De Lint’s first adult fantasy novel in 8 years weaves a rich tapestry of story with classic CdL elegance. Young Thomas Corn Eyes sees into the otherworld, but all he wants to do is get off the rez. Steve Cole escaped from his rock star life to disappear into the desert and mountains. Fifteen-year-old barrio kid Sadie Higgins has been discarded once too often. Blogger Leah Hardin needs to leave … Newford, come to terms with the loss of her best friend, and actually engage with her life. When these lives collide in the Hierro Maderas Mountains, they must struggle to escape their messy pasts and find a way to carve a future for themselves.
They don’t just have to learn how to survive. They have to learn how to fly.
Beautiful, elegant, and remarkably kind, this is the work of a storyteller at the peak of his
abilities. With de Lint, there’s no need to say, “I can’t wait to see what he does next.” What he does now is always enough to take my breath away.
—Seanan McGuire, author of the October Daye series and other novels
Charles’ new book filled me with joy! From the first line to the last, I was completely involved. A book about those “outside” who think they want to get “in,” there are good lessons to be learned—painlessly—from beginning to end.
—Janis Ian, songwriter & musician
With this gently rolling, lyrical composition of a book, the godfather of urban fantasy flows back to where he’s most needed. If there’s one thing today’s world can gain from literature, surely it’s de Lint’s signature sense of unsullied wonder and devotion to the best within us.
—Melissa F. Olson, author of the Scarlett Bernard series and other novels
As a struggling unpublished novelist, I read Charles de Lint and found the template for the kind of stories I wanted to tell, ones that brought magic and folklore into the modern world. After fifteen novels of my own, I’m still both humbled and enthralled by the ease with which he draws the reader into his stories, because now I know just how hard it is. The Wind in His Heart is tough, tender, grim, light on its feet, magical, and brilliant: in other words, a typical de Lint masterpiece, once again setting a high bar for those of us who follow.
—Alex Bledsoe, author of the Tufa series and other novels
Oh what a sweet, wonderful ride that was! I was enthralled. I didn’t leave my house all weekend; it was glorious. It was throwback CdL, a vast, shifting landscape of story woven upon story, just what I love. What a love letter to the desert.
—Lizz Huerta, author, winner of the Lumina fiction award
Splendid and so very healing!
—Charles Vess, artist, winner of the World Fantasy Award
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Every bit as good as I remember
I stumbled upon a Charles de Lint book years ago in a used book store and read whatever of his other books I could find after that. I loved looking into the other-world through those stories. I always found beautifully written ideas that stopped me in my tracks to think about what they said to me.
And then for several years I found nothing. By chance I came across The Wind in His Heart a couple of weeks ago on Amazon. (Sadly, they seldom seem show up in libraries or the few remaining bookstores.) Now I remember just how magical and filled with meaningful ideas his stories are. I can hardly wait for more!
I know it’s been out for a while, but I’m not always (read: ever) on top of what’s most current. I’ve loved DeLint since the first book I read by him.
Amazing urban fantasy. He’s not quite in his Newford world here, though there are references to Newford, so we’re in the same universe, on the same planet.
One of the things I love about DeLint is his ability to generate intense emotional content. It’s something I’ve strived for in my own urban fantasy: that sense of present, intimate, personal feeling. Even if he’s not giving you an epic sword battle–and let’s face it, that’s not what he’s going for anyway–you’re sucked in by incredibly deep and broad characters, people who serve as a mirror into your own soul. This is urban fantasy served up as “literary fiction” better than some of the masters of that genre could have done. We have real, three-dimensional humans, encountering the bizarre and the unknown, in a world where the rules are alien at best, maybe even impossible to intuit.
For this relative unknown, DeLint remains a true inspiration. Keep ’em coming, sir!
Beautiful book.
Charles de Lint continues to be one of my favourite writers. He is a gifted storyteller–an original, who has written more than 70 novels for children, young adults, and adults, and received several awards for his work. Renowned as one of the trailblazers of the modern fantasy genre, he is the recipient of the World Fantasy, Aurora, Sunburst, and White Pine awards, among others. Modern Library’s Top 100 Books of the 20th Century poll, conducted by Random House and voted on by readers, put eight of de Lint’s books among the top 100.
If you like Neil Gaiman, I guarantee you will like Charles de Lint. His Newford series is fantastic. Widdershins (book #11 in the Newford Series) is one of my all-time favourite books.
Like me, Charles loves myth and folklore, so it finds its way into his urban fantasy novels. He is also a poet, an artist, and a musician, like many of his characters. De Lint says, “I’ve taken to calling my writing “mythic fiction,” because it’s basically mainstream writing that incorporates elements of myth and folktale, rather than secondary world fantasy.”
De Lint weaves this story through multiple viewpoints and each character has their own tale to tell, but the main thread winds around the arrival of a young girl named Sadie Higgins.
When Sadie is dumped on the Kikimi Rez by her abusive father, she is rescued by an ageless musician named Steve Cole who takes her to stay with Abigail White Horse (Aggie), an eighty-year old Kikimi artist. After mending Sadie’s physical wounds with desert herbs, one of the first things Aggie does is feed her. Sadie’s never eaten much that didn’t come from a can or arrive as take out, so Aggie’s traditional stew makes an impression.
The Kikimi people are a fictional Native American tribe from the American Southwest. A desert people, who dwell in the Painted Lands, the Kikimi have a long complex history. Before the Spaniards and the Americans invaded from the south and the east, the people grew corn, beans, and squash and lived peaceably along the San Pedro River. Forced into the mountains, they became warriors and fought back, until the Women’s Council “saw the futility of battling the endless tide of invaders” and they forged an uneasy and unequal peace. As is the case on some reserves today, a conflict arose between traditionalists intent on preserving culture and those open to cultivating business, like casinos, on the reservation.
In The Wind in his Heart, the protagonists are traditionalists. A conflict arises when Sammy Swift Grass, who manages the casino, guides hunters into the mountains to kill a bighorn sheep. The problem is, the sheep is actually Derek Two Trees, a ma’inawo who happened to be shot while in his animal form. Sammy has his head, ready to give to the hunters for mounting.
Two worlds converge: the contemporary Kikimi world and the mythic otherworld—ghost lands where the spirits and ma’inawo dwell. The otherworld is like Faerie, and as in Faerie, humans who venture there are changed. Aging halts. In the otherworld, past, present, and future occur simultaneously.
Time moves differently on the other side. The otherworld is actually an onion of worlds, each skin peeling back a different layer to reveal yet another world. In some places, years pass in what are only minutes here. In others, a few days can be a decade.
The ma’inawo are magical beings who can appear in either human or animal form or as both together. Naturally, the traditionalists, many of whom are ma’inawo themselves, want to avenge the murder of Derek and other ma’inawo.
“Derek Two Trees wasn’t the first to die at the hands of Sammy Swift Grass and his hunters…The kin of other victims have been speaking to the wind, asking for justice,” says Abigail White Feather (Aggie).
Like other characters in this story, Aggie moves between worlds. She appears to be in her eighties, but was born before the Europeans invaded the Painted Lands. Aggie is an elder, a wise woman, and an artist. She paints the ma’inawo as she sees them. “Weird animal-human hybrids” like Calico, the foxalope. Sometimes, Calico sprouts horns; other times, she wears the face of fox, and still other times; she is a beautiful red-haired woman. Similarly, Aggie’s red dog, Ruby, shifts between being a dog and a woman.
Like the otherworld, de Lint’s story is multi-layered. After a second reading, I’m still sorting through all the complexities, and the story has found its way into my consciousness.
Kikimi shaman, Ramon Morago says, “My medicine speaks to the spirit. It teaches the spirit how to heal itself.”
The Wind in his Heart also speaks to the spirit. It holds its own medicine. Casts its own spell. Charles de Lint’s characters find healing in different ways. One by staying in the Painted Lands. Another by leaving. Still another, by receiving kindness and acceptance from the people she encounters no matter what she does to drive them away. This novel is about healing.
One of the author’s absolute best. Falling under South West fantasy, I would dearly love to meet the “cousins”.
This is one of my most favorite books or 2018. De Lint’s southwest stories always move me, and make me wish the characters were real.
Love Charles de Lint, and this is a great story. I really enjoy his urban fantasy stories that are set in the desert.
Wonderful fantasy by a great author
great author, one of his best recent books!
Charles de Lint is always on the ball when he blends modern plots with faerie. Here he uses AmerIndian legends to tell a story by turns sweet and scary, hopeful and tragic. This one will stick with me. Well worth your reading time.
If you love Charles De Lint’s books, this will please.