Walking the Wall

I love Patricia McKillip’s writing because she truly takes you away to a world that is so completely different, but in the end she is telling a lesson about things that are just as important in our every day lives as they are in those far off worlds. The covers on her books are simply gorgeous, every one of them. Most of her book covers, and all of her newer book covers are by Kinuko Y. Craft and there hasn’t been a greater melding of the written word and the cover art that I’ve ever seen. On the full jacket cover you can see all the main elements Od Magic, Od is sitting to the left with all the animals on and around her, the blinded magician at the top signifying they have lost their ability to really see, and the beauty of the woman behind the mask with her gorgeous embrodiered dress of quiet magic.

This book was a breath of fresh air, in it is a gardener who doesn’t realize his power, and one of the greatest aspects of his power is simply being able to be completely still, to listen with every part of his being, so still, and so silent that he can hear the plants growing and whispering. The wizards of the land had learned so much that they had learned how to define what was impossible–and so it nearly became impossible because they couldn’t look outside of their own definition of magic to see that other lands and other peoples might have other magics different–but no less important. They discovered that if you fear something enough, it is all you can see, everywhere, all around you:

"You are seeing what the king would fear. I see–" Yar paused, felt their attention again, their awareness of him. Wonder swept through him, fierce curiosity, longing. "I see," he wishpered, "all the possiblities of magic" (288).

In their fear, they nearly killed wonder and possiblity, in their quest to kill everything they feared, they nearly lost everything. It is a beautiful book, well worth reading, and applicable to the world we live in, not just the world of Numis.