Letters From the Labyrinth 303

Good morning. If you’re wondering who I am and what I’m doing in your inbox, I’m Brian Keene and this is Letters From the Labyrinth, a weekly newsletter for friends, family and fans of my work.

Had a great time signing at Barnes & Noble in Annapolis, MD yesterday with my pals Richard Chizmar and Ronald Malfi. Thanks to Tony, Jenn and the rest of the staff for having us, and to all of the folks who came out.

“We’re coming to your town. We’ll help you party down…”

That leaves three final signings for this year.

November 4 and November 5th I’ll be at Barnes & Noble Libbie Place, 5501 West Brad Street, Richmond VA 23230. This is a two day event with over two dozen authors, and in addition to signing books we’ll be doing panels, readings, and more.

November 19 Ronald Malfi and I will be signing at a brand new Barnes & Noble in Pikesville, MD. So brand new, in fact, that I don’t have an address for it yet. I’ll get that for you next week.

November 20 I’ll be at Lovedrafts Brew Pub 165 Gateway Drive, Mechanicsburg PA 17050 from noon to 6:00pm. Again, this is another multi-author event.

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Each week, during my Reader Recession Relief Program, I make the Kindle & Nook editions of one of my books available for just 99 cents.

This week’s selection is LOVE LETTERS FROM A NIHILIST. The Kindle and Nook editions are just 99 cents until Tuesday morning, at which point the will return to their regular price and a different book will take their place.

Enjoy!

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Below is Dirk Berger’s cover for Joe R. Lansdale's THE DRIVE-IN: MULTIPLEX, an anthology edited by myself and Christopher Golden.

Featuring all new stories by (in order of appearance) Gary A. Braunbeck, Joe R. Lansdale and Keith Lansdale, Stephen Graham Jones, S.A. Cosby, Rachel Autumn Deering, Jonathan Janz, Cynthia Pelayo, Chet Williamson, Josh Malerman, Elizabeth Massie, Owen King, Linda D. Addison, Gabino Iglesias, Aaron Dries, James A. Moore and Charles R. Rutledge, Nancy A. Collins, Norman Partridge, Mary SanGiovanni, Laird Barron, and David J. Schow.

The signed limited edition hardcover is expected to go up for preorder from Thunderstorm Books next January or February. The best way to not miss out when that happens is to go to the Thunderstorm Books website, and sign up for their newsletter (the tab at the top of the screen).

Gorgeous, right?

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Mary SanGiovanni is offering some personalized cosmic horror stories. She says: “Want to be written into a Mary SanGiovanni cosmic horror story? I'm offering a deal right now to write a personalized short story, with YOU as the main character, for $100. You get the original manuscript, signed by me, and I reserve the right to publish the story elsewhere, with a nod to you. To get a story personalized for you, just Paypal $100 to marysangiovanni@hotmail.com and leave your full name and any aspects about you that you want me to include in the notes section.”

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Scares That Care’s AuthorCon II is shaping up to be the biggest horror author-centric convention since the old, defunct (and much missed) World Horror Conventions. I’m telling you — regardless of whether you’re an author or a reader — if you can only attend one convention next year, make it this one. We’ll be announcing more Guests of Honor soon, as well as revealing the full list of all the other authors who will be attending, as well. Sonora and I will also begin putting together programming in the coming weeks. Full details (as they are announced) can be found here.

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Summer is sliding into Autumn here along the banks of the Susquehanna River.

Work this week was once again conducted at the kitchen table, as Josie Wales and her eight kittens still have the run up the second floor. The babies all had their first vet appointment last Tuesday, and they all got a clean bill of health. One of them goes to her forever home today, while you’re reading this. The other seven go to the local SPCA next Tuesday. I learned this past week that the SPCA does not actually euthanize animals to make room for more animals. This is a common and unfortunate misconception in the public sphere. So, I feel better about things. (And they asked that, being a public figure, I let folks know this, as well, so consider yourself informed).

Am I sad? Yeah. Despite my best efforts, I’ve gotten attached to this latest litter, particularly the one little girl who can scale my ankle to my shoulder with her tiny claws in about four seconds and then perch next to my head while I walk around. But Mary and I would also very much like to have our offices back. John Urbancik has had to host our weekly Magic the Gathering games at his apartment because our library and game room is overrun with cats. I’ve got a ton of Lifeftime Subscriber packages to mail out, and I’ve been afraid to open the boxes and sign everything on the off chance that one or more of my Lifetime Subscribers is allergic to cats. I had a Zoom call regarding movie stuff and a Scares That Care Board meeting this past week that was also conducted via video, and my kitchen doesn’t present a very professional backdrop for either of those things.

But it’s still sad. I wish we could keep them. We can’t, but that doesn’t just change the longing, now does it? But this is the way with all life. My oldest son, David, used to be a little boy who was into Power Rangers and the X-Men cartoon. Now he’s in his thirties and works as a counselor to adults with special needs. My youngest son was — just yesterday — a little boy who was into Pokemon and Minecraft. Now he’s 14, a freshman in high school, and refers to me as “My dude” instead of “Daddy”, and is on his way to becoming both a writer and an elementary school teacher. My future stepdaughter, Ada, used to be a 10-year old who barely tolerated her mother’s weird boyfriend. Now she’s a young woman who tolerates her mother’s weird boyfriend. And my adoptive other son, Mike Lombardo, used to be a frenetic teenager who wanted to make movies. Now he’s in his thirties and just back from Italy, where he and THE BRILLIANT TERROR both got standing ovations at a film festival.

So, too, will these kittens. They will go on to bring joy and laughter and happiness to families who will love them, and it has been a joy to help them on that journey and keep them safe until it could happen. But on Tuesday evening, the house will seem as empty as my front porch has seemed since bringing them inside.

But there will be peace in that emptiness.

Summer's going fast
Nights growing colder
Children growing up
Old friends growing older

Freeze this moment
A little bit longer
Make each sensation
A little bit stronger

Rush - “Time Stand Still”

(I should also mention that our own forever cats have been confined to the first floor of the house since Josie and the babies were brought inside, and they, too, are looking forward to having the second floor back).

So yeah, come Tuesday, we’ll take the babies to the next step in their journey to forever homes, and then deep clean the second floor. And then my very next order of business throughout much of next week is Lifetime Subscriber packages. Thank all of you so much for your patience. I know its been a particularly long wait. I’ll stress again — once Manhattan on Mars Press is in full swing, that wait time is going to decrease a lot.

Anyway, from the kitchen table last week:

ISLAND OF THE DEAD is now finished. The complete serial is available on Kindle Vella and my Patreon. I’ll now put it together into print book format, and you should see a signed limited edition as well as paperback, digital and audiobook next year.

I also worked on formatting the new edition of LEADER OF THE BANNED: THE BEST OF HAIL SATEN Vol. 4. That book has been out of print for a decade, and this will be its first time in paperback or digital. Hoping to release those editions in time for the holidays, along with the paperback, digital and audiobook editions of SUBMERGED: THE LABYRINTH Book 2. Both will be via Manhattan on Mars Press.

I dived back in to the first draft of SPLINTERED: THE LABYRINTH Book 3, which is currently being serialized exclusively on my Patreon. And I continued working on the final draft of the second half of GWENDY’S BUTTON BOX, and tore apart an aborted first draft of BENEATH THE LOST LEVEL and figured out what was wrong with it.

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Currently Listening: Brian Keene Radio

Currently Watching: Head Count (Shudder), Significant Other (Paramount +), Rob Zombie’s Devil Rejects Trilogy

Currently Reading: Illuminations by Alan Moore

I know I missed several Morning News segments on Brian Keene Radio this week. Couldn’t be helped. Had stuff going on, and the moment I begin canceling things just so I can be live on mic at 8:30AM is the moment this pirate radio station stops becoming a hobby and turns into something else.

Head Count starts out a predictable monster/slasher killing surplus teenagers film, but then morphs into something unexpected and delightful. I enjoyed it. Significant Other does the exact opposite. I really enjoyed it up until the last 20 minutes, at which point it jumped the shark.

Illuminations is great. There were two stories that didn’t quite work for me, but the full-length novella “What We Can Know About Thunderman” is well worth the price of the book, and — in my opinion — ranks alongside my other personal faves by Alan Moore (those being The Highbury Working, Jerusalem, Watchmen, V For Vendetta, Neonomicon, and Swamp Thing).

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And I suppose that does it for this week. John and I have to take a road trip today (non-writing business), and then when we get back home I have to deliver that kitten (mentioned earlier) to her forever home.

I hope things are good with you. If they aren’t, then I hope things get better this coming week. If they don’t, then I hope that this newsletter at least gave you a brief respite from everything. I can’t tell you how much I’ve come to enjoy typing these every Saturday. I’ve cut way back on social media this year (except for Twitter), and I intend to pull back even more in the coming months. By early next year, I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m barely using social media at all, and instead, am choosing this weekly missive to communicate with the world.

So, I’m glad you’re here, listening. It’s Autumn on Mars, and in the quiet, there are still a few more stories to tell…

— Brian Keene