Yours truly feels a smug sense of satisfaction after reading Fantasy Fuels a Factor’s Other Side from today’s issue of WWD (sub req’d). The topic of the article was Gary Wassner’s other life as an author of fiction. If you recall from the article I wrote last month, Financing fashion: 10 mistakes designers make based on an interview with Hilldun Factor’s Gary Wassner, I said:
Frankly, I expected Mr Wassner to be nothing other than a stodgy, narrowly focused financial manager type. He was none of those things. Rather, while he has 25 years in financing fashion, Gary is a philosopher and a multi-book author. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a master’s degree in philosophy. His works of fiction are highly and favorably reviewed… I explain his background so you’ll see his introspection provides an insight to fashion talent beyond the numbers on a balance sheet. Financing start ups -too young and small with little or no credit history- can be fuzzy but Gary has a gift for picking talent worth funding.
Smug because WWD has decided the topic was worth ink. Is it possible WWD is reading me? With over 70,000 monthly visitors, maybe I’m attracting some tradional industry readers but who knows? Perhaps they’ll consider advertising on site -I do have rent to pay.
Speaking of Gary’s books, I’ve read the first two in his series Gem Quest and am in the middle of the third. It’s impossible to explain but I’ve long forgotten he’s Gary Wassner of Hilldun Factors. No, he’s an author. If you enjoy fantasy, you’ll find the series engrossing. Add his books to your summer reading list and enjoy visiting another dimension.
Ok, this is off topic, but I saw the Birthday Greetings on Pattern Review this morning and thought I’d wish Kathleen many happy returns of the day…;)
LMAO!
Here’s part of an email from Gary:
Thanks for the kind words. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t, but they interviewed me for that article about two months ago.
As I told him, I can still delude myself into thinking my post led them to run it (you don’t publish everything you write). At the very least, I beat them to the punch :)
It’s a good interview. That Wassner fellow comes across as quite astute… which is why I work for him. :)
I’m in the middle of redesigning his website, by the way, so it doesn’t mention that Book 4 of the GemQuest series, The Revenge of the Elves, will be released April 2007. It’s phenomenal, too, so you’d better finish the third.
And check out this cover art!