Where the boys aren’t

I notice odd things. One that’s been going around in my mind, as I try to push myself to actually write a book review, has to do with Patricia McKillip’s Od Magic. It’s a great book, you should buy it. As with all of McKillip’s books of late, it has a truly lovely dust jacket by Kinuko Craft which pretty much provides a summary of the book (much as Josh Kirby’s covers did for Pratchett’s Discworld novels). When you’ve read the novel you’ll recognise the characters on the front and rear of the book, and the various other elements. What might strike you as odd, though, is that none of the novel’s male characters are represented. Given that at least one is, arguably, the book’s major character, it seems very strange.