ... but that's about to change!
Back in 2013 I ran a book-tower contest. Some mighty edifices resulted - teetering, toppling, towers built from hundreds of millions of words. I believe we can exceed even those lofty heights in 2020.
Build me a tower, oh reader! Let it reach up unto heaven!
The tallest, prettiest, luckiest, and cleverest will win prizes. Perhaps your base will be all your low fantasy books and the top all your high fantasy books. Perhaps it will be a tower of books only about towers. Perhaps it will be ten feet tall!
The tallest will definitely win a prize. I'll hand out a random prize so that every entry has a chance, and I'll hand out at least one discretionary prize.
The prizes will be signed copies of The Girl And The Stars.
Rules:
i) Build a tower.
ii) Don't hurt yourself - wear a hard hat, follow all local building regulations - Mark Lawrence Inc accepts no responsibility for injury.
iii) Use only books.
iv) It must have no additional support (i.e. your hand, a wall etc)
v) Email a photo of it to me at empire_of_thorns@yahoo.co.uk - titled TOWER CONTEST.
An estimate of its height would be useful, a measurement doubly so.
I will post all entries here.
Entries
(lots of nice messages coming in with the entries - forgive me if I don't answer, there are so many, but I am reading and appreciating them)
Note - you're all still shy of the 2013 winner at 9' or 273cm!
Height Winner: #62 @259cm / 8'6"
Random Winner: #74
Aesthetic/creative winners (I canvassed opinion on Facebook & Twitter here): #53 & #79
We had 4 entries over 2.5m tall!
#62 Jon (utilising the stairwell #protip 8'6" or 259cm)
Note - the world's tallest man could rest his chin on this!
#61 Zoe (257cm)
#60 Carina (Currently a tie for the lead!Get on your bike if you want to beat it! 254cm)
#59 Alex (curtains for the competition? 254cm)
All entries as they arrived:
Note - you're all still shy of the 2013 winner at 9' or 273cm!
Height Winner: #62 @259cm / 8'6"
Random Winner: #74
Aesthetic/creative winners (I canvassed opinion on Facebook & Twitter here): #53 & #79
We had 4 entries over 2.5m tall!
#62 Jon (utilising the stairwell #protip 8'6" or 259cm)
Note - the world's tallest man could rest his chin on this!
#61 Zoe (257cm)
#60 Carina (Currently a tie for the lead!Get on your bike if you want to beat it! 254cm)
#59 Alex (curtains for the competition? 254cm)
All entries as they arrived:
#79 Lawrence (The Tower Room -On the shoulders of giants)
#78 Jonah (229cm)
#77 Ben (a tower with a fine crown!)
#76 Meggan (The Leaning Tower of Meggan)
#75 Amy (cheers)
#74 Nathan (famous towers 'to scale')
From front (low) to back (high)
Stonehenge 30 feet
The Tall Castle “Tall castle is of course anything but tall” Jorg Ancrath
Academia Tower >100 feet??
Green Angel Tower 300 feet
The Dark Tower. 700 feet
The Wall. Over 700 feet tall
Barad-dur. 4000-5000 feet
#73 Kyla (Canadian Igloo - tower 73 is 7'3")
#72 Tom (tall as mountains!)
#71 Manu (book arch)
#70 Kerri (Totoro cage)
#69 Sadia
#68 Andrew (nice to see the Wild Cards book with my story there)
#67 Teresa (so colourful - " the stairway to heaven leads to somewhere over the rainbooks")
#66 John (7 foot and mostly air!)
#65 Jesper (including mug! - 237cm)
#64 Florencia (& measuring man)
#63 Celia and Lucia (and a confused looking cat)
#62 Jon (utilising the stairwell #protip 8'6" or 259cm)
#61 Zoe (257cm)
#60 Carina (Currently a tie for the lead!Get on your bike if you want to beat it! 254cm)
#59 Alex (curtains for the competition? 254cm)
#58 Evita (crowned with a dire wolf)
#57 @so_many_books6 (fortress)
#56 Nikolay & wife!
#55 Caroline
#54 Bec (Prince of Book Mountain - 210cm)
#53 Mark (7'9" or 236cm - remarkably we have neither exceeded the height of the tallest ever man or the high jump record yet...)
#52 Marielle (who wouldn't want to lay siege to that? alphabetic order no less!)
#51 @notra661 (go Jorg!)
#50 Rich (~7 foot or ~213cm)
#49 Symon & Leah (shelves of books)
#48 Timo (first of the big boys! 205cm)
#47 Elizabeth (Imperial Battle Cruiser)
#46 Vivianne (I like the colour coordination!)
#45 Meny (Asimov's Foundation is part of the foundation)
#44 Scarletbea (more of a book-city)
#43 Tony (Rome used to build a tower in a day)
#42 Samantha (the tower with all the answers)
#41 @HighhFantasy (shortstack)
#40 @Jackson_porter (literally a throne)
#39 Jenny (tree-tower)
#38 Chris (big tower, small person)
#37 Nicolas and wife (husband and wife in shot for scale)
#36 Shaun (tripod - the chances of anything coming from Mars are a million to one, they said)
#35 Steve (our shortest entry)
#34 Fiona and Fiona minor. (Tower and Fort)
#33 Jessie (Echoes of Eiffel - 175cm)
#32 Sean (the uncharitable might call it a pile rather than a tower - but it still stands a chance at a prize)
#31 Curtis (180cm)
#30 Ville (alien sculpture)
#29 Samantha (a handsome edifice)
#28 Ase (shark fin)
#27 Aurel (something new!)
#26 John (no books ... or people ... were hurt, 185cm)
#25 L.A (as high as she dared)
#24 Deb (Inuit Inukshuk)
#23 Dora (Tower of Babel)
#22 Jose (Happy Bookmas!)
#21 Michael (170cm)
#20 Nicolle (The Star Tower)
#19 Kristina (practically a whole city)
#18 Tamas (a wholly Hungarian tower of me)
#17 Morgan
#16 Erik (155cm!)
#15 Franck (from France - no relation to Mr Eiffel)
#14 Vance (excellent building materials)
#13 Johanna & Lilja (Castle Grimdark)
#12 Liz (as tall as and felled by an 8yo girl)
#11 Dorian + helpers 3 & 5 yo (The Tower of Youth)
#10 Raffael (signed and special editions)
#9 David
#8 Laura (& friend)
#7 Sarah (a castle!)
#6 Scott (a new angle)
#5 Brad (fine product placement)
#4 Juliet (artistic!)
#3 Jeremy (interesting architecture!)
#2 Knut (all my books- hooray!)
#1 Tammy (all signed grimdark!)
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