Jo Walton’s Among Others is out today in both e-book and hardback and having pre-ordered the Kindle version, I couldn’t resist – I sucked it only my iPhone and took a look around in it. Having looked in it, I can say that I would be absolutely shocked if a lot of it isn’t autobiographical. Not what happens in it, of course, just some of the places and the inside of Mor’s head. Of course, it’s also possible I just think so because of hat I alluded to before, building my own brain out of books, but I’m pretty sure that’s as true or more so of Jo Walton.
Madeleine L’Engle wrote somewhere that all of her characters were herself at different ages, or aspects thereof. That’s likely true for all or most authors – of the viewpoint characters, at least. Still, it feels somehow specially true here. If there’s not a whole lot of her creator in Mor, I will eat my iPhone.