Letters From the Labyrinth 192 - Brian Keene

Hi. I'm Brian Keene and this is the 192nd issue of Letters From the Labyrinth, a weekly newsletter for fans of my work.
Been a tough two weeks for our industry. Publishers both big and small struggling financially. Booksellers and comic book retailers struggling, as well. Creators getting sick. Seventeen different individuals accused of various sexual misbehavior ranging from inappropriate messages to all-out assault.
I honestly don't remember it ever "feeling" this bad before. The closest might be the Zebra/Dell-Abyss collapse in the 90s, or the comic book implosion of the 90s, or the trifecta of the Mid-List/Small Press/Dorchester Leisure Books collapse in the Aughts, but as somebody who lived through that latter one, I think this feels worse...just in slow-motion.
The only writing I got done this past week were the pieces of daily content for my Patreon. (Which I'm grateful for, creatively, because otherwise I wouldn't have gotten any writing done at all). The rest of the week was dominated by journalism and the podcast.
Everything is sort of a blur now, but to the best of my memory, except for some quick conversations with friends David J. Schow, Richard Chizmar, Rachel Deering, Paul Goblirsch, Gabino Iglesias, Cathy Gonzalez, Stephen Kozeniewski, Geoff Cooper, Wesley Southard, and Bryan Smith, every other person I talked to this week was while wearing my reporter hat and doing due diligence for the podcast. And even my conversations with David, Rich, Rachel, Paul, Gabino, Cathy, Koz, Coop, Wes, and Bryan were about everything that was going on.
I apparently came dangerously close to having a stroke Friday evening.
So, instead of allowing my blood pressure to kill me, I have been enjoying whiskey, weed, and my own personal radio station.

I'll see you back here next week.