Here we go!

This will be celebrations of authors, books, food, wine, etc.
Look for regular posts after March, I am moving a household of books, art, manuscripts, computers, etc.

Right before I went to Hawaii over the winter hols (mugged by a whale!), I finished Chalice, by Robin McKinley. What a wonderful book! About how hard it is to rebuild a world and yet how possible (at least that's one of the themes; like a dream, this book is open to interpretation!) Like Sheri Tepper, Robin writes books that are all different from each other and (sorry Sheri--you must remember I've said you wrote the perfect book) less didactic. Anyway I am old enough to have read Robin since her Beauty first appeared and even though I might like to see more of the same characters, she never disappoints with her new departures.

The book was totally unexpected and wonderful and there's a part about bees that reminded me of Elizabeth Goudge's Linnets & Valerians and that led me to Robin's blog which is very funny and I recommend it, too. I love how the characters in Chalice are figuring out what to to & how to be as they go along, because their abilities (but not their sensibilities) are different from 'the tradition" and yet there is no doubt they've been chosen to make things right. And they'll go down trying, if they have to. I enjoyed it immensely, even though I was hoping for a Sunshine sequel. See her faqs about that, sorry.