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Edward Willett
Edward Willett was born in Silver
City, New Mexico, and moved to Weyburn, Saskatchewan, Canada from
Texas as a child. He studied journalism at Harding University in
Searcy, Arkansas; then returned to Weyburn to work as a
reporter/photographer for the Weyburn Review,
eventually becoming news editor. He then worked as communications
officer for the Saskatchewan Science Centre in Regina for several
years, quitting to become a full-time freelance writer in 1993. Ed
is the author of three previous young adult science fiction and
fantasy novels: Soulworm, which was short-listed for a 1997
Saskatchewan Book Award in the category of Best First Book; The
Dark Unicorn, which was short-listed for a 1999 Saskatchewan
Book Award in the category of Children's Literature -- both from
Royal Fireworks Press, and Andy Nebula: Interstellar Rock
Star from Roussan Publishers. Spirit Singer won the
Regina Book Award for best book by a Regina writer in the
Saskatchewan Book Awards. He has also published half-a-dozen
non-fiction books for children, which include Meningitis,
Arthritis, Hemophilia and Alzheimer's Disease,
all part of the Diseases and People series from Enslow
Publishers, and Careers in Outer Space from Rosen Publishing. Enslow Publishers have recently issued his children's biography of J.R.R. Tolkien, J.R.R. Tolkien: Master of Imaginary Worlds and he is currently working on a similar biography of Orson Scott Card.
He has also published computer science books including: Teach
Yourself Microsoft Publisher 2000, Your Official America
Online Guide to Creating Web Pages, and Your Official America
Online Guide to Internet Safety. Mr. Willett is webmaster and administrative assistant for SF Canada. Ed's short fiction has been
published in On Spec, Transversions and Artemis
Magazine. He also writes short stories, plays, and a weekly
science column for the Regina Leader Post and CBC radio, and
works professionally as an actor and
singer. Ed lives in Regina, SK with his wife, Margaret Anne, a
telecommunications engineer and their young daughter Alice.
Author's website
Hassenpfeffer, the author's blog site
ISFDB Bibliography
Biography
Interviews with Edward Willett:
1,
2
REVIEWS:
Spirit Singer:
1,
2
Lost in Translation:
1
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A review by Georges T. Dodds
Besides being a fun novel with engaging characters and having all the basic elements of a good fantasy [a prophesied heroine, a
quest, a feudal society, magic, an evil wizard-king, a character wavering between good and evil], Spirit Singer, shortlisted
for the 2002 Regina Book Award, manages to pack it all into 150 pages. Wait... it's not a 3,000 page, multi-volume series... not even
a obvious tie-in for a sequel... could it be that fantasy can be brief and well written too? While I'm not suggesting that
Spirit Singer has the depth of The Lord of the Rings, it's entertaining, unpadded, and has a clear presentation of
the problem, those wishing to fix it or worsen it, and finally a resolution of the problem. While Willett presents some characters
that are uni-dimensionally good or evil, others are torn between the two, and the villain isn't just smack-you-in-the-face evil,
he can be deceptive and play good with the best of them, albeit for a short time.
Amarynth is a young female apprentice spirit singer, learning from her grandfather how to ceremonially lead the spirits of the
dead through a spirit realm to a heaven of sorts. A dark entity suddenly begins to haunt the spirit realm, and black-vested travelling
spirit singers are muscling-in on towns and villages everywhere. Upon her grandfather's demise, Amarynth goes off in search of a new
spirit singer for her village, but notwithstanding a temporary escape with the help of an innkeepers son, she is dragged off to the
villain's lair. Refusing to pledge allegiance to the dark entity, and aided in her escape and quest by the innkeeper's and villain's
sons, she must reach a mountain-top sage in order to save her world.
This novel, marketed for young teens, has relatively little violence and is sex-free, both in the sense of interpersonal
relationships and personal growth. Certainly, if you're looking for a girl's evolving discovery of her womanhood, this isn't
the book to read. The evil has predominantly a spiritual/theological existence, though it has physical minions to feed it and
run its errands. These spiritual aspects might offend some fundamentalist Christians, but otherwise the book is fairly
innocuous, yet maintains a good pace and holds interest. Certainly, on the whole, young readers would likely get much more out
of this book in terms of good succinct plotting and writing than they'd ever be likely to from the droves of role-playing game
tie-ins and fat fantasy trilogies. The title is available in book form as well as a number
of electronic formats.
Copyright © 2002 by Georges T. Dodds
Georges Dodds is a research scientist in vegetable crop physiology, who for close to 25 years has read and collected close to
2000 titles of predominantly pre-1950 science-fiction and fantasy, both in English and French. He writes columns on early
imaginative literature for WARP, the newsletter/fanzine of the Montreal Science Fiction and
Fantasy Association and maintains a site reflecting his tastes in imaginative literature.
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