I mean that they had become lovers and partners, not that he had removed his clothes and left them with her while she performed small puppet shows for them). I was excited by the prospect of meeting Susanna Clarke, and when I did finally meet her it was in the company of Colin Greenland, who had, shortly after their first encounter, persuaded her to entertain his suit (an odd expression, now I come to write it down. He called Susanna and asked to buy her story for an anthology he was editing. I loved everything about it: the plot, the magic, the glorious way Susanna put words together, and was particularly delighted by the information in the cover letter that Susanna was writing a novel set in the world of the tale, and that it would be called Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell – so delighted that I sent the story to an editor of my acquaintance.
Gamely, though, she sent me the rest of the story. This came as some surprise to Susanna Clarke, who had no idea that Colin had sent me an extract from `The Ladies of Grace Adieu'. I read it, and wrote back, and demanded more. He enclosed an extract from a short story.
Inside the envelope was a letter, in which Mr Greenland explained that he had just taught a writing workshop, and that one of the writers at the workshop was a remarkable woman of great talent, and that he wished me to read her work. Greenland had been one of the first persons I had encountered a decade earlier when I had stumbled into the worlds of science fiction and of fantasy: an elfin gentleman with a faintly piratical air, who wrote excellent books. I moved to America from England in 1992 and I missed my friends, so I was exceedingly delighted when the post brought a large envelope from one of them, a Mr.
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