Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
#186:  If you like E. Nesbit, you have to read Edward Eager (_Half Magic_
is the first book in his series).

Even more obscure than Nesbit (but almost as good, in my opinion) is
a novel called "The Ship That Flew" by Hilda Lewis.  In it, four children
have magic adventures in a flying ship -- which is sold to the eldest by
a white-haired old man with a patch over one eye. 
  

    
E-mail from Donna:

Hi Terry, I finally got to read through the whole string last night and when
you mentioned possibly reanimating Esk - the instant thought came to my mind
- what a fearsome foursome: Esk and Simon, and Susan and Lobsang.  Just
imagine any world seen through the eyes of a witch-wizard, a pure research
wizard, a teacher who moonlights as death, and the thief of time.  Even Lord
Vetinari (with Inigo's help of course) would have difficulty keeping one step
ahead of that crowd.
You are very right about the victorian "twee" humor - I had to pull Hogfather
off the shelf and remind myself of poor mis-named Twyla and Gawain.
Also, Rab, thank you for the apology and you are right, this forum isn't the
place for either of us to vent.  On with the Terry appreciation club.
Donna
  

    
Wow. I'd put a "want" in at abe.com for your book "The Last Hero" and
got an email today that somebody is selling the uncorrected proof -
just like they did when ToT came out. UNlike when ToT came out, they
are charging twice as much as what the hardback issue is going to be.
$65 and up. Wow. Eager as I am to read it, I think I'll wait this time
unti Roundwood book store sends me mine. 

Where do all these proof copies come from and how do so many go out
ahead of time?
  

    
Terry:
A few months ago I was standing outside the Book Eddy (a great used
book store that's near my house and has two resident cats) in So.
Knoxville one day looking at their dollar books when a woman pulled up
suddenly, parked sideways, and asked, "Do you like the books they sell
here?"

When I said, "Well, yes", she pulled out a piece of paper and told me
she'd been cleaning house, found this, and I was welcome to it. As she
pulled off I saw it was a $15 gift certificate for the store.

Being a believer in omens, I decided this was a good one, went in and
bought "Good Omens", read it, and loved it.
  

    
Forgotten authors,

I remember reading some of Nesbit's books (Phoenix and the Carpet, 
Five Children and It), and I didn't hate them (I read two after all), 
but they didn't really excite me like, say, the Swallows and Amazons
books. But then Swallows and Amazons was the first 'real' book I 
ever read solo and I was learning to sail at the time too, so no 
surprise there then.

Gill (my wife) meanwhile, who grew up in Catford, *loves* Nesbit and 
can't get on with Ransome at all.

I loved BB's books too, which as well as being beautifully written,
were beautifully illustrated with the author's own wood engravings.
I came to those from a vaguely weird angle; BB used to write a
column for Shooting Times, which my dad subscribed to and which I 
read every week. BB's column really stood out as it was so well 
written, and by someone who really knew what he was writing about.
I still remember a column he wrote about the deciding whether to 
get a new gundog after his last one died of old age because he 
realised that the odds were that he'd die of old age before it did.

Once I realised he'd written novels I was off down the library with 
a sheaf of request cards. 

TH White, another great. My favourite of his though is 'The Goshawk'.
  

    
Jane -- glad you're enjoying American Gods.

Dodge -- I think the rule on proof copies seems to be that people who
have them (booksellers mostly, and journalists) charge a lot for them
pre-publication, as they are selling to fans who want to read the book.
As you get closer to publication the prices tumble to less than the
cost of a hardback, and then, slowly climb, as the only people who want
them then are proof collectors, and there aren't a lot of them about.
  

    
Dodge -- re proof copies...

What he said.  But in the UK at least proof copies seem to have become
a growth industry in recent years -- I mean there seem to be hundreds
around.  And it gnaws me off, because they are *proof copies*, for
heaven's sake!  Would you believe the someone a couple of books ago
complained about the 'astonishing' fact that there were changes between
the proof and the ultimate book?  And someone else complained that the
proof copy -- which is, for those who don't know, simply the
first-run, unread proofs bound in paperback form -- had spelling
mistakes in it...

I'd be very surprised if the are full proof copies of TLH yet; there
may be copies of the blad, which is a few pages bound with
illustrations to give the trade an idea of what the book is going to
be.  Or it may be a bound copy of, simply, the text.

Terry
  

    
JaNell,

That was no ordinary woman.  You only have to read early F&SF or the
old Unknown magazine to know that she was from the future, or another
dimension, or the Galalctic Stage Manager's office.  It was very
important to the history of the world for you to buy that book. Bad
things would have happened if you hadn't.

:-)

Terry
  

    
Piers,

I disliked Swallows and Amazons.  I was a bolshy little kid, and the
adventures of piping middle-class children turned me off.  But, oddly,
I was a great fan of Just William (whose family had a cook, and a maid,
and a gardener) because he was so recognisable.

Good to see another BB fan.  He was a magnificent writer.  Sometimes I
suspect that, in the 60s, his robust shooting background counted
against him the the children's book world.

Terry
  

    
Lenny,

Good grief, I remember The Ship That Flew!  It was great!

Why do some books go under and others survive?  It's mystery to me...

Terry
  

    
Donna,

You raise an important point, and that is: you can have too many
powerful heroes.  Put too many in a book and it implodes. And while
Susan might well find a long-time friend in Lobsang, I imagine a
relationship with someone who is everywhere at once and knows
everything you're going to say could become irksome to someone like
her.

Esk, now...I know how her return goes.  But it won't be for a while.

Terry
  

    
Terry:
See, I *thought* it was something like that, or just my ability to
manifest people and things kicking in, as I was looking at the dollar
books because that's about all I had on me, and I was jonesing hard for
some new reading material...
  

    
JaNell,

When that car got around the next corner it turned into something
else...

Terry
  

    
Was it something useful? 

More specifically, did it turn into books, chocolate, infinite powers
of good or evil, feral kittens, soap bubbles, anything a good shade of
purple, Breyer's ice cream, money, an object that would allow me to
explode people's heads from afar with the power of my mind, sterling
silver oval bracelets small enough to fit me, or any other elusive
thing that I want?

And is there still time to catch this 'something else' ?
  

    
E-mail from Donna:

Hello again

Terry, thats something you haven't yet put into the DW books... we have the
wandering shops and we have the wonderfully efficient journalist, but we
don't have the eccentric bookseller/bookshop as yet--- closest is the gouging
publishers in masquerade.  Speaking of eccentric bookshops, should you ever
get out towards the Central Coast of California, there is a great 1/2 a city
block and ever-growing used book store called Leon's Bookstore in the
downtown area of San Luis Obispo, which, a long long time ago in a lifetime a
far cry different from now, I had the privilege of closing 4 nights a week.
I'd like to say I worked there, but that implies that I took money for
services and since it was a joy and my paycheck was mainly a revolving
bookstash - it wasn't really work.  No, they didn't have a store cat when I
worked there but they had a great Newfoundland that hung out on the door mat
and required some stepping over.
I got your point about the too many heroes spoiling the soup.  Your
characters never fail in the strength and eccentricity department, I imagine
it can be difficult to get them to bend to your will.  I personally can't
imagine Susan bending at all and then there is the Granny Weatherwax theory
of abiding by the rules until you break them good and hard.
I want you all to know that I'm taking careful notes of Authors and titles
because I *used* to think that I had a broad and varied reading habit and
I've got to tell you that as a collective, this group puts me to shame.  I've
already started searching.
If you don't mind, I find these three praiseworthy and will read anything
they publish:  Tim Powers, particularly Last Call and The Stress of Her
Regard, James Blaylock, and Phillip K. Dick -- none of the three are
children's authors but James has written some YA stuff.
Donna
  

    <scribbled>
  

    
Phillip K. Dick, _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?_

_Blade Runner_ is probably my favorite movie, and shows how potent a
short story or novella can be.
  

    
JaNell,

Of course you can't catch it!  It's moved on to give the *next* person
what they need...

You only get one.

Terry
  

    
Okay, I've been saving this question:  What's with the black hats?
  

    
If you don't mind the presumption, I just want to say that I think
you've grown substantially as a writer -- I think you're probably
better than you think you are.  ToT was as funny and inventive as
anything you've written before, but it was tight and crisp as well. 
You're doing a good job at something I've noticed many authors have a
great deal of difficulty managing: learning and honing their craft
without losing their creativity and vigor.

I'm not the least surprised that Esk is waiting in the wings for a
spectacular reappearance.  Esk is powerful -- she demands another book!
 Er, um, okay... *I'd* like to see Esk again.  But it sounded better
the first way.
  

    
Okay, I was busy being depressed over TT's big announcement, but this
makes up for it...they never had Terry Pratchett on TT. They never had
anyone I actually read on TT, come to think of it. I should have been
here all along.

Thief of Time was great. I like what you did with Susan. She was
destined to become a teacher. Of the kind that makes fluff brained
administrators (is there any other kind) feel awkward.

The reappearance of the Sweeper was also welcome. I've been wondering
about him every since that business with Vorbis and Brutha in Small
Gods.

I have yet to read a book of yours that I didn't like. Even Strata.
This DW series, however, is in a class by itself. It is amazing to me
that you can continue to write those books and manage to be profound
and hilarious every single time. Truth and comedy usually go hand in
hand but I don't think too many manage to marry them up as well as you
can.

Question: Is Rincewind coming back? I actually think Rincewind and
Susan would make a good couple. Lobsang is nice and all...but the
thought of Time and Death having children just frightens me. Death and
Accident-Prone but with Incredible Luck seem a better match.  
  

    
Maybe they only gave *you* one, Terry...
  

    
Catlike treader,

They're hats. And they are, indeed, black; I've got about eight of
them.  I just like big black hats, and when I went into a shop back in
the late 80s and saw this big Louisiana on a stand I thought, yep, this
is a life moment, this is Charlie Chaplin finding the baggy trousers.
Mind you, I have some others -- a big brown Akubra for Australia, for
example (it's still got the stain where the koala pissed on it.)

The black hats make a good Zen disguise.  Here, if I go anywhere in
the hat, someone *will* recognise me.  If I take it off, I can join the
vast anonymous brotherhood of bearded men with glasses.

Terry
  

    
Keith,

Thank you. I certainly have to be a more *careful* writer; in the
early days of DW I could invent wildly, but these days everything new
has to fit, in both the past and the future.

What I find works is the wild dash draft 0, fighting to get it all
down before it goes away...and then the months of editing that stuff!

Terry
  

    
Arlene,

I know not this TT of which you speak...

Again, thank you.  I Am Not Worthy -- well, not *that* worthy:-)

Yes, Rincewind will be coming back.  I doubt if I could ever kill him
off.  But Rincewind and Susan? (pauses to stare at wall for a
while)...on the whole, I think not.

It's a strange world.  I've just written a bit with Sweeper explaining
to someone how the quantum universe works, and blow me down if there
isn't an article in New Scientist about a new theory that exactly
covers what he says.  

Terry