We may have to wait a bit longer for George R.R. Martin to produce The Winds of Winter, the sixth installment in his Song of Ice and Fire saga. But this fall will see a new book that’ll have Game of Thrones fanatics lining up around the corner (or at least scurrying to their favorite online retailer) when it’s released on October 18. In honor of the 20th anniversary of the book series that launched one of the most popular TV shows in the world, Random House has put together a massive illustrated version of Martin’s first novel, A Game of Thrones. It’s a gilded hardcover that’s 896 pages long, includes a new introduction from professional nerd John Hodgman, and is filled with 73 illustrations (old and new) to head off each chapter, plus eight richly detailed color plates. The volume is fit for a king (though, preferably not Joffrey) and Vanity Fair has an exclusive look at 10 of its images—as well as the story behind how the new edition came together.

By Marc Simonetti/Penguin Random House.

When it comes to the lore of Game of Thrones, it’s not easy to surprise Anne Groell. She’s been editing Martin’s sprawling fantasy series since the very beginning and has had a hand in all the graphic novels, history volumes, and various published off-shoots that A Song of Ice and Fire has inspired. Which is why, she told Vanity Fair, she was surprised when her author kept rejecting an artist’s rendering of the famed Iron Throne.

“Oh, no. That’s totally not right; that’s sort of what HBO did,” Groell recalled Martin saying of an early effort by Tommy Patterson. “Mine is much bigger and more tangled.” After several rounds of rejections, a frustrated Groell leaned into her familiarity with the novels. “I ended up going through all the books and pulling every description of the Iron Throne that talked about how it was big and hulking and bestial. I sent all of this to George, and I said, ‘O.K., tell me what I’m missing.’

“He finally said, ‘It’s 10 to 16 feet off the ground, with steps going up to it like a slide.’ I said, ‘O.K., nowhere in the books does it say that!’ It’s what I like to call the ‘invisible-head syndrome,’ that authors always think you can see into their head and see the vision that they’ve got. But if it’s not on the page, you’re not going to see it.”

Martin has since pointed to Marc Simonetti’s depiction of the throne (above) as what he wants his readers to see when he writes about the seat of power, which was made from a thousand melted-down swords gathered from Targaryen enemies. It’s just one example of how the new illustrated edition can root readers more firmly in the world Martin has created—you never know which details he forgot to include.

The Simonetti illustration is several years old; in fact, many of the images in the book have been re-purposed from old Song of Ice and Fire calendars, board games, or the 2014 edition of The World of Ice and Fire. But Groell balanced familiar imagery with some surprising new paintings.

By Magali Villeneuve/Penguin Random House.

“I made a list of all of the images we [already] had that were relevant to just A Game of Thrones. Then I went through the book, chapter by chapter, and tried to figure out, ‘Where would our existing art be able to go? Then, what does that leave me?’” Though it’s an action-packed book, not every chapter in A Game of Thrones inspired an iconic scene. “O.K., this is a chapter about politics,” Groell explained. “We had an illustration of crossed swords and hands, and I was like, ‘Why not? Let’s do swords!’” Working with Martin and his assistant, Raya Golden, Groell picked eight “iconic scenes from the book”—the discovery of the wolf pups, Jaime and Cersei together, and so on—to reproduce in color. Groell wound up recycling two color images—both having to do with Daenerys and her dragons—but commissioned six new full-color, full-page plates, including this Magali Villeneuve painting of Ned Stark—looking nothing like HBO fans might imagine—meeting his doom.