Sketch of Queen Elspeth from 1998, by me

I am still trying to piece together the evidence of how Daniel, Geir and I convinced ourselves to do a crossover, and do it as two separate books telling the same story from different angles. What I know is this:

• In summer 1996, I visited Daniel and Geir (and Geir's brother Trond) in Norway (Oslo and Ranheim, respectively). Geir and I discussed story ideas that would turn into The Eye of the Underworld. Later that year, Daniel came over to Groningen, the Netherlands, for the first time.
• In 1997, Daniel came over for a second time to record some music in a studio here.
• He came over for the third time in 1998, to record tracks for the musical version of The Double. I was present at those sessions, and drew this sketch there. The figure at the top left is my brother, waiting for his turn to record a part.
• By then, though, I had already drawn The Eye of the Underworld and was probably already working on Guðdrún which I started drawing quite early in the year.

It's likely, then, that the seeds of the crossover were sown before that. Did I go to Norway partly to talk that over? Why didn't I keep a diary?

Before the trip to Norway, Geir, Daniel and I communicated through snail mail a lot. I still have the letters they sent me; there may be more information in those. Finding any information in 10-year-old email seems like a remote possibility although I do still have a lot of it.