Clare gave me the The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition by Ursula Le Guin and illustrated by Charles Vess. I’m ashamed to say that I have not read any of the books before — in fact I have only read a couple short stories by Le Guin. I attended a lecture she gave at Georgetown in the 1990s and was impressed with her, but never got past the first few pages of A Wizard of Earthsea when I tried to read it.
I asked for this book because of Charles Vess. I loved his artwork in Neil Gaiman’s Stardust and follow Vess on Facebook. I actually have a connection to him. My brother was housemates with a guy called Josh who grew up in Abingdon, Virginia and his parents and Vess were friends.
The book is 1,008 pages long. I plan on reading it over the course of next year. At three pages a day, that’s not a big challenge.
Cedar Waxwing's 365 