The internet has changed a lot since I first went online around the turn of the century, and the way I use it has changed too. I launched my web site - www.darrenshan.com - way back in the year 2000, and from the very beginning I used it to share fan art. Back in those days, drawings were either posted to me, or handed to me at events. I'd then scan them in and upload them to my site -- a process that took a lot of time, since I was still on dial-up internet (ask your grandparents!).

For years I worked that way, uploading many hundreds of drawings, but over the last decade the way people share art with me has changed. I almost never receive drawings in the post now -- instead, fans post their pieces to Twitter or Facebook or elsewhere online, and I download them from there.

For a while I continued to upload the downloads to my site, but that still took a bit of time, so for the past several years I've just been sharing them on Facebook, Twitter and my Blog, since it's easier and quicker. BUT I came across a folder recently, containing quite a few drawings that I'd set aside years ago to scan in and upload, and then... um... forgot about!! Whoops!!!

Anyway, I'm a firm believer in the old "better late than never" motto, so I scanned in the contents of the folder and will share them through my social media pages over the next few weeks and months. (I'm not uploading fan art to my site any longer, as people just aren't visiting those pages these days.)

I'm kicking things off with four drawings of Mr Crepsley, all drawn by students of a teacher called Mr Kraye, in the USA. He reads Cirque Du Freak to his class every year, and sends me a few drawings by his pupils each time round. In order, they were drawn by Alex, Jaydnn, Keani and Landon. My apologies to Mr Kraye and the artists for such a long wait -- but hey, don't blame me -- blame technology run amok!!! :-)