"Christopher Stasheff - Warlock 03 - King Kobold Revived" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stasheff Christopher)

Stasheff, Christopher - Warlock 03 - King Kobold Revived (v1.0) (html).html



TO MY READERS
This isn't a new book.

But it isn't an old book, either.

Let me tell you how it happenedтАж

Back in 1970, when King Kobold was first published, I waited with bated breath
to see what the critics thought of itтАФand was rather disheartened to find they
weren't exactly overwhelmingly enthusiastic. That's when I decided I shouldn't
pay too much attention to the critics.

Unfortunately, I couldn't ignore Lester del Rey. I had always admired his
perspicacity and penetrating insight (i.e., he always agreed with my opinion
about new books. Please understand that, at the time, I had never met him.).
When del Rey said, "It isn't a bad book, if you don't expect too much of the
evening spent with it," I knew I was in trouble. Worse, letters began arrivingтАФ
and they agreed with del Rey! And though del Rey had been gentle and
charitable, the fans felt no such need for restraint.

So, when the good people at Ace indicated an interest in reissuing King Kobold,
I said, "Not until I rewrite it!"

Please remember, I'd had twelve years to mull over the flaws of the original, and
figure out how to fix them. There were some changes that I knew I definitely
wanted to make, and quite a few others that I was thinking about.

So the book you hold in your hand is not the product of a publisher who tried to

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Stasheff, Christopher - Warlock 03 - King Kobold Revived (v1.0) (html).html


jazz things up to hype sales; it's the result of a mulish writer who refused to go
through having fans call him nasty names again. If you bought the original King
Kobold fourteen years ago and misplaced your copy-sorry, this ain't quite the
same book you read back then. And, if you never did read King Kobold (an
offense I will overlook only if you were too young to read), this ain't the plot
you've been hearing about. Better, I hope, but not the same. If your favorite
scenes are missingтАФwell, sorry. Or, worse yet, your favorite characterтАФwell,
I'm even sorrier; but I just don't think he really worked (not "she"тАФshe was a
total nonentity, and I don't see how anybody could miss herтАФexcept maybe
"him"). All in all, I'm pretty satisfied with this revised version; it's still
essentially the same story, but I think it's much more solid, and a much better
read (all right, so I haven't cut out all the lousy jokes). Besides, if you really
liked it better the other wayтАФwell, there's always the original edition. You'll