One of my personal writing heroes/goddesses passed away last night after a long illness. Vale Diana Wynne Jones. Thank you for your stories.
Dogsbody and Charmed Life are two spec fiction books I remember reading when I was quite young (I suspect around 8). I don’t think I connected them as the same author back then but loved them both for their mix of the everyday with the fantastic and great characters and even then, though I wouldn’t have been able to tell you, the sense of depth to her worlds. I may have read others of her children’s books back then but those were the two that stuck with me. The star stuck in a dog’s body and the enchanter who doesn’t know he’s got magic.
Diana came back into my reading life when I was a teenager. I had gone to the city for the day on the train from the country town I grew up in which means I must have been fifteen or sixteen, I guess. And I have a very vivid memory of stopping at the little newsagent/book stall at Flinders Street station as I was heading home with about ten dollars left in my purse and seeing a stack of books on sale and picking up one with an interesting orangey cover with a wicked looking lady on a horse (the power of covers) and the intriguing title Fire and Hemlock. The blurb sounded interesting and it was $6 so I bought it. And probably ignored my friends on the way home while I read it and fell in love with a story of magic and mythology with Romance! and a heroine who does the rescuing but still with this very ordinary world feel to it. As though just round the corner from ours was this world she wrote about and that maybe you could find the right doorway and get there.
I still have that very book, re-read many, many times (though I’ve never seen my particular cover anywhere else) and from that day began to read every DWJ I could get (not so easy back then before the internet).
She’s been one of those authors whose every new book I anticipate and devour and I re-read several of her books each year. She has undoubtedly had a huge impact on the way I think about story and fantasy (for a start, all fantasy writers should read The Tough Guide to Fantasyland) and my stories. And I’m very sad she’s gone. It feels like losing someone I know and the knowledge that there are no more of her stories to be had is horrible. Fire and Hemlock, I think, is sadly out of print as are some of her other earlier books but hopefully one day it will be re-printed (or released digitally) but there are plenty of wonderful books of hers that aren’t…from kids books to YA to adult books, so if you get a chance, read one of her stories and hopefully you’ll fall in love like I did.
I wish I’d written to her at some point and told her how much I loved her books. I think that’s one of the best things you can do for an author (besides buying the books and telling others how much you love them)…let them know when you love something they write. It’s so much easier now with the internet and I know my writer friends all love to hear that they have written something someone loved. It can be a tough thing, this writing gig, and I think all writers deep down must have that part of them that writes because they want to share their stories and maybe give to somebody else what a beloved story has given to them. So go forth and tell the writers you love that you do and then tell other people.
And, if you’re a writer, then in honor of a wonderful writer and her stories, write hard and make something great.
