Writing:
The Wanderer came out in hardcover from Tor in May. Very satisfying to see this work, completed during my second pregnancy, arrive on bookstore shelves the same month my child was born. I've been working on Patternmaker (my new book), but progress has been slow.
Artwork
The beautiful map that I did for The Wanderer ended up on the wrong disk and did not appear in its finalized form in the hardcover edition of the book. The lesson here: I allow myself to get too excited by intermediate iterations. NEVER give the production people anything other than the final copy of the work you intend to appear in a book. Labeling along the lines of "Draft only—final to come" will inevitably become separated from the work, with predictable results.
September: My "Calendar" has been updated for the remainder of 2004. August: I loved, loved, loved the review of The Wanderer which gave a snippet of "Cherry's" beautiful use of language—taken from one of the major bandages I had created over a major plot hole Cherry had not found the energy or time to correct herself. My "minor contributions to pull the manuscript together" were "appreciated."
Hah!
The revisions necessary to complete Cherry's novel—I'll be a gentleman and say only: they were NOT insignificant.
I'm glad that some at least have found the work to cohere—though that said—the title—and "wandering"—was Cherry's literary choice, and not just the cancer that killed her's effects. May: The Wanderer, by Cherry Wilder & Katya Reimann was published May, 2004, by Tor Books.
THE WANDERER
Cherry Wilder, Author, Katya Reimann, Author. Tor $27.95 (392p) ISBN 978-0-312-87405-6
Full of cosmic drama and grand enchantments, the late Wilder's last Hylor novel, completed by Reimann (Wind from a Foreign Sky ), addresses the same morally and philosophically complex issues of gender, society and self-learning that lifted earlier volumes in the Rulers of Hylor series (A Princess of the Chameln , etc.) above the common run of fantasies. The ambitious daughter of a peasant family struggling in a land of poverty, Gael Maddoc eagerly trains as a mounted soldier when offered the opportunity. She wins the respect of her rank after guiding betrayed charges across an enormous desert. Receiving council from the Shee (aka the Fair Folk), Gael is soon submerged in ancient intrigue. The plot gathers momentum when it becomes clear that she's the legendary, long-awaited Wanderer, "the chosen servant of the light folk." The authors' sparing use of magic helps highlight a naturalistic world of warring kingdoms, treachery and political conflict. Fans of both pastoral and hard-edged fantasy should be well satisfied.
(May 19, 2004)