I recently asked at The Rabbit Room whether readers there are more Took or Baggins. A great discussion has ensued.

So what are you? Answer at The Rabbit Room.

• Paradise Lost, by John Milton
• The Enchanted Castle, by Edith Nesbit
• Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll
• Till We Have Faces, by C.S. Lewis
• The Invisible Man, by H.G. Wells
• Dracula, by Bram Stoker
• The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
• The Little White Horse, by Elizabeth Goudge
• Electrophysiology Testing, by Richard N. Fogoros
• Handbook of Cardiac Electrophysiology, by Murgatroyd, et al
• The Only EKG Book You’ll Ever Need, by Malcolm S. Thaler
• Dracula, by Bram Stoker (again; audiobook)
• The Singer, by Calvin Miller
• Hog’s Head Conversations
• Coraline, by Neil Gaiman
• Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
• On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, by Andrew Peterson
• North! Or Be Eaten, by Andrew Peterson
• Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens
• The Nuts and Bolts of Cardiac Pacing
• The Nuts and Bolts of ICDs
• The Nuts and Bolts of Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy
• Captain Blood, by Raphael Sabatini
• The Castle Otranto, by Horace Walpole
• The Fiddler’s Gun, by A.S. Peterson
• The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman
• Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
• The Prodigal God, by Tim Keller
• The Man who Was Thursday (re-read), by G.K. Chesterton
• American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
• Between Noon and Three, by Robert Farrar Capon
• The Chimes, by Charles Dickens
• Letters from Father Christmas, by J.R.R. Tolkien
• The Chronicles of Prydian, Book 1: The Book of Three, by Lloyd Alexander
• The Farthest Shore, by Ursula K. Le Guin

From years ago: The Homestar Runner crew wishes everyone a Happy Thanksgiving.

Disclaimer: If you don’t already know about the characters of Homestar Runner, this will not be funny to you. Here’s a classic Thanksgiving toon from homestarrunner.com:

Bill Kauffman, a Batavia local and my favorite writer at Front Porch Republic, gives us some interesting Thanksgiving history. Read the entire article. It’s very funny. Here’s a teaser:

It seems that in 1939 Thanksgiving was to fall on November 30th, a matter of consternation to the big merchants of the National Retail Dry Goods Association (NRDGA). The presidents of Gimbel Brothers, Lord & Taylor, and other unsentimental vendors petitioned President Roosevelt to move Thanksgiving to the previous Thursday, November 23, thus creating an additional week of Christmas shopping—and to the astonishment of those Americans without dollar signs in their eyes, the President did so. (Not all merchants favored the shift. One Kokomo shopkeeper hung a sign in his window reading, “Do your shopping now. Who knows, tomorrow may be Christmas.”)

The new banner here at Letters from the Perilous Realm is the work of Aaron J. Smith, aka Cultural Savage. Those buttons for my two books on the sidebar below the pictures of Rochester are also his work.

If you’re looking for logos or banners, this is the guy you want to work with!

I’ll post pictures later of Sophia in her Clifford costume, Tricia in her Marge Simpson costume, and me in my vampire costume. In the meantime, I need to link the James Jordan piece on Halloween that I link almost every year. It’s a favorite.

PubCast #71: “A Hog’s Head Halloween,” or “John Granger’s Tell-Tale Dead Dog” will be posted at The Hog’s Head later tonight.

I’ve recently cut a few things from my life that will allow more time for writing, and I’ve begun the preliminary brainstorming work on a three-book series on The Christian Imagination. I’m in talks with a publishing company about them at present. Letters from the Perilous Realm will be my “home base” for scratching out the initial thoughts, so, once again, I’m working to revive this blog. I’ve also got an artist – new BHT fellow and brilliant log0-maker and photographer Aaron J. Smith – doing great work for me now, so new banner and connections to a new hub for my work will be coming in the near future.

Hope your Halloween is a great one!

I cannot wait for this.

Hog’s Head Conversations: Essays on Harry Potter
Edited by Travis Prinzi
with contributions from Colin Manlove, John Granger. Amy H. Sturgis, and more!
Zossima Press, 2009

“Aberforth! Two more fire whiskeys for these friends!” Welcome, HARRY POTTER readers, to the Hog’s Head,the gathering place for members of Dumbledore’s Army and the historic rallying point before the Battle of Hogwarts. We scholars of the Hogwarts Saga (Harry Potter’s triumph over the Dark Lord) have come together here to share our researches on the meaning of Harry’s seven adventures. Listen attentively to discover hidden secrets of the series and learn why the books are worthy to be studied more closely! Sip that fire whiskey slowly. Sit back and enjoy the ten best Hog’s Head conversations of the past year, edited into this handy collection. And don’t forget to throw your peanut shells to the goat in the corner.

Read the introduction! (pdf)

Purchase at Amazon.com!

I am happy to announce that I will no longer be blogging alone. You’ll get Perilous Realm letters from yet another writer from here on out: My wife, Tricia Prinzi!

Her first post, a book review of Eat, Pray, Love, will post right away.

I’ve definitely found new energy for this blog, and I’m happy about that. But I need to take a week off, because over the next week I have a talk at Brighton Memorial Library, a major Harry Potter conference (over 1,000 attendees) in San Francisco where I’m a Featured Speaker and  member of the press, a book release, and I have to pick up my dry cleaning.

See you next week.