Take a look at all of our current pens machined from the industrial thermoplastic Ultem. From fountain pens to pocket ballpoint pens, these are the perfect for someone who wants durability in a very lightweight pen.

Let's talk more about books. Not so much underappreciated book series this time, though maybe overlooked. Two of these three series are often referenced by book critics, though I feel like they go under-read. One has been adapted into a film franchise though the films are VASTLY different than the books. The third is the most modern and fast paced. These series are three of my favorite book series about assassins. In recent years there has been a massive move to publish books that heavily feature assassin protagonists, and not just in the fantasy genre. At any point in time, there are four or five trade paperbacks on the Costco tables featuring modern assassin tales that were written in the last five years. They're not all good. In fact, a lot of them are just mass-produced cookie-cutter books with no real plot or character development. That is NOT the case with these three series. For those that care, this list is chronological by publication date just to keep things fair.

Published in 1980, Robert Ludlum's The Bourne Identity is an incredible look at a spy/assassin who experiences retrograde amnesia and must piece together his life and mission all while attempting to survive multiple attempts on his life from numerous organizations. It was loosely adapted into a film starring Matt Damon in 2002 which saw huge success and prompted the creation of the Bourne movies series. The book is incredible, though it spaces out the action and adds more intrigue than the film. It's a great spy/action/assassin series that anyone should read if they enjoy those genres.

Robin Hobb is perhaps, the greatest fantasy author you've never heard of. Her 1995 masterpiece, Assassin's Apprentice, literally wrote the book on how to, well, write a book about an assassin protagonist. It's the first book in her Farseer Trilogy that spans the Realm of the Elderlings series. It follows the story Fitz, a royal bastard, through his young life in servitude then into training in combat, and finally apprenticeship to the royal assassin. The character development and story is one that has few peers. Hobb is a master of her craft, and the entire trilogy is a joy to read. It's not too dense, and I couldn't put it down.

Brent Weeks took Hobb's assassin-template and layered on a bunch of interesting magic and modern plot devices when he released The Way of Shadows in 2008. More fast paced and vastly more raw, the story revolves around Azoth, a street urchin/thief who eventually finds his way to training with the shadowy assassin, Durzo Blint, and finally serving Lord Gyre as the newly named Kylar Stern. Their are twists, turns, betrayals galore, and enough assassinations to keep the reader enthralled. Weeks' magic system is quite interesting, and it heavily impacts the story as time goes on. I love this series for it's grittier, more R-rated writing. It's also a quick read.

Our latest round of testing CUBES with anodize seems to be a success. We've got the first small-ish batch of black and blue CUBES and we're in the process of inspecting and assembling these. The plan is to launch these on the website this Friday, June 7th. These are going up directly to the website, as many of them as pass inspection. They'll be priced at $115 with applicable shipping depending on destination. Be advised, we have recently added shipping charges to the CUBES due to changes in the pricing structure of our carriers on items of this size with a higher weight. When checking out, you'll be given a choice of shipping fees based on your location. This batch of anodized CUBES is limited in quantities, we do not have a timeframe for adding more of these colors or expanding to other colors any time soon.

More Jowo Decographs...

While Bill was making the Ultem Decograph grip sections with Jowo threading, he made some Brass and Copper versions as well. Rather than wait around, we've added the purchase pages for the Brass Decograph Jowo Signature Edition and Copper Decograph Jowo Signature Edition fountain pens. They have placeholder images currently, but will have some photos with Jowo nibs added in the next few pages, but if you're chomping at the bit to get one of these, they're live now. The initial batch of both of these pens is limited but if we sell through them quickly we will make more grip sections.