Celenic Earth Publications Announces the SMJU Halloween Annual 2026
Shaun M Jooste 
Celenic Earth Publications is excited to announce a new project from author Shaun M Jooste: the SMJU Halloween Annual 2026.
Planned as the beginning of an annual Halloween tradition, the publication will bring together characters, locations and stories from across the Shaun M Jooste Universe (SMJU) in a format quite different from his usual novels.
The inaugural 2026 edition will primarily feature Jooste’s two established fictional worlds, The Celenic Earth Chronicles and Sacred Valley, combining fantasy and supernatural horror with the fun of a traditional annual.
More Than a Short Story Collection
The SMJU Halloween Annual is not being developed as a conventional anthology. Instead, Jooste is drawing inspiration from the annuals that have entertained generations of readers with combinations of stories, comics, activities and special features.
While the final contents are still being developed, the SMJU Halloween Annual 2026 is expected to include original short stories, cartoons, bloopers, artwork, games, puzzles and other Halloween-themed entertainment.
This format also provides an opportunity to explore the lighter and stranger sides of characters readers usually encounter under considerably more serious circumstances.
Not every adventure needs to become part of official SMJU canon, after all.
The Celenic Earth Chronicles Returns
Fantasy readers will find familiar territory within The Celenic Earth Chronicles, Jooste’s epic fantasy series featuring Shadowolf and the many races, creatures and conflicts of Celenic Earth.
The setting already contains magic, dragons, wolves, monsters and dark forces, making it a natural fit for Halloween.
The annual provides Jooste with an opportunity to create additional adventures involving familiar characters without being restricted to the structure of the main novels. Serious tales and additional pieces of lore may therefore sit alongside humorous situations, cartoons and deliberate bloopers.
Halloween Comes to Sacred Valley
Jooste’s supernatural horror world of Sacred Valley will provide the darker half of the first SMJU Halloween Annual.
Characters and elements from Sacred Valley: Betrayal and Sacred Valley: Obversion are planned to appear, bringing the unsettling atmosphere of the series into a publication created specifically for Halloween.
However, even Sacred Valley’s characters may not escape the annual’s more humorous features.
The freedom of the format means frightening stories can exist alongside unusual scenarios and non-canon encounters that would never normally appear within the novels.
A Glimpse at the Future of the SMJU?
While the 2026 edition will focus on The Celenic Earth Chronicles and Sacred Valley, the Shaun M Jooste Universe is not limited to these two worlds.
Jooste has additional novels and fictional settings planned for the future.
That creates another interesting possibility for the annual. Future characters, concepts or worlds could potentially make small appearances before receiving their official introductions elsewhere.
Nothing has been confirmed for the first edition, but readers may want to pay attention to anything lurking between its pages.
A New Annual Halloween Release
The exact specifications of the SMJU Halloween Annual 2026 are still being developed. A larger format, potentially A4, is being considered to accommodate the combination of prose, cartoons, illustrations, games and other visual content.
Most importantly, the intention is for this not to be a once-off publication.
The concept has been created as an annual release, with a new SMJU Halloween Annual planned around Halloween each year. Future editions could introduce additional SMJU worlds and characters as Jooste’s catalogue continues to expand.
For Celenic Earth Publications, it represents an exciting new way to bring together the author’s growing collection of fictional worlds while giving readers something very different from a traditional novel.
The SMJU Halloween Annual 2026 is officially in development, with more information about its contents, format and release to be revealed as Halloween approaches.
