Now here's a fun way to spend a few pleasant hours: Finished Clive Barker's Everville, and now I'm in the middle of Tim Powers' The Stress of Her Regard.

An accident of timing in the to-be-read pile, certainly, but an interesting one, nonetheless.

Everville was very fun; it wasn't one of the new editions, I found an older paperback at Half-Price on my last trip there. I haven't read Great And Secret Show, something I didn't know was even necessary until I cracked the binding and found "Second Book of the Art" listed.

Fortunately, I dug through it anyway, and Clive hooked me as he almost always does, and gave me the groundwork I needed as I went along.

I say almost always because I bounced off Imajica. A big part was me, at the time Imajica came out, I just wasn't much in a place for it to catch me.

Damnation Game, Coldheart Canyon, those I caught but somehow I missed Great and Secret Show and Everville. The Books of Blood, I think I'm on my third or fourth copy of the first collection, I got that one the first edition, and this may be the first time I've had them stay in my house for longer than a year. All my other copies I loaned out to spread the word, and they never came back. Not that I mind. Sort of like Tad Williams and my copies of his first three novels, there are some stories I share widely.

Stress of Her Regard, well; mostly I had a hard time finding a copy, but the newest trade paper edition came out and I jumped on it as soon as I noticed. Tim, I started with The Anubis Gates, and return to the various other novels as I find them. Last one I read was Three Days to Never, which is a fun discussion all by itself.