The Lewis Legacy-Issue 85, Summer 2000 Note

All the Bells on Earth by James Blaylock (Ace Books)

“Blaylock is one of the most brilliant of that new generation of fabulist writers; All the Bells on Earth may be his best book…mystical and enthralling…at once reminiscent of C. S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength and Clive Barker’s urban fantasies.”

Washington Post Book World

In fact, Blaylock’s book is a lightweight compared to Lewis’s, but it is closely connected to the Lindskoogs, because it takes place near their home in picturesque central Orange, CA. The story begins: “A wet winter night. Nearly two in the morning and the spirit of Christmas haunts the ocean wind, sighing through the foil candy canes that sway from lampposts along Chapman Avenue, through the ribs of the illuminated Santa Claus in the distant Plaza, along empty alleys dark with shifting, anxious shadows. Raindrops slant across the misty glass globes of streetlamps, and heavy, broken clouds drift across the face of the moon. For a few moments the terra-cotta tiles of St. Anthony’s Church glisten in the moonlight.” Blaylock lives in central Orange.

Tim Powers has been a Lewis lover since childhood. He is a prizewinning author and an occasional teacher of creative writing. He was a signer of the C. S. Lewis petition.