Hammerfall and the House of Hammer – where it all begins.
Thank you for joining me on this journey, and welcome to the Hammerfall Bulletin. I’m glad you’re here.
I’ve always been fascinated by where stories come from. Sometimes it begins with a character. Sometimes it’s a scene or a question that refuses to go away.
For Hammerfall, it started with a restaurant.
The House of Hammer began with a simple question: What might happen if an ordinary pleasure became forbidden in a future society determined to manage risk and personal choice?
In the world of Hammerfall, that ordinary pleasure is real meat.
By 2114, meat isn’t simply expensive or difficult to find. It’s illegal. The official reasons sound reasonable enough: public health, environmental protection, animal welfare, and the efficient use of resources. Society has cleaner alternatives that are safer and carefully controlled.
Most people have accepted the change. Some have never tasted real meat and don’t understand why anyone would want to.
But people have a habit of wanting what they’re told they can’t have.
That’s where the House of Hammer came from.
Hidden beneath a Retro-Mart in New York City, it’s a restaurant that shouldn’t exist. There’s no sign outside and no reason for anyone passing on the street to suspect what lies below. You have to know where to go—and someone has to decide that you can be trusted.
Once inside, the controlled world of 2114 gives way to something warmer and more familiar. I imagined the smell of food, aging wood, and lemon oil. People sit close enough to talk without a screen between them. The walls are covered with hammers collected from different places and periods, each with its own shape, purpose, and history.
I wanted readers to feel that they could walk through the door and find a table.
The funny thing is that the House of Hammer was never really about meat. The food may bring people there, but the restaurant is about choice, privacy, memory, and the pleasure of experiencing something the larger world has decided people no longer need.
The hammers on the walls gradually became part of that idea. A hammer can build a home, repair something that’s broken, or shape raw material into something useful. In another person’s hands, the same tool can destroy.
The hammer doesn’t make that decision. The person holding it does.
That felt right for Hammerfall. Technology, authority, and even rebellion can be used to build or destroy. What matters is who controls them and what they’re willing to do.
As I continued writing, the House of Hammer became more than a setting. It became a place where many of the larger questions behind the story could meet.
That’s also what I hope to do with these Bulletins.
Some will come directly from me, with stories about where the characters and ideas originated. Others will come from inside the Hammerfall world: CIN broadcasts, confidential dossiers, intercepted communications, and recovered files.
You won’t need to have read the books to enjoy them, and I’ll be careful not to spoil the discoveries waiting there.
Thank you again for being here at the beginning.
Welcome to Hammerfall.
— Rob Savette
Author of the Hammerfall Series
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