"Del Rey Internet Newsletter #38" - читать интересную книгу автора

to write the new book. At first I was stumped. Where had Rali gone,
and for what purpose, and why hadn't she come back? I read Amalric's
words over and over again for some clue. Many days and much pacing and
nail-biting commenced.

The storm hit about an hour before dusk. The whole house shook with the
force of the wind. It was so strong that the ocean outside my window was
flattened. The surface peeled off in sheets, drenching the house. Then
it started to hail--big golfball-sized stones that hammered the roof and
exterior walls like demons at the Devil's forge. There was a flash and
all the power went off. Kathryn and I lit lanterns and got a fire going.
It was bloody cold.

I don't recall why, but for some reason I decided to go out into the storm.
I pulled on rain gear and stepped out the door. The hail was smaller now,
heaping up in drifts on the porch. I got into my pickup, put it in
four-wheel drive, dropped it into low, and strained over the dunes to the
beach, wiper blades fighting to clear the windshield. I stopped to look
out to sea. Not far off shore I saw a fishing boat battling the storm.
The seas were crashing over it as it fought to get away from the land.

And then it came to me that Rali was standing on this very beach.
Battling this very storm. And the boat was actually her ship and somehow
she'd been marooned in some cold desolate place.

About five years ago my wife and I went to Antarctica, and I've always
wanted to write a book set in that region. Here was my chance.

As I turned the truck around and headed home, the opening lines of what
was to become the third paragraph came to me:

"My tomb was ice. The castle that held that tomb was ice and it crouched
in a realm of frigid stone washed by frozen seas..."

I had solved the mystery of what had happened to Captain Rali Emilie
Antero, late of the Maranon Guard.

--Copyright 1996 by Allan Cole
[email protected]

Q & A===================================================================

Q: I am writing to find out when Anne McCaffrey's next novel is due out?
A: Anne McCaffrey has just turned in a new Pern novel; it's due out the
middle of next year.

Q: I have the book THE DREAMWRIGHT, published by your company. It is Part
I to the Might and Magic Series by Geary Gravel. I would like to know
when the next two books, THE SHADOWSMITH and THE WORLDCRAFTER, will be
available for anxious readers like me, or if they have already been