Category: Enamel Pins

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LAST DAY FOR EERIE ANIMAL KICKSTARTER, and New Release: “The Offered Ones” by A. L. Heard

Today, as we release the last of our four “Eerie Fall” Kickstarter tie-in stories, we also enter the final 24 hours to back our crowdfunding campaign!

Love artwork by Aceriee (Instagram | Tumblr | Twitter)? Love enamel pins? Then don’t miss out on these gorgeous pins featuring Aceriee’s work! There’s currently only two designs unlocked – the Wolf and the Crow – but with a strong final 24 hours, we can unlock two more – the bear and the moose! Support a small business on this awesome Small Business Saturday, and help us reach the goal by checking out the campaign now!

Meanwhile, we have our fourth and final “Eerie Animal” tie in story, a perfect one for exploring the animals in the campaign, because in this story…all these animals are characters!

Title: The Offered Ones

Author: A. L. Heard

Genre: Fantasy

Rating: General Audiences

Trigger Warnings: body horror, harm to children

Relationship: found family

Character Features: animal, animal transformation (involuntary), bird, non-human character

Tags: animal point of view, body modification (involuntary), pov third person limited, sentient animal

Teaser:

There was a girl sleeping in Forest.

Fox didn’t know the girl. She was a human, that much was clear, though he hadn’t seen her kind in ages. They traveled this way and that like they owned the whole world—he had seen many before—but most stayed away from Forest. They were blind, deaf, dumb creatures, unable to perceive what was in front of them. Still, they sensed the magic of Forest, so they stayed away. If they did wander into the dense line of oak and pine, they spoke in hushed voices and didn’t linger.

They certainly didn’t sleep in Forest.

Length: 17 pages/6,400 words

Price: $1.99 US

Get it now!

Can’t get enough Eerie Fall stories? Check out the other three theme stories: “Widow’s Black” by Nina Waters; “Campfire Stories” by Nicola Kapron; and “A Shield For the People” by Puck Malamud.

Love what we do? Sign up for our monthly newsletter and get previews, behind-the-scenes information, coupons, and more!

Want to support the Press and get lots of our stories? Consider backing our Patreon or ko-fi monthly at a level that includes free stories, and read your fill!

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New Release: “Campfire Stories” by Nicola Kapron

Our second “Eerie Fall”-themed story is here, served up as a slice of horror by author Nicola Kapron! And don’t forget, our eerie fall stories were inspired by our “Eerie Animals” enamel pin Kickstarter campaign – which is running for another two weeks, so don’t miss your chance to order your own awesome, gorgeous pin! (And don’t skip this fabulous story, either!)

Title: Campfire Stories

Author: Nicola Kapron

Genre: Modern with Magic, Horror

Rating: Mature

Relationship: found family

Trigger Warnings: body horror, cannibalism, violence (graphic descriptions of)

Character Features: bipoc, creature, masquerading as human, murderer, serial killer, trans

Tags: alcohol use (casual), past tense, pov third person limited

Teaser:

When Hydrangea reached the campsite, the fire was roaring. Five logs had been dragged into a tight circle around it, and Oleander was already seated and waiting. Pale hair, pale skin, and pale clothes made a ghost of him in the dark. Sparks played in the reflection off his perfectly white teeth.

Hydra shook his head and quickened his pace. He vaulted over the back of his log and landed on top with a thump, tucking his hands into the pockets of a hoodie three sizes too big. “Really? I broke like nine traffic laws getting here. How do you keep beating me?”

Length: 16 pages/5,490 words

Price: $1.99 US

Get your copy now!

And, check out the other eerie fall story, “Widow’s Black” by Nina Waters, for more spooky, dark fall feels.

Love what we do? Sign up for our monthly newsletter and get previews, behind-the-scenes information, coupons, and more!

Want to support the Press and get lots of our stories? Consider backing our Patreon or ko-fi monthly at a level that includes free stories, and read your fill!

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Now Available: Widow’s Black by Nina Waters

Our first title of November is also the first of our “Eerie Fall” theme stories – creepy, creaturey tales that tie into our “Eerie Animals” Enamel Pin campaign currently running on Kickstarter!

Widow’s Black is Crow-themed, just like one of our two currently unlocked pins. Learn more…

Title: Widow’s Black

Author: Nina Waters

Genre: Historical Fiction, Horror

Rating: Mature Audiences

Relationships (platonic): adoption, mentor/mentee

Character Features: christian, murderer, serial killer

Tags: child abuse, child point of view, death of a child (mentions of), death of a mentor, death of a parent, death of a sibling, descriptions of violence (graphic), era: the 1860s, location: california, location: united states of america, location: wisconsin, major character death, minor character death, past tense, pov first person, prostitution (mentions of), revenge

Teaser:

The well dryin up saved my life. The bang-bang of gunshots didn’t draw me back; nothin unusual ’bout that. I knew somethin was wrong when I saw brother Billy flat on his back in the wheat field starin up at the sky. So much plowin to do, and he was never no slacker. I set the buckets I’d filled at the crik down and crept through the windbreak til I saw the cabin. Papa was sittin out front, but he wasn’t honin his knife no more. ’stead he was slumped, his arms and legs danglin and limp. The back of his head was wet and shaped weird. I knew what that meant. I’d seen the like when Papa and Billy and Jake came back with a deer after huntin.

Papa’s head been shot clean through.

Length: 17 pages/6,384 words

Price: $1.99 US

October may be done but the spooks are just starting – add some creepy to your Saturday with Widow’s Black!

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Eerie Animal Enamel Pins

What’s that noise? Is it the caw of something out of sight high overhead? A who-who-who echoing out of the darkness? A grrrr coming from the rustling underbrush? The crash, crash of something large moving through the trees?

No! It’s the sound of our latest Kickstarter launching!

Celebrate Fall with our Eerie Animal Enamel Pins!

Fall is the season of spook. Get your Autumn on—literally!—by donning one (or more!) of our eerie animal enamel pins! These realistically rendered, gorgeous pins feature different animals indigenous to northern areas of North America and Europe surrounded by elements of their natural habitats.

For our first merchandise-only campaign, Duck Prints Press approached the spectacular artist Aceriee (Instagram | Tumblr | Twitter) and asked her to let her imagination run wild. The results are gorgeous, unique, and perfect for the season: 7 animals at their spooky, creepy, scary best, depicted in the rich colors of fall. Seasonal enough to enhance any autumn outfit, classy enough for year-round wear.

All the pins for this campaign are 2 in x 2 in (5 cm x 5 cm) and feature black nickel metal with soft enamel color work coated by a clear epoxy finish. They have two attachment posts with silver butterfly closures and feature either 6 or 8 colors, one of which glows in the dark (which varies in each pin).

This is a tiered release pin campaign (and our first-ever art-only project!)

At our initial funding goal ($1,500), backers can pick the Crow and Wolf pins (buy one or both or multiples of either/both!)

If we exceed $3,500 in backing, all backers will be able to choose from among four pins: Crow, Wolf, Moose, and Bear.

If we exceed $6,000 in backing, all backers will be able to choose from among six pins: Crow, Wolf, Moose, Bear, Raccoon, and Owl.

If we exceed $9,000 in backing, all backers will be able to choose from among eight pins: Crow, Wolf, Moose, Bear, Raccoon, Owl, Fox, and the not-yet-revealed Deer.

At $10,000, we’ll offer another unrevealed option: Bobcat. And, if we reach $11,000, we’ll offer out tenth and last pin, which is—of course!—a Duck!

Mix and match, pick your favorites, buy enough for all your friends, or just get one—you’re not going to want to miss this one chance to get these spectacular fall-themed animal pins!

The campaign is live now, and will run through Sunday, November 27th, 2022.

Ready to learn more? Check out our campaign page NOW!

Also—want an exclusive extra pin? Back us on Patreon or ko-fi at the $10/month or $25/month level and get a backer-only bonus!

Love what we do? Want to help us spread the word? We love signal boosts, so please share this on the social media platform(s) of your choice!

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Only 48 Hours Left to Back “She Wears the Midnight Crown” and “He Bears the Cape of Stars”

We’re entering the home stretch on Duck Prints Press’s third crowdfunding campaign. She Wears the Midnight Crown and He Bears the Cape of Stars are anthologies of wlw and mlm stories that share a common theme: masquerades, the queerer and more unusual the better! The 18 stories in each anthology – 36 stories total if you get both books! – are set in many different times and places and genres, and feature diverse queer and genderqueer characters…and every story has a happy ending!

First you’re hearing about it? You can learn everything you could want to know by checking out our campaign page, visiting our website, and/or reading the updates we’ve posted throughout the last month!

Contributor Spotlights:

Merchandise Spotlights:

Also – did you know? Patreon and ko-fi backers at the $10 and $25 level who also back the Seed & Spark campaign will get a campaign-exclusive bonus (on top of all the other awesome benefits our monthly backers receive, like free stories, access to our Discord and backer blog, and more!)! So, consider becoming a regular Duck Prints Press supporter; be an even more awesome person, and get even more awesome stuff!

After July 15th, 4 PM Eastern Time, you won’t be able to get these books in-print again – so back now to make sure you don’t miss out!

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Merchandise Spotlight: Campaign Bookmarks and Pins!

The Seed&Spark campaign for He Bears the Cape of Stars and She Wears the Midnight Crown includes a lot of gorgeous merchandise options. Today, we’re taking a look at two of them!

Bookmarks

Our Bookmarks, one aligned with She Wears the Midnight Crown, the other with He Bears the Cape of Stars, feature the lovely artwork of Pippin Peacock.

Bookmark for She Wears the Midnight Crown.
Bookmark for He Bears the Cape of Stars.

With printing by UPrinting, who have also printed the campaign bookmarks for Add Magic to Taste and And Seek (Not) to Alter Me, our first two anthologies, we know that this merch will be gorgeous in high-gloss on quality, thick cardstock. The back of the She Wears the Midnight Crown bookmark will feature the signatures of the authors who contributed to that book; likewise, contributors to He Bears the Cape of Stars provided their signatures so we could share them on the back of that bookmark!

The bookmarks are each 2 in x 7.25 in (5 cm x 18.5 cm) and will have rounded corners, a 3/16 in hole at the top center, and gold tassels!

Enamel Pins

We’ve once again contracted Miss Aceriee to create artwork for our enamel pins, and the results are simply stunning. (In fact, Miss Aceriee produced so many lovely ideas that we had trouble picking – more on that later!). Miss Aceriee took our inspiration and ran with it, creating a design for two pins that are each lovely as stand-alone pieces, and even more amazing when paired!

Enamel pin designs aligned with She Wears the Midnight Crown (left) and He Bears the Cape of Stars (right).

For manufacturing purposes, we will be working with Alchemy for the third time – the pins they made for each of our previous campaigns have turned out fantastically. These pins will each be approximately 2 in x 1 in (5 cm x 2.5 cm), with two back-prongs to help ensure they attach securely. The metalwork is gold, with matching butterfly pin backers. The enamel work will be soft enamel with a clear epoxy coating, and one color (the dark green-blue) on each will have glitter to make it extra sparkly.

Bonus: Backer-Exclusive Reward!

We had so much trouble deciding which of Miss Aceriee’s designs to use as the campaign pins that we decided, first, to have a third/fourth pin offered as a stretch goal (if we hit $26,000 in funding, everyone who backed the campaign at level 5+ will receive one or both pins as extras!), and second, that we’d make the same design we chose for that into a die-cut sticker for some of our monthly backers. People who back Duck Prints Press monthly on Patreon or ko-fi at the $10 or $25 level, AND who back our crowdfunding campaigns, always get an exclusive extra. This time, it’ll be this design in one of these four colorways:

Want to know which of the four will become the sticker? So do we! Our backers can vote on their favorite for the next week, and their wish will be our command – and, if we reach the $26,000 stretch goal, the colors of their choice will also be made into two pins – the sun/crown mask and the star/beard mask, lovely as stand-alone, amazing as an interlocking pair!

So, if you’re a backer, go vote, and if you’re not a backer yet – no time like the present to become one!

You, yes YOU, can support us on Patreon or ko-fi!

And you can back the He Bears the Cape of Stars and She Wears the Midnight Crown Campaign HERE!

(Also, just sayin’ – it’s also the last 24 hours to have a say in the theme of our next Queer Fanworks Inspired By… anthology on Patreon or ko-fi – that poll is open to ALL our backers; the sticker poll is only open to backers at the $10 and $25 levels, since they’re the only folks who receive the exclusive campaign extra.)