Very sad news about Harry Horse and his wife, Mandy. Reading the obituary, I was struck by the means of his discovery:
“The manuscript of The Last Polar Bears arrived at Puffin Books in a beautifully manufactured parchment parcel knotted with string and covered in hand-drawn postage stamps. It looked as if it had indeed come from the North Pole, where the book is set. Most unsolicited manuscripts arrive unheralded but within moments all the senior Puffin editors were huddled round to examine this exotic package. No time was wasted in signing it up.”
Normally when unsolicited “packages” arrive like this they are given a wide berth: there seems to be a law of nature that extravagance of presentation is in inverse proportion to the quality of writing within. In Harry’s case, his sheer talent shone through.
