Willie P. Bennett

Willie P. Bennett - R.I.P.

http://www.williepbennett.com/

(Photo by D. Staples)

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Newsletter 25

Greetings all,

I hope this finds you well. MaryAnn and I are fortunate to have spent a good part of this summer at our little cottage (read: an old schoolbus on a lake) in Quebec, where rural life rolls out slowly and the most exciting events in our days consist of local wildlife sightings. No bears so far, but September's the time when they'll likely show up to raid the nearby apple orchards.

It hasn't been all play. I've been steadily working on a new novel tentatively titled The Mystery of Grace and expect to turn it in to Tor this December.

NEW BOOKS - SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER BOOK TOUR

My latest young adult novel, Little (Grrl) Lost, should be showing up in your local bookshop any day now. In a few weeks Penguin Putnam will send me on a whirlwind book tour to meet my readers and sign books. I'll be in North Carolina, Texas, California, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alberta. I hope you'll drop by and say hello if I'm in a town near you. You'll find details on my site at:
http://www.sfsite.com/charlesdelint/faq-appearances.htm

Seattle will be my busiest area with five events. Most are signings, but the Hugo House signing on the 17th will include a concert with MaryAnn (sadly, Seattle's the only part of the tour where she'll be joining me). We'll also give a concert at Foolscap IX convention in nearby Bellevue. 
http://www.foolscapcon.org/index.html

Charles Vess will be my co-Guest of Honour at Foolscap. It's always a treat to feast your eyes on Charles's artwork and I'm sure he'll also have some good stories to tell about the making of the movie Stardust.


Also hot off the press is my new Jilly novel, Promises to Keep, from Subterranean Press. Details, reviews and ordering info are available here:
http://www.subterraneanpress.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=SP&Product_Code=delint15

MYTHIC FICTION WRITING WORKSHOP

I'll be teaching a one-day Mythic Fiction workshop in Seattle on Sunday, September 16th. Class size is limited to 15 persons, so sign up quickly if you care to sit in. There's a course description and registration info here (scroll wayyy down):
http://www.hugohouse.org/classes/listings/

AWARDS & HONOURS

I'm not one to toot my own horn, but MaryAnn insists that I tell you about some recent honours.

Widdershins has made the British Fantasy Society Award Recommendations for 2007, and also placed 1 in Amazon.com's Editors' Picks for the Top 10 Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2006.

The Blue Girl won the Ontario Library Association White Pine Award as well as the 2007 Great Lakes Great Books Award. Both were voted on by high school readers, which makes winning them particularly gratifying for me.
http://www.bookcentre.ca/awards/award_ind/awards.php?award=whitepine
http://www.michiganreading.org/

AUDIOBOOKS COMING

Other good news is that I've recently licensed five books to Blackstone Audiobooks. Titles include Widdershins, The Onion Girl, Moonheart, Memory and Dream and Dreams Underfoot. It's too early to know the production schedule, but I'll get back to you when I have more info. I'm especially happy that some of my work will finally be available to visually impaired folks.

MUSIC RECS

It'd be easy to go overboard with music recommendations simply because there's so much good music coming out, every week, week after week.  So let me just touch on a few: I'm loving the album This Is the Life by Scottish singer-songwriter Amy MacDonald.  I've also had the chance to hear the new Steve Earle CD Washington Square Serenade (thanks Ian!); it's due out in October, and well worth checking out.  KT Tunstall's new CD Drastic Fantastic is out sooner (September 10th in the UK); I've only heard the first single so far, but it sounds...well, fantastic.  Lastly, for now, if you catch Calexico on their current tour, pick up their CD Tool Box, which is only available at concerts; it's an all-instrumental outing (probably outtakes from their last studio CD) and easily one of my favourites by them.  It's probably also available from their Web site.  (I'd go check, but I'm writing this from the bus and we only have dial-up here...)

MARYANN'S NEWS

MaryAnn closed the doors on her boutique at the end of June. She had a great time with the shop and has no regrets about delving into retail over the past couple of years, but she's deliriously happy to return to "normal" life. That said, she'll surely show up on eBay from time to time, so if you want to be told when she puts things up for auction, just drop her a line at mah@cyberus.ca.

cheers

Charles

www.charlesdelint.com

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Newsletter 24.1

May 8, 2007

MaryAnn is pretty excited about my September publishing schedule, to the point where she snitched a couple of advance reading copies for eBay. To steal a few lines from a message she sent to her own mailing list:

"LITTLE (GRRL) LOST has the folks at Viking so jazzed that they've made it their lead title for the fall and PROMISES TO KEEP is going to satisfy a lot of readers who were curious about Jilly's transformation from messed-up street kid to exhuberant young artist."

Here's a link to MaryAnn's auctions: http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQfgtpZ1QQfrppZ25QQsassZreclectica

Viking will be sending me out on tour for LITTLE (GRRL) LOST, but I haven't a clue yet as to where. I do know that MaryAnn and I will both meet up in Seattle on September 15th for our 27th wedding anniversary, which is a happy circumstance. We'll then spend a few days visiting with friends before heading over to Bellevue, Washington on September 21st for Foolscap IX. Their artist Guest of Honor will be Charles Vess, so we're even more delighted about that trip. http://www.foolscapcon.org/

PROMISES TO KEEP also has a September release date. This link will take you to its page at Subterranean Press: http://www.subterraneanpress.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=delint15&Category_Code=B&Product_Count=37

Take care of each other.

Charles

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Newsletter #24

May 8, 2007

Hello folks.  Calling these few short paragraphs a "newsletter" is a bit of a stretch. Maybe "news flash" would be better. Still, here we are, and I hope this finds you well. 

After a long dreary winter (I seem to remember too much rain and grey skies and not enough days with the sun gleaming on the crisp white snow), spring has finally arrived up here in the north. The flight patterns of the crows have changed as they return to roost each evening, our little white cat spends each day trying to get as muddy as possible, and the moles are poking their heads out of the ground, blinking in the bright light and thinking they should say hello to the larger world beyond their underground burrows (that would be me).

Mostly, I'm writing to let you know about my latest project with Charles Vess.  We're both so busy these days that we don't get to work together as much as we'd like.  I'm making progress on my next book for Tor, and if you want to see what Mr. V.'s been up to, check out his Web site at www.greenmanpress.com.  But we did get to collaborate on a piece for Realms of Fantasy, and I wanted to mention it to you while it's still on the newsstands.

It's called "Companions to the Moon," a story of mine based on a painting by himself.  This is the first of a series of collaborations.  Subsequent offerings will feature stories by other authors, but the paintings will all be Vess originals. Ours appears in the June 2007 issue, and I notice that retailers are asked to display it until June 4th--which is why I thought I'd better get this out to you before it's gone. (But with that said, you could always get a subscription.  I mean, where else are you likely to find a new Richard Parks story every few issues?)

Speaking of June, MaryAnn and I will be having our huge annual book and yard sale on Saturday the 9th. You can find all the info about it up on my Web site, www.charlesdelint.com, including a spiffy new poster designed by MaryAnn and maps showing you how to get here. 

We've been delighted to meet some far-travelling visitors at the sale, so if you're thinking of coming, please take the time to say hello when you arrive.  We'd love to meet you even if we seem busy.

What else?  Well, the third CD by Rodrigo y Gabriela hasn't left my player in months.  If you like acoustic guitar music with a Spanish flavour, you really should check them out.  Some other favs include the new Brock Zeman album (www.brockzeman.com), which was recorded with Dan Walsh (ex-Fred Eaglesmith band).  Then there's the Detroit Cobras' Tied & True; a new Feist (The Reminder); The Good, the Bad & the Queen (featuring the Clash's Paul Simonon); an album of covers by Patti Smith (Twelve) and Alan Stivell has a new CD (Explore) with rhythms that sound like he might have been exploring Jamaica.

I'll keep this brief because I'll be sending you another note shortly about other projects. For the moment, I wanted to be sure you heard about "Companions to the Moon." Hope you can track it down.

Take care of each other and enjoy the spring!

Charles

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Christmas

Are we already almost at the end of another year?  Is it really Christmas tomorrow?  I don't practice any organized religion, but I still like Christmas because people are usually in a better mood than usual at this time of year.  You almost get the feeling that we could all get along in this old world of ours. 

So from our household to yours, no matter what faith you practice, we wish you Merry Christmas and the best for the upcoming new year.

Charles & MaryAnn

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Birthday messages

Thanks for all the kind words, folks.  It's much appreciated.  And if I don't get the chance to update this before Christmas and New Year's (because I've been so very concientious about doing so this far!), here's wishing the best of the season to you all.  (Cue in your favourite holiday music--I'm rather partial to the Raveonettes Christmas single from last year myself.)

cheers

Charles

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Bluesfest

          I write everyday, no exceptions.  But there are times when I don't do as much writing as I could, such as this past weekend.  But I had a good excuse: it was the opening of the Ottawa Bluesfest, ten days of music that ranges from Americana to Latin, rock, indie, alt-whatever, and yes, blues. 

          The highlight so far has definitely been Calexico on the Black Sheep Stage, who already were pretty much my favourite band (I mean, the Clash are long gone, right?).  I would have liked some more material from the new album, but whos going to complain when a band pulls out its greatest hits and delivers them to you, non-stop, for seventy-five minutes or so?  Not me.

Here are a few shots from the show:

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Newsletter 23.2

I really enjoyed meeting all of you who came out to the various signings on the recent short tour for Widdershins--thanks so much for your support.  Mythic Journeys was a fabulous ending to it all. 

But it's not completely over.  While we were in Atlanta for Mythic Journeys, MaryAnn and I recorded some music and conversation for Anne Strainchamps' To the Best of Our Knowledge show which will be broadcast on Wisconson Public Radio on Sunday, June 18th.  It's a special show with a Midsummer Night's Eve theme that also features our good friend Holly Black.  You can get more into at:

http://www.wpr.org/book/060618a.html

You can also listen to the show on-line, or pull it up from their archives if you happen to miss it while it's airing.

Then, on Tuesday, June 20th, we have our Ottawa launch to celebrate the publication of my 60th book,  Widdershins.  The event takes place at Patty's Pub (1186 Bank St., in Old Ottawa South at the corner of Bank and Ossington; 613 730-2434), and includes a reading, some live music, and a signing.  While you can certainly bring your own books, there will be books available at the venue.

And lastly, our annual book & yard sale is happening on Saturday, June 24th this year (with a rain date of Sunday the 25th).  You can find more information and directions on my Web site at:

www.charlesdelint.com

I hope those of you who live in the Ottawa area can make it to either, or even both events.  And as I mentioned before, thanks once again for all your support for this book, and the rest of my body of work.

Take care of each other.

Charles

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