#dduane

prologue of diane duane’s so you want to be a wizard—

How did my dash know this was actual canon dialogue from The Search For Spock?

After seeing it on tumblr for years now, I finally joined the ranks of hundreds? thousands? of people who have made @dduane's Aggressively Garlicked Lamb.

It's really good! Different from other lamb dishes I've had before. Rather than disguise or lighten the, shall we say "robust" flavor of the lamb with acids, crusts, or complex herbs, the garlic simply rises up and enters a full-on cage match with the lamb. I used 2 bulbs and I could have used 3. The result is not at all subtle, but delicious and comforting. Bring the strongest Cabernet you have to the show for a savory, hearty tavern brawl in your mouth. Perfect for a cold winter night.

I'll admit, posting this letter openly online wasn't what I had originally thought would happen - when I drafted this, I had been hoping I'd be able to find an email address, or work address I could physically mail it to, since a part of me is still nervous about the thought of putting this somewhere everyone can see it rather than just the intended recipient and her business associates. It doesn't help that I was born an old man and that using social media like this is not something I am used to. Using my real name especially, even if it's just my first, is not something I like to do online - but this letter is personal enough I wouldn't feel right utilizing a username.

On top of that, I had not imagined that you would be going through such a loss upon receiving this letter. To read that you are dealing with the death of your husband was dreadful news, and I doubt, even were I to put my all into trying, that I could fully comprehend the feelings you have in this moment. I wish I had better words, and though I do not know you personally, I say with as much sincerity as text will allow that I am sorry this has happened to you.

I wonder if I should wait - hold off for some theoretical future ideal time to send the letter instead because doing it now will lead to it having been screwed up and the thoughts and feelings I put into it will have been for nothing. But even as the back of my mind says this, I know that doing so will just leave this letter to sit on my hard drive collecting metaphorical dust, and that those ideal circumstances will never arrive. And I know I will ache if I don't share these feelings.

So, even if I can't know there will be a response, or even know if this will be read, I have to fling this message out into the world and hope it reaches its destination.

---

Dear Diane Duane,

When I was in elementary school, I found a copy of an audio recording of So You Want to Be a Wizard at my local library. Though passing years had erased some of the finer details, I distinctly remember renting it on multiple occasions to listen to as I played with toys like Lego, as I drew, and as I lay in bed trying to sleep. And the finer details that did stick stuck very hard.

I remember being enthralled by the approach to magic requiring careful planning, and how the spells were more akin to mathematical equations than the flicks of the wrist and simple incantations I was familiar with through other wizard focused media. I remember thinking that Fred, a sentient white hole, was a fascinating concept (I imagine he is at least part of the reason I have a long standing interest with black holes and the strange ways their intense gravity bends our understanding of physics), and that his sacrifice introduced the conflicting feelings of being sad that he was separated from Nita and Kit, yet comforted in the thought that he would in some way live on in Timeheart because they cared about him so deeply. I remember finding the other New York and the Lone Power simultaneously terrifying and yet utterly captivating. Above all, I remember loving the book and wishing I could spend more time in its world with its characters.

It wasn't until a few years ago, once I was several years out of college and fully employed, that I discovered the rest of the Young Wizards series. Doing so was a fluke – I was working an unsatisfying job which had just recently changed their policies to allow employees to wear earphones to listen to music/podcasts while in the lab. Even all these years later, So You Want to Be a Wizard remained in the back of my mind, and the drudgery of my time at work made me ache for the kind of wonder it had inspired when I was a kid. Upon completing it, I was recommended Deep Wizardry, and upon starting it I was immediately thrust back into the wonder of its world.

Since then, I have found a job in which I feel more fulfilled, have gotten married, and have been regularly rereading your stories. I've been sharing them with my friends, incorporating ideas from them into the tabletop role-playing games I play in and host, and have been letting them absorb me whenever I feel stuck in my own creative writing endeavors.

Though a part of me yearns to have been able to explore this world as I grew older alongside it, getting to encounter these stories as an adult has helped me recognize details in the writing that I couldn't as a child. I adore the theme of 'words have power' used throughout the series, particularly the return to the idea of changing a name in the first book – the rule that you must ensure your name in a spell is written correctly lest it change you, and using that rule to allow the Lone Power to change himself by Nita altering his name in the Book of Night with Moon is a beautiful bow in the story. I love how the characters react to each other and to the events around them throughout the series. The scene of Nita and Kit revealing wizardry to Nita's parents in the second book is so expertly paced – I appreciate how sincerely and seriously it is handled without becoming mired in being dour. There's no 'get out of jail free card' that allows Nita and Kit to get away with ignoring the consequences of how their parents perceive their actions, and the story doesn't revert to a full status-quo either. I appreciate that them revealing wizardry means something, and how this alters their relationship in scary, yet ultimately good, ways. There are so many details in your writing of this series that I love, I think that were I to record and list all of them here I would start rivaling the series in length.

Ultimately, beyond all of the wonder of diving beneath the sea as whales, beyond the horrors of finding yourself lost within a hive of alien insects as the threat of the universe growing cold looms above, beyond the fascinating thought experiment of how a computer based lifeforms might think, and beyond the tragedy of losing your mother despite doing everything in your power to stop it, the core feeling within the stories resonates with me in a way that I feel I can't fully convey. I appreciate how your stories portray that communicating with and working to understanding the world around us and the people that inhabit it is difficult, can feel thankless and leave you lonely at times, and that the world changing around you can be scary, and yet despite that, or even at times because of it, the connections that are forged in doing so are so much more valuable. That the world is a better place because of your individual efforts to make it so and your efforts are in some way recognized by the way you work to shape the world into something better than it is.

I hope that with this letter I am able to at least partially convey both the longstanding and newfound love I have for the work you put into your stories. The world you have crafted is a beautiful one, and the characters that occupy it have been a joy to see grow and change into better versions of themselves. I want to hold that core feeling tightly within me and introduce it to others because I find it so valuable and worth sharing (though he has not made it far into your series, I am determined to get my husband to read more - his own philosophy matches that of the Wizards and he, like everyone, could do with more of it in his life).

Finally, I want to thank you so very much for writing these stories and putting them out into the world. I wish I had better words to say than what I am about to write, as I feel they are not sufficient in expressing everything; the Young Wizards books are truly special, and the world is so much more magical because of your work.

Sincerely,

It's...

Wow. IT IS!

(sits around the house in wide-eyed astonishment for a day or so)

My gosh. Thanks so very much for that! I can't believe that never occurred to me before. NEVER!

...So now I know what I'm going to be spending the next week looking like...

(snicker)

Meanwhile, on the virtual side of things: various characters look on in vague astonishment.

"She said she's going out trick or treating like that... but she's gonna have to work a little harder on the lurching and staggering bit...."

I noticed something peculiar about the art here, it's a very small detail but still present!

What's this I see? Why, I believe those are the braids of the second in command! But wait a minute...

Bones' long sleeve uniform has different braids, as he's in charge of his department but not in the direct chain of command (kirk, then spock, then scotty). He may be fourth but that's not the point

My theory is that the artist for this cover used a still from one of the episodes as a reference for the pose, which is completely fair when you're trying to capture realistic detail like hand position and cloth folds. And, since spock is also in blue, it would be easiest to use a pose where spock is sitting in the command chair

I couldn't find the exact pose they used, but this is the most visually similar. Entirely possible they made some minor adjustments to small things! And such a minor detail as command rank braids isn't necessarily on an artists mind when their making a piece (aware of the show but not a fan, I believe that's how James Blish was when he began the novelization of episodes)