| Author: | Charles de Lint | ISBN: | 9780920623459 |
| Publisher: | Triskell Press | Publication: | April 25, 2015 |
| Imprint: | Language: | English |
| Author: | Charles de Lint |
| ISBN: | 9780920623459 |
| Publisher: | Triskell Press |
| Publication: | April 25, 2015 |
| Imprint: | |
| Language: | English |
When asked to choose his “very best” stories, Charles de Lint went directly to his fans, who helped him select this collection of timeless, magical tales. From his beloved Newford to the streets of modern Ottawa, these stories take you effortlessly to a place where mystery and myth are right next door. To quote his readers: “His stories are good for the heart and soul…he reminds you of hope and strength and Beauty and Grace that you may have forgotten.”
“Just as Charles de Lint’s pen drips magic and enchantment, he is also never afraid to write about the darker and painful side of life, and he writes it in a way that moves you. Give this wonderful book a chance; I promise you it won’t disappoint you. Even more, I can assure you, you won’t be the same person when you are done with it: de Lint will have changed you with his magic.”
Reviews:
Contemporary fantasist de Lint built this winning compilation with help from his readers, who voted on their favorite stories. The result is an outstanding and widely varied collection of 29 tales. The delightfully light-hearted "Pixel Pixies" adds magic and mischief to innocent online interactions. ("If you're lucky, [the pixies are] still on the Internet and didn't follow you home.") "Merlin Dreams in the Mondream Wood" investigates the nature and meaning of memories. The heart-wrenching "In the House of My Enemy," later developed into the novel The Onion Girl, narrates the decisions made by a pregnant girl with an abusive past. Longtime fans and newcomers alike will fall in love with de Lint's graceful, poetic language and characters like "an old man who wore the shape of a red-haired boy with crackernut eyes that seemed as bright as salmon tails glinting up the water."
—Publishers Weekly
When it comes to urban waifs and strays, Ottawa fantasy writer Charles de Lint has his own unusual take, creating in his fiction a fantastic world populated by artists, musicians, booksellers, scholars, runaways and, well, magic. With The Very Best of Charles de Lint, the author, who is also a musician, has created a greatest-hits set with a twist. To determine which stories to include (from a body of work spanning 25 years), he asked his fans for their favourites via Facebook and Twitter. The resulting volume is more than 400 pages of the finest urban fantasy fiction of the past three decades, characterized by de Lint’s deep and passionate humanism.
—Robert Wiersema, National Post
There are a number of stories here—quite an impressive number of them—that are simply perfect. By that, I mean that they hit the mark they've aimed at. (And de Lint never aims low.) They've achieved the intended effect. An artistic balance has been achieved between lyricism and clarity of language, consistent and well-developed characterisation that propel the plot at a good pace, and the elements of myth dosed out carefully enough that they retain the elements of mystery. And it's easy to miss that exquisite feat of craft in sheer enjoyment of the story, and the set of feelings the author has evoked. And that, my friends, is storytelling at its best.
—Green Man Review
“Charles de Lint was writing Urban Fantasy before that genre was infiltrated by vampires and gritty streets. His Urban Fantasy introduces a magical realism to the world, spirit magic seeping into the cement environments mankind has built and most of the stories selected for this volume reflect that interest.”
—Steven H. Silver, The SF Site
De Lint is prolific, and if you’ve resisted picking him up because you’re not sure where to start, this is an excellent way to get a feel for his polished prose, his deep empathy for his own characters, and a wondrous world that may be filled with danger but is no less beautiful because of that.
—Mark Rose, BookGasm
“One of the most original fantasy writers currently working.”—Booklist
“Charles de Lint is the modern master of urban fantasy. Folktale, myth, fairy tale, dreams, urban legend—all of it adds up to pure magic in de Lint’s vivid, original world. No one does it better.”
—Alice Hoffman
“De Lint creates an entirely organic mythology that seems as real as the folklore from which it draws.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Charles de Lint is an impossibly, ridiculously talented sort of man—and I’ve been reading him for so long that he pretty much crafted my own ideas of what a fairy tale ought to be.”—Cherie Priest
“Charles de Lint is a folksinger as well as a writer and it is this voice we hear…both old and new, lyric, longing, touched by magic.”
—Jane Yolen
“He shows that, far from being escapism, contemporary fantasy can be the deep mythic literature of our time.”—Fantasy & Science Fiction
“You open a de Lint story, and like the interior of a very genial Pandora’s box, the atmosphere is suddenly full of deep woods and quaint city streets and a magic that’s nowhere near so far removed as Middle Earth.”—James P. Blaylock
“De Lint is a romantic; he believes in the great things, faith, hope, and charity (especially if love is included in that last), but he also believes in the power of magic—or at least the magic of fiction—to open our eyes to a larger world.”—Edmonton Journal
“It’s hard not to feel encouraged to be a better person after reading a book by Ottawa’s Charles de Lint.”
—Halifax Chronicle Herald
When asked to choose his “very best” stories, Charles de Lint went directly to his fans, who helped him select this collection of timeless, magical tales. From his beloved Newford to the streets of modern Ottawa, these stories take you effortlessly to a place where mystery and myth are right next door. To quote his readers: “His stories are good for the heart and soul…he reminds you of hope and strength and Beauty and Grace that you may have forgotten.”
“Just as Charles de Lint’s pen drips magic and enchantment, he is also never afraid to write about the darker and painful side of life, and he writes it in a way that moves you. Give this wonderful book a chance; I promise you it won’t disappoint you. Even more, I can assure you, you won’t be the same person when you are done with it: de Lint will have changed you with his magic.”
Reviews:
Contemporary fantasist de Lint built this winning compilation with help from his readers, who voted on their favorite stories. The result is an outstanding and widely varied collection of 29 tales. The delightfully light-hearted "Pixel Pixies" adds magic and mischief to innocent online interactions. ("If you're lucky, [the pixies are] still on the Internet and didn't follow you home.") "Merlin Dreams in the Mondream Wood" investigates the nature and meaning of memories. The heart-wrenching "In the House of My Enemy," later developed into the novel The Onion Girl, narrates the decisions made by a pregnant girl with an abusive past. Longtime fans and newcomers alike will fall in love with de Lint's graceful, poetic language and characters like "an old man who wore the shape of a red-haired boy with crackernut eyes that seemed as bright as salmon tails glinting up the water."
—Publishers Weekly
When it comes to urban waifs and strays, Ottawa fantasy writer Charles de Lint has his own unusual take, creating in his fiction a fantastic world populated by artists, musicians, booksellers, scholars, runaways and, well, magic. With The Very Best of Charles de Lint, the author, who is also a musician, has created a greatest-hits set with a twist. To determine which stories to include (from a body of work spanning 25 years), he asked his fans for their favourites via Facebook and Twitter. The resulting volume is more than 400 pages of the finest urban fantasy fiction of the past three decades, characterized by de Lint’s deep and passionate humanism.
—Robert Wiersema, National Post
There are a number of stories here—quite an impressive number of them—that are simply perfect. By that, I mean that they hit the mark they've aimed at. (And de Lint never aims low.) They've achieved the intended effect. An artistic balance has been achieved between lyricism and clarity of language, consistent and well-developed characterisation that propel the plot at a good pace, and the elements of myth dosed out carefully enough that they retain the elements of mystery. And it's easy to miss that exquisite feat of craft in sheer enjoyment of the story, and the set of feelings the author has evoked. And that, my friends, is storytelling at its best.
—Green Man Review
“Charles de Lint was writing Urban Fantasy before that genre was infiltrated by vampires and gritty streets. His Urban Fantasy introduces a magical realism to the world, spirit magic seeping into the cement environments mankind has built and most of the stories selected for this volume reflect that interest.”
—Steven H. Silver, The SF Site
De Lint is prolific, and if you’ve resisted picking him up because you’re not sure where to start, this is an excellent way to get a feel for his polished prose, his deep empathy for his own characters, and a wondrous world that may be filled with danger but is no less beautiful because of that.
—Mark Rose, BookGasm
“One of the most original fantasy writers currently working.”—Booklist
“Charles de Lint is the modern master of urban fantasy. Folktale, myth, fairy tale, dreams, urban legend—all of it adds up to pure magic in de Lint’s vivid, original world. No one does it better.”
—Alice Hoffman
“De Lint creates an entirely organic mythology that seems as real as the folklore from which it draws.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Charles de Lint is an impossibly, ridiculously talented sort of man—and I’ve been reading him for so long that he pretty much crafted my own ideas of what a fairy tale ought to be.”—Cherie Priest
“Charles de Lint is a folksinger as well as a writer and it is this voice we hear…both old and new, lyric, longing, touched by magic.”
—Jane Yolen
“He shows that, far from being escapism, contemporary fantasy can be the deep mythic literature of our time.”—Fantasy & Science Fiction
“You open a de Lint story, and like the interior of a very genial Pandora’s box, the atmosphere is suddenly full of deep woods and quaint city streets and a magic that’s nowhere near so far removed as Middle Earth.”—James P. Blaylock
“De Lint is a romantic; he believes in the great things, faith, hope, and charity (especially if love is included in that last), but he also believes in the power of magic—or at least the magic of fiction—to open our eyes to a larger world.”—Edmonton Journal
“It’s hard not to feel encouraged to be a better person after reading a book by Ottawa’s Charles de Lint.”
—Halifax Chronicle Herald
