As promised

I told you I'd be giving Spirits in the Wires the deluxe treatment when I finished it, and guess what? I did. Here we go.

Spirits in the Wires by Charles de Lint was published in 2003 in hardback, reprinted in softback in 2004. It achieved at it's peak 32,513 in Books on Amazon's rankings. It remains in print. Reviews of the book tended to focus on the characters rather than plot or setting, despite both plot and setting being fantastical in nature. They also noted that the key market was people who followed the characters and in general the writing of de Lint. According to the author's web site, he has written 61 books including short story anthologies and notvels for adults and young readers, and of those at least eight have been set in Newford (the primary setting) and included some of the same characters. The author has commented that each of his stories are meant to be capable of standalone enjoyment, but that it might enhance the reader's pleasure if they were read in a certain order (found here). In general, reviews were positive, though one noted that repeated reading of de Lint might grate the reader as "slightly saccharine and hackneyed after the umpteenth happy ending, but longtime de Lint fans will be delighted." --Jhana Bach

This is a good one, I swear

I've been a pretty good boy with my writing. I finish my assignments with enough time so that I can go back and redo them when I realize they're garbage, and that's important for anyone.

Reading, I'm still not quite done with Hero with 1000 Faces. I did read an article on the author of 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance' this weekend. I gave my brother a copy of this for Christmas a few years back; I'd never read it before, still haven't, but I knew it was supposed to be a strong story on personal philosophy that, unlike so many others in the genre, has survived decades and still is viable. The article told me a lot more about both the author and both his books than I imagined could be in there. In retrospect, I probably should have, as the course of true personal enlightenment ne'er did run smooth, but it still piqued my interest, and I'll probably steal that book from my bro when I see him over the holidays. The article was in the 19 Nov Sunday edition of the Observer.

I'm in the middle of reading Spirits in the Wires right now, by Charles de Lint. I was first clued into his writing by a friend who lent me a volume of short stories he's written. Various characters all set in the fictional town of Newford in modern era, and how these characters deal with their brief encounters with the mystical. As far as structure goes, de Lint is a bit too formulaic. He's found the plot he likes and can produce, and he does it in many different ways. What keeps me interested in the characters he does this with. Many varied backgrounds encoutner each other under somewhat similar circumstances, they have their own reactions, the make their own decisions, you come away feeling like you're getting a real look at a fairly-idealized tucked-away town where a little of everything lives. I haven't looked at the reviews online or the marketing analysis because I haven't finished it just yet and want to form my own opinions before giving it the full write-up treatment, but it is coming.

Making up for lost time

I got through Wuthering Heights. I had to take a few shortcuts to make it through (like a bit of audio-book listening versus reading), but I retained enough to get the points of the lesson. The language is a bit dense, but the story itself was pretty enjoyable, I thought. I would like to go back and give it a proper read-through when I have the time. One thing I really liked that we didn’t get to touch on in class was the nature of Heathcliff’s antagonism – yeah he ends up being this colossal jerk towards everyone around him, but he didn’t start out that way. He was betrayed or abandoned by just about everyone that showed him any kindness, that’s going to mess anyone up. I tended to think of him not as malevolent as much as revealing; he just showed the negativity everyone around him tended to repress.

I also read a couple of magazines from the base room: the Graphic Novel edition of the Bookseller and the Oct 11 issue of Marketing. Marketing I couldn’t get a lot out of, but that may just be because I didn’t have a lot to look for. I think it’s a magazine you read when you have a particular thing you want to sell and need to know how others are doing the same thing. The Bookseller was a bit more for me, I definitely want to read the more general edition, but the Graphic Novel section was very informative. It focused on how bookstores might move more product of that medium, and not just manga (although that’s what most people are buying but I’m not going to comment on that). I love my comic book shop, but if the medium is going to expand I think it’s going to be in bookstores, so that’s an outlet I and other aspiring comic book makers should pay attention to. I’m going to try to make borrowing magazines from the base room a regular thing – I don’t know that I’ll be able to read them any other way.