[Evans]

I'll confess that if anything I enjoyed the little series of vignettes in Madder Mysteries more than the stories themselves. The Cabinet of Curiosities was a wonderful idea - bizare and witty little sketches.

(I like Oliver very much as a writer too but I'm afraid I find a few of his stories suffer from being overly nebulus. The Aickman and James styles are mismatched sometimes.)

EDIT: I'm pretty sure that illustration is not in the Nightfarers itself - the story it refers to is The Dawn At Tzern.

Quote Originally Posted by MadsPLP

I I do think there is a significant evolution in the quality of his drawings though. The drawings in Madder Mysteries are much better and more accomplished than in The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini.This does not imply that I dislike the illustrations in the latter, more that his style and technical skill seems to have improved very much over the last few years.

Don't quote me on this but I belive Mr Oliver may be redoing some of the drawings (or at least adding more) for his Centipede Press Omnibus. Perphaps he will touch up some of the earlyer ones.

Amusingly his normal portrait of James from Madder Mysteries looks far more ominus and impressive than the dark mage one from The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini.