Orrin Grey's Blog: Shovel Murders & Monologues, page 5

The Busy Season

For those of us who ply our trades predominantly within the spooky industries, October is always going to be our busiest time of year. And this year is no exception, as I gear up for the release of Glowing in the Dark, my latest nonfiction collection featuring some of my best writings on the horror film, due out from Word Horde next month.

In fact, this October might just be my busiest one to date. I’ll be hosting movie screenings, hanging out at an outdoor literary festival, having a book launch party at the Stray Cat Film Center, attending some screenings that I’m not hosting, and much more. To help keep everyone (including myself) up to date, here’s a list of all the events where you’ll be able to find me in October:

Oct 3, 7pm – I’ll be hosting a 25th anniversary screening of House on Haunted Hill (1999) at the Screenland.

Oct 6, 7pm – I’ll be in attendance for Andrew’s Video Void: Paranormal Paradise at Stray Cat.

Oct 10, 6:45pm – I’ll be hosting Eyes Without a Face (1960) at the Screenland.

Oct 12, 1-5pm – Find me hawking books at Lit on Grand outside Afterword Tavern & Shelves. This will actually be your first chance to pick up a physical copy of Glowing in the Dark!

Oct 13, 6:30pm – The annual Analog Sunday Double-Creature featuring not one but two Evil Dead knock-offs! At the Screenland.

Oct 15, 6pm – The big one! Book launch party for Glowing in the Dark at Stray Cat! Come see me, buy books, and stick around for a wild and weird Secret Screening! Admission to the party is free, but the screening either costs $10 or is FREE with the purchase of Glowing in the Dark.

Oct 16, 6:30pm – I’ll be hawking books in the lobby of the Aztec Shawnee Theater during a special double-feature of Werewolf of London (1935) and The Wolf Man (1941).

Oct 19, 4:30pm – One of my few holiday traditions. For the tenth year in a row, I will be in the crowd at Nerdoween, hosted by Greg and Jenius at the Screenland!

Oct 23, 6:30pm – Back for a repeat of the werewolf double-feature at the Aztec Shawnee Theater, assuming I haven’t yet sold all my books by then. If you miss this screening, there’s one more on October 30, but I won’t be around for that one.

Oct 24, 7pm – The Horror Pod Class presents the Sleepy Hollow Mixtape live at the Stray Cat!

There’s a lot more going on in October, but those are all the places and times where you will definitely find me. As previously mentioned, I also worked on a special pub crawl experience called The Harvest Society that’s running at watering holes all over Kansas City throughout the month. You can find more info at that link, and the whole thing wraps up at the Great Harvest Bonfyre on October 26 at Callsign Brewing.

There’ll be more coming here and on social media throughout the month of October. I’ll be posting more about some of these events as they transpire and I will, of course, be encouraging you, in so many different ways, to buy my book! Nor is my book the only one I’ll ballyhooing. My friend and fellow KC film nerd Abby Olcese also has a new book of film writing out this month, so pick up Films for All Seasons from IV Press!

If you’re local to the Kansas City area, I hope to see you at one or more of those events as the nights grow long and the veil wears thin! And if you’re too far away to attend in person, we’ll see you there in spirit!

Harvest Home

Besides that whole “new book coming out” thing, I’ve been working on some other stuff that’s happening this October. Before I get too far into that, though, it seems worth mentioning that Drinkaway Camp is up for “Best Pop-Up Bar” in The Pitch‘s annual Best of KC survey. So, if you enjoyed Drinkaway Camp or just enjoy putting your thumb on the scales of democracy, why not go over there and cast a vote?

For those who don’t know, Drinkaway Camp was a pop-up experience conceived and executed by my friend and Horror Pod Class co-host Tyler Unsell, with help from the rest of the folks at Signal Horizon Entertainment. I helped to come up with the name and wrote the backstory and booklet for the first Drinkaway Camp, which took place last year.

My involvement in the latest thing from Signal Horizon is considerably greater. This year, rather than just one pop-up bar, Signal is bringing together a haunted pub crawl spanning more than nine locations throughout Kansas City. Are you ready to become a member of the Harvest Society?

Since time immemorial, the members of the Harvest Society have gathered near the autumnal equinox, as the nights grow long and the veil wears thin, to perform the Great Harvest and decide the future of this world. The Reapers work to cut down the growth of the Erl King and his children, while the Sowers plant the seeds of transformation. Will the Reapers emerge victorious and usher in another year of life, or will the Sowers open the way to a new world of gods and monsters? The choice is yours…

Last time, I just cooked up some ideas and wrote the booklet. This time, I created much more of what the Harvest Society would ultimately become. Any project like this is the work of divers hands, however, and the Society as it exists is very much the product of the hard work of Tyler Unsell, Tracy Palmer, and others, not to mention some dynamite graphic design work from Elijah LaFollette.

What exactly can you expect from the Harvest Society? There’s only one way to find out, but I can give you some hints. Signing up for tickets will get you access to a guidebook (written by me and designed by Eli) that will walk you through a little of the history of this secret society and the Great Harvest which, each year, decides the fate of the world.

It’ll also guide you to nine different drinking establishments, each with their own spooky ties to Kansas City history, where you can enjoy local libations while also solving puzzles that will help your side to win, whether you choose to stand with the Reapers and defend this world, or throw your lot in with the Sowers and watch it all burn.

The Great Harvest begins this Friday the 13th, so get your tickets now, pick your side, and see if you have what it takes to survive the Harvest…

Light & Shadows

Thus far in my career, I have rarely sat down with the intent of writing a book. With the exception of some longer pieces written for licensed work, most of my books have been collections made up at least partially of previously-published material, whether that be short stories or movie columns.

That said, when I’m putting together a book, there’s almost always a moment of genesis where that specific book is “born.” Sometimes it’s a title or phrase, as it was with Painted Monsters; other times it’s a conversation, as it was when Silvia Moreno-Garcia and I co-edited Fungi.

When it comes to Glowing in the Dark, that genesis came from two sources. One was when no less a personage than John Langan expressed his desire that such a book should exist, lamenting that there was no volume that collected my more scattered essays, reviews, and other nonfiction writing on the horror film.

The other was a phrase that I wrote myself, in my story “Night’s Foul Bird,” which first appeared in Innsmouth Magazine all the way back in 2013 and was reprinted in Painted Monsters. In that story of a girl obsessed with silent horror films, I gave a brief description of what it feels like to watch a horror movie, when it all really works.

“Terrified, yes, by every creak and flutter, but something else, too. Alive, illuminated. I could feel the beating of my heart, feel the rush of blood in my veins. I felt as if I were glowing in the dark, as if I were giving off light.”

That description became the foundation around which Glowing in the Dark came to exist, and it informed the cover art and design, by the always great Yves Tourigny. (We wanted to actually make it glow in the dark, but that proved unfeasible.) That final cover was recently unveiled over at Unwinnable, where many of the essays and reviews in the book made their first appearance.

Glowing in the Dark is up for pre-order now and should be on your shelves just in time for Halloween. I’ll have a lot more to say about it between now and then, including a list of some local events that I’ll be participating in as part of the book launch festivities (and my usual busy October programming schedule), but for the time being, just enjoy that beautiful black-and-white cover that – like the best movies of the silver screen – seems to almost glow in the dark, hit that pre-order link, and as always, share far and wide on social media. A book like this relies on the word-of-mouth of folks like you so, if you’re as excited as I am, let people know.

Grave Encounters

I have been back from Providence for several days now, though not as many as I should have been, for reasons that I’ll get to in a moment. As always, NecronomiCon was a joy of a convention, and I missed spending time with more people than I managed to see. That said, I think I safeguarded my energy and my health sufficiently that I am only somewhat ragged and tattered after my return.

The return trip itself didn’t help. My flight from Providence to New York went fine, but my flight from New York on to Kansas City was delayed and delayed and delayed. Eventually, I ended up getting a hotel room for the night and flying out on a much more timely plane the next day.

The location of that hotel room proved a serendipitous capstone (or should that be tombstone?) on an unexpected theme of the entire trip. The hotel was, you see, directly across the street from a sprawling necropolis straight out of a Fulci movie (Brandon Kawashima, one of the many people I wanted to see more of at NecronomiCon) dubbed it “Hotel Fulci.”)

To make things even better, when night fell, the lights of the city caught certain reflective headstones in the midst of that boneyard and made them glow eerily. At least, that’s what I tell myself. We all really know that it was ghosts.

Hotel Fulci was only the latest sepulchral stop on my visit to NecronomiCon. While I was staying in the hometown of everyone’s favorite racist uncle, I naturally stopped by a few Lovecraftian landmarks, including the requisite photo of the Shunned House, which I had also done the last time I was in town. However, this was the first time that I went out to visit Lovecraft’s grave, with its very famous epitaph.

That trip was one of a couple of gravesite tourism trips that I took with Mike Bukowski and Jeanne D’Angelo. And while I didn’t get to spend as much time as I wanted with anybody while I was in Providence, it was great to go grave-hopping with them.

Besides Lovecraft’s grave and the environs of Swan Point, we also made a short road trip to visit Lizzie Borden’s grave in Fall River, Massachusetts. While there, we discovered that the same cemetery was also home to the grave of writer and actress Cornelia Otis Skinner, which was particularly exciting for me, as Skinner memorably plays the lesbian-coded Miss Holloway in The Uninvited.

Of course, I did a lot of other stuff, besides grave tourism while I was in Providence. I hosted movies, talked on panels about subjects ranging from John Carpenter to Jean Ray to the Hollow Earth, went to bookstores, watched movies, talked with friends both old and new, ate good food, played bodyguard to a bunny, wandered the streets, and much, much more.

Now, though, I’m back home. It’s good to be home, and I’m gradually recovering from my adventures, just in time to start a new one, as I’ll be hosting a FREE screening of Matango as part of the Horror Pod Class at the Stray Cat Film Center right here in my very own Kansas City in just a few days!

Come out and see us on August 29 at 7pm and watch one of my favorite weird movies of all time!

We Are Providence

In just a couple of days, I will be in Providence for NecronomiCon. It’s my second time attending the “international festival of weird fiction, art, and academia.” I had a blast at my first NecronomiCon a few years ago, and planned to make it a regular thing, but unfortunately COVID threw a wrench into the works for a while.

In fact, this will be my first time back on a plane since COVID – which I’m not looking forward to. I am looking forward to the con, though. I’ll be on several panels, talking about a wide array of weird topics. I’ll be introducing some really fun movies. And I’ll be seeing friends I haven’t seen in over four years.

If you’re going to be at NecronomiCon in Providence, here’s where you’ll definitely be able to find me:

Friday, Aug 16
6:30-10pm Hosting a double-feature of Die Monster Die and Planet of the Vampires in RISD Metcalf

Saturday, Aug 17
8-9:15am Jean Ray Panel in Providence Ballroom, Omni Hotel
11am-12:15pm Stop Motion Panel in South County Room, Omni Hotel
6-8pm Hosting The Primevals in RISD Metcalf

Sunday, Aug 18
11am-12:15pm John Carpenter’s Apocalypse Trilogy Panel in Biltmore Ballroom, Graduate Hotel
2-3:15pm Hollow Earth Panel in Providence Ballroom, Omni Hotel

When I’m not at one of those places I’ll probably be lurking in the dealer’s room, hanging out at Lovecraft Arts & Sciences Council, or haunting the streets of Providence looking for eldritch inspiration.

If you’ll be at the convention, feel free to drop me a line either via email or social media and hopefully we can catch up. As you can see, I have a relatively full docket, but I’m hoping to make time to hang out with friends both old and new, as well.

If you’re not going to be at NecronomiCon and you’re local to me here in Kansas City, there’s some very cool stuff happening while I’m gone. SOV filmmaker Brewce Longo will be back in KC for a double-feature of his latest film, Coven of the Black Cube, along with Busted Babies by Kasper Meltedhair on August 18 at 7pm at the Stray Cat Film Center.

Earlier in the weekend, the fine folks at Friday Night Frights will be showing a once-in-a-lifetime (?) screening of the found footage shocker It Doesn’t Get Any Better Than This on Friday night at 9:30pm.

I’ll be missing both of those, obviously, as I’ll be in Providence showing other awesome movies at that time. But I’ll be there in spirit, and, not too long after I get back, the Horror Pod Class will be roaring back into action with one of my favorite movies of all time as we screen Matango at Stray Cat Film Center on August 29. Come watch literally everyone who isn’t me try to figure out what the fuck they are watching live in real time!

All My Friends Are Skeletons

One of the nicest things about working in a creative field is that sometimes you get to be friends with some of the most talented people you know. People whose work consistently amazes and inspires you. That’s certainly true of my field, where I’m lucky enough to be friends with some of my very favorite writers who are working today – and, as it happens, some of them have books out now, or will have them out very soon!

I don’t think Silvia Moreno-Garcia will need any introduction to readers of this blog. After all, she wrote the introduction to my latest collection, How to See Ghosts & Other Figments. More importantly, she’s the author of a raft of justly celebrated and bestselling novels that demonstrate an enviable talent for skipping across genres, including Mexican Gothic, The Beautiful Ones, The Daughter of Doctor Moreau, and Silver Nitrate.

Her most recent book, The Seventh Veil of Salome, is every bit as much of a triumph as any of those that came before. I know, because I was fortunate enough to read an advance copy so that I could write and program the Seventh Veil of Salome Film Festival, which is available in the Book Club Kit. I did something similar with Silver Nitrate, and I guess they liked my work.

The Seventh Veil of Salome isn’t a horror novel, but I don’t think that any of my readers would be disappointed in it. It tells a story of love and loss against the backdrop of Golden Age Hollywood – a story about the price that we sometimes pay for following our dreams. And it’s all as gloriously realized as we’ve come to expect from Silvia. It’s also out today, so pick up your copy, if you haven’t already.

Longtime (or even relatively short time) readers of this blog will not be surprised to learn that Jonathan Raab is one of my favorite voices working in indie horror writing today. Anytime he releases something new it’s a cause for celebration, and this year we’re lucky enough to get not only his recent rules-lite tabletop RPG Vampyrvania but also another entry in his must-read Halloween TV Special series, The Mausoleum of Gore, with cover art by another friend, Trevor Henderson.

The Halloween TV Special series previously kicked off with The Crypt of Blood, and it’s rapidly become every bit as much a part of the season as grinning pumpkins or rubber bats. My copy of Mausoleum of Gore arrived in the mail yesterday, so I haven’t actually read it yet. I’m going to try to save it for closer to Halloween – we’ll see if I succeed!

Victoria Dalpe is someone I knew before I had read any of her work, which is always a somewhat scary proposition. Fortunately, her debut novel Parasite Life proved to be a highlight of my reading the year it came out. Also a talented artist, Victoria has broken up shows of her paintings with a winning short story collection, Les Femmes Grotesques, and is now kicking off the first in a planned trilogy from Clash Books with Selene Shade: Resurrectionist for Hire, due out on September 10.

I haven’t read this first Selene Shade book yet, but its premise – jamming together necromancy and police procedural – sounds like the kind of thing that Victoria Dalpe will absolutely knock out of the park, and her previous work makes it a must-read. And I’m not just saying that because I’ll be seeing her in Providence in a couple of weeks for NecronomiCon.

Last but by no means least, Michael Kelly of Undertow Publications has been kind enough to give me a platform to write about pretty much whatever I want in my recurring Grey’s Grotesqueries column at Weird Horror. This has led to columns on fungal horror, the Crestwood House Monster Books, Hollow Earths and dungeon crawls, and the horror of inanimate objects, to name just a few.

However, in order to turn me loose like that, money is needed to run the magazine, and Weird Horror is currently engaged in a fund drive to help cover the cost of printing and shipping the magazine through next year. Think of it like one of those NPR fund drives, only way less annoying and you get a freaky magazine with great cover art, amazing stories, and some rambling by yours truly out of the deal.

What could be better?

Nominated

Besides being an absolute mouthful to write or say, Experience Points: The Lost Chapters from Monsters, Aliens, and Holes in the Ground is also up for an ENnie this year. You can vote for it at that link, should you be so inclined.

I didn’t write Experience Points. Stu Horvath did that, with an able assist by Ed Coleman for one chapter. It is, as the subtitle suggests, a zine made up of chapters excised from his absolutely phenomenal history of the tabletop RPG, Monsters, Aliens, and Holes in the Ground. I didn’t write that either. Stu did.

But I worked on both books, as a line editor. And Stu, being Stu, has been generous enough to act as though all of us who contributed, in any form, to the formation of the book are also deserving to share in its accolades. So, go vote for Experience Points in the ENnies before GenCon arrives, and help us not get beaten by [checks notes] a plush kobold (that is clearly actually an orange goblin).

Despite my work as line editor on both Monsters, Aliens, etc. and Experience Points, this really has very little to do with me. This is all about Stu and his wonderful books. But it may also be as close as I ever get to winning an award like an ENnie – then again, who knows?

Regular readers are probably aware that I have written considerably for Privateer Press, including much of the new Iron Kingdoms: Requiem roleplaying game. The latest Kickstarter that I worked on for them will be launching in the next few days, in fact, and it’s about IK’s very own ghost busting crew, the Strangelight Workshop. So, if you’re interested in that sort of thing, you’ll want to sign up today.

That said, the future is uncertain, at least where my involvement in the Iron Kingdoms is concerned. Recently, Privateer Press sold Warmachine, the Iron Kingdoms, and all attendant properties to Steamforged Games. Such a pivotal decision raised a lot of questions that don’t yet have answers, including what the role of freelancers like myself will be in the development of future products.

Regardless of how the cards fall, however, I hope that the Iron Kingdoms are in good hands, and I remain proud of all the work I’ve done there. With any luck, this will only be the beginning of many more things I do for the setting. But either way, I wish it the best, and look forward to what comes next.

What a Wonderful Night to Have a Curse

My favorite Castlevania game – and the one that I played the most – was probably Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PlayStation. But it wasn’t the one that had the biggest impact on me. Too much of me was already fully formed by the time Symphony of the Night came along. No, that big formative impact came from Castlevania III, subtitled Dracula’s Curse, for the NES.

I received a copy for my birthday the year it came out in North America (so, 1990). Though I had played Castlevania games before, it was the first one I ever owned and, when I think of Castlevania, it’s still the one I think of the most. The same is obviously true of Jonathan Raab.

Vampyrvania, designed and written by Raab and with all-new illustrations by Peter Lazarski, is an obvious attempt at translating the Castlevania franchise as a whole into a combat-heavy, rules-lite tabletop RPG.

This is apparent in everything from the video game art style to the layout of the books themselves, which are bound horizontally to resemble old NES instruction booklets. But if Vampyrvania takes cues from throughout the Castlevania franchise (the inspiration for the “Legion Sphere,” for example, comes from Symphony of the Night), Dracula’s Curse is its most frequent touchstone.

You can find Casltevania III in everything from Vampyrvania’s archetypes – which mirror the fearless vampire killer and his various helpers from Dracula’s Curse – to the nature of the game’s magic to the look and feel of its subweapons.

At launch, Vampyrvania is accompanied by one expansion “stage,” The Clock Tower, a staple of Castlevania games since the inception of the series. But the hints of “greater horrors ahead” to be found at the back of the book also suggests further influence from Castlevania III in the form of a “ghostly galleon,” public domain equivalent of that game’s “Haunted Ship of Fools.”

Of course, Vampyrvania is more than just a clever, nostalgic evocation of a game we’ve all already played before. It reflects the style and the obsessions of its creators. Longtime readers will be familiar with my affection for the writings of Jonathan Raab, who has made a career out of repurposing modest ghoulishness and gothic nonsense into biting political commentary. Among his many hats, he is one of the most reliable modern champions of a creaky sort of overwrought gothic atmosphere that too many contemporary writers eschew as old fashioned or only trot out as camp.

Peter Lazarski, meanwhile, is perhaps best known online as the creator of the classic 8-bit throwback platformer Halloween Forever. Which is to say that they are both creators after my own heart, and the perfect folks to bring something like Vampyrvania to life.

The art is the first thing that you’ll notice about Vampyrvania, in fact. From the logo on down, it evokes the aesthetics of the Castlevania franchise perfectly, while still maintaining Lazarski’s unique style, and it’s a delight to see his take on everything from familiar characters to recurring foes. The border which accompanies the “Introductory Rites” section of the core book is a particular treasure.

It would be easy to assume that some of Raab’s writing style might be lost to the technical nature of something like an RPG rulebook, and to some extent that is true, but Raab is very much still here. “The minds of the ruling class are infected by devils,” say those aforementioned Introductory Rites, “driving them to ever greater acts of oppression and depravity.”

Similarly, the way that enemies are listed not only reflects the style of in-game Castlevania bestiaries but also allows Raab some freedom to flex. The Leaper Goblin, for instance, is described as “a weird little freak,” while the Clock Tower expansion adds narrative encounters that showcase Raab’s talent for repurposing familiar gothic tropes in new ways.

Ultimately, though, much of the creativity in Vampyrvania comes from how faithfully it translates an 8-bit video game platformer into the very different realm of the tabletop RPG. Everything is here, from subweapons powered by hearts to breakable blocks containing “wall meat.” And all of it is rendered in ways that should be quick to pick up and play for newcomers, and familiar to anyone who has ever experienced a classic Castlevania game.

At the time of this writing, I have only read through Vampyrvania, not actually played a game of it. And, given how sporadically I actually manage to play roleplaying games, perhaps I never will, But that’s fine. Collecting games is, as others have said before, its own hobby, and the joy that comes from reading through Vampyrvania – or even just looking at it – is well worth the very modest cover price.

Apocalyptic Stop-Motion Rays from the Hollow Earth

I’ll be a guest at the NecronomiCon in Providence August 15-18. It’ll be my second trip out to Providence, and I’m really looking forward to it, even if all my con-going and socializing muscles have sorely atrophied in the last few years.

I’m on several panels which certainly represent the… breadth of my interests, lets say. Panels where I’ll be contributing my weird opinions and random factoids include one on the weird fiction of Jean Ray, a panel on Hollow Earth stories, one on John Carpenter’s “Apocalypse Trilogy,” and one on stop-motion animation.

Undeniably, these are all topics in which I have an abiding interest, if not necessarily expertise. I’ve read pretty much every piece of Jean Ray’s weird fiction that’s available in translation, thanks mostly to the efforts of Scott Nicolay and Wakefield Press, and while I am far from a Ray scholar, I am eager to share my enthusiasm.

Besides being a fan of Hollow Earth stories, I’ve recently written my own Hollow Earth story cycle, including tales such as “No Exit.” The cycle is completed and is just awaiting the laborious process of being turned into an actual book.

As for John Carpenter’s “Apocalypse Trilogy,” I have written about it frequently, though my best known piece on the subject might just be my best known piece period – an article more than a decade old that originally showed up on Strange Horizons and has since been translated into several languages and referenced in academic books and Wikipedia entries alike. It’s also the lead-in essay for my forthcoming book of filmw writing, Glowing in the Dark, coming later this year from Word Horde.

When it comes to stop-motion, I am back in the realm of enthusiastic appreciation, rather than expertise, but that doesn’t mean that I haven’t written about stop-motion animation more than once. Of course, the form has influenced several of my stories, probably most notably “Baron von Werewolf Presents: Frankenstein Against the Phantom Planet,” which originally appeared in Eternal Frankenstein and was later reprinted in Guignol & Other Sardonic Tales. But I’ve also written plenty of nonfiction about stop-motion animation, including a lengthy and very personal appreciation of Ray Harryhausen which originally appeared in Unwinnable and will also be reprinted in Glowing in the Dark.

In addition to doing duty jabbering on various panels, I helped out a lot with the film programming for this year’s convention. And I am very excited about the feature film lineup. Probably my biggest contribution was suggesting a double-feature of Die, Monster, Die and Planet of the Vampires, as they were originally shown on a double bill. I also helped to arrange for a screening of The Primevals, which was my favorite movie of last year and which has heretofore been hard to see. And while it will be out on Blu-ray soon, it’s a movie that begs to be seen on the big screen. Finally, I didn’t have much to do with this one, but I wish I had, because they’ll be screening The Legend of Hillbilly John, one of the only movies ever adapted from the works of Manly Wade Wellman! Come see a character get killed by a break in the film!

Besides all that, I’ll be doing the usual stuff of spending too much money and time in the dealer’s room or lurking suitably around Providence, which is a very great town for lurking. If you’re going, I hope to see you there! I am usually not very hard to find…

Arcane Secrets

In May of 1997, Wizard magazine ran a contest. Back then, I had a subscription to the mag, so I got every issue, and each issue usually had several contests, though I rarely entered them. This one, though, stuck with me.

The gimmick of the contest was simple enough: The grand prize was “a personalized collection of books (and stuff) which helped to inspire Mike [Mignola] in creating his Hellboy series.”

Needless to say I entered that one, though I didn’t win. Over the years since, that contest has taken on an almost mythic quality for me. It’s the kind of thing I would love to do one day, if I ever became well-known enough for a contest like that to hold much value for fans. And I always sort of wondered what books the winner actually got.

Thanks to a friend who tracked down an old auction, I probably now have the answer. It was never really about the books, though. It was the idea of the thing that stuck with me.

Fast forward to today. I have been fortunate enough to strike up a friendly acquaintance with many of my favorite creators over the years, including Mike. More recently still, he has been thinning out some of his expansive collection of books and generously offered to put together a “mixed bag of curiosities” for me.

I got the result in the mail today and it is much more than I had ever dared dream. Like with that contest that fired my imagination all those years ago, however, it’s less the books themselves – though they are wonderful – than the idea of them that makes them special.

That idea, though, makes them very special, indeed.