The Fellowship of Loons

Publishers Weekly (2/25) recently ran this quote from the web site bio of Wilbur Smith, the best selling author of The Quest:

"I was born of British stock on January 9, 1933, in Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia, in Central Africa. As an infant of eighteen months I was struck down by cerebral malaria, delirious for ten days. The doctors told my parents that it was probably better if I died, because if I survived I would be brain damaged... I survived and am now only mildly crazy. Which is good because you have to be at least slightly crazy to write fiction for a living.