Comments | extemporanea: I belong to Chrestomanci Castle

extemporanea

I belong to Chrestomanci Castle

Mar 27, 2011 21:56

A happy day playing quite a lot of Dragon Age yesterday (I'm getting better at setting tactics), but I got to my Twitter feed late last night to see that Diana Wynne Jones had died. This wasn't entirely a shock, I had a horrible suspicion it was her when Neil Gaiman tweeted about a friend on their way out, but it was still incredibly sad, and I'm ( Read more... )

fantasy, woe, y.a., books

Comments 11

Archer, Shine, Dillian, Venturus, Hathaway, Erskine, Torquil pinkthulhu March 27 2011, 20:22:05 UTC

Aaah, I remember reading her as a child. Archer's Goon was my favourite. Sorry to hear of her passing.

Re: Archer, Shine, Dillian, Venturus, Hathaway, Erskine, Torquil extemporanea March 28 2011, 07:43:10 UTC

Those names are amazing, aren't they? Like a litany. It's a wonderfully quirky book, one of my favourites as well.

virtualkathy March 27 2011, 23:37:35 UTC

I think it may have been Fire and Hemlock now that you mention it and oddly enough at the time I had *no idea* she'd written anything else. I originally stumbled across it as a young teen.
And I couldn't agree more, it's deeply sad to think there won't be new stories being added to my shelves. But I am looking forward to introducing her to my kids.

extemporanea March 28 2011, 09:52:49 UTC

ooh, point! I shall start acquiring a second collection posthaste, to inflict upon Da Niece. Heh.

wolverine_nun March 28 2011, 05:16:52 UTC

virtualkathy seems to think it was her :) but I have a distinct memory of it being me. Perhaps we got in simultaneously. It was Witch Week I remember recommending to you. It was the DWJ my local library stocked and which I had read multiple times. It will always have a special place in my heart.

extemporanea March 28 2011, 07:50:53 UTC

That's a bit odd, because my memory is of reading Witch Week rather late in the series - after I'd already read other Chrestomanci ones. Possibly you recommended it and I didn't do anything about it? Alternatively, my memory is as soft and cheesy as ever.

virtualkathy March 28 2011, 15:52:47 UTC

My memory is terribly vague on this, so it could well have been w_n? It's a bugger, getting old :->

extemporanea March 28 2011, 16:20:36 UTC

I know you were quite definitely Fire and Hemlock, I associate it with you very strongly, but I may be entirely wrong about it being the first DWJ I ever read. I've just checked with the Evil Landlord and he says I definitely introduced him to DWJ and gave him his copy of Archer's Goon, so clearly my memory isn't. Age. As you say. Alas. *fossilises*

Oh, gods, I've just remembered. The first one I ever read was Castle in the Air, because we dramatised the hell out of it for that Tolkien Soc evening, remember? Which of you was responsible for that?

mac1235 March 28 2011, 06:45:50 UTC

I've been picking up Chrestomanci cheap at bookshops over the last year.

extemporanea March 28 2011, 16:21:29 UTC

as do all right-thinking people ;>. There's also a new paperback series which is available quite cheaply on places like Loot.

Uneducated first_fallen March 29 2011, 11:54:25 UTC

I've never read any DWJ :(. I admit to being more of a SF fan from about 14 onwards and haven't really read any fantasy since Eddings and the Dragonlance stuff and the Drizzt stuff (please don't shoot me). I am liking the Tepper, though, perhaps I should give fantasy more of a chance :P.

Please push some DWJ at me next time I'm at your place fondling your Hobbit.