Letters From the Labyrinth 393

Further Toward the End of the Road

As you read this, I am in the midst of a nine hour drive to Haverhill, Massachusetts. If I take the Tappan Zee Bridge over the Hudson, it’s only a seven hour drive, but recently, three dead author friends (J.F. Gonzalez, Dave Thomas, and Dave Barnett) have visited me in dreams, and a dead Navy buddy (Jay Sharpes) has visited my mother in one of her dreams, which is wild since she never met Sharpes while he was alive, and I have taken this as a sign that I am not supposed to drive across the Tappan Zee Bridge.

Also, the last time I drove across it I had a panic attack that would have made Tony Soprano proud.

Good morning. I’m Brian Keene and this is Letters From the Labyrinth — a long-running weekly email newsletter for fans, friends, and family.

So, yeah. Instead of going that way, I’m heading up by State College, Pennsylvania and then crossing over upstate New York and adding two hours to my drive. I should arrive at Christopher Golden’s house just in time for dinner.

Monday morning, me and Chris and some other friends will load the entirety of James A. Moore’s library into Red Sonja (the name I’ve given my new truck), and then I’ll make that same nine hour drive in reverse. The contents of his library has been estimated at “between 60 and 100 boxes” so it’s going to be a heavy load. Maybe not as much fun as running a load of guns and moonshine from the Kentucky/West Virginia border to New York, but running guns and moonshine is a young man’s game, and at 56, I prefer to run books.

Once I get them back to Pennsylvania, I’ll inventory and appraise them for Jim’s widow, and then sell them for her via Vortex.

This marks the start of an incredibly busy month — probably the busiest I’ve had in years. I wrote about it at length in the Vortex newsletter and on Patreon earlier this week. We’ve got a total of 21 authors signing at the store this month, plus my son and I are going to see Weezer, plus I’ve got an appearance at the York Author Fair, plus this trip to gets Jim’s library. And then on top of that, the daily requirements of writing and also running a bookstore, and answering email, and so on and so forth.

My whole life, i looked forward to road trips. I’ve written about that in END OF THE ROAD. But I’ll tell you, I’m not looking forward to this one. 18 hours of driving weighs on a man, no matter what age he is. And if he’s 56, and he’s hauling the sum total output of another dead friend’s literary estate behind him? Well, that’s a heavy load.

But it’s not just the mental or spiritual exhaustion. September will be physically exhausting, as well.

I figure there’s a 50/50 chance I make it to October 1st.

So you should come to this.

Or, if you can’t make it to that, you should come to one of these signings.

And if not, well then, I will see you at the end of the road.

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Pandi Press, who published me and Chris’s THE DRIVE-IN: MULTIPLEX anthology, are about to launch a Kickstarter for the PandiPack — a year-long Pandi Press Book Box subscription. Why am I bringing this up here?

Because one of the books is tentatively called THE BEST OF BRIAN KEENE, and it will be an exclusive edition only for Pandi Press customers. (The only other folks who will get it are my Lifetime Subscribers).

For more details, or to be notified when the Kickstarter goes live, click here.

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AUTHORCON IV — a Scares That Care event — is less than a month away. I’ll post the Programming Schedule next week. However, in the meantime, a very important thing for anyone who is attending:

If you booked a room at the hotel and DID NOT get the special room rate (because the hotel website told you the room rate was sold out), please email joe Ripple at joe@scaresthatcare.org and give him your name so that we can get you onto the room block and save you some money.

If you haven’t yet booked your hotel, you can still get rooms in the room block. And if you tried to book at the hotel and the hotel website told you the room block was sold out and you booked a hotel elsewhere, you can still get rooms in the room block. To do that, you use this link. Again, the hotel room block is NOT sold out. You have until September 12th to get your room. But you have to use that link.

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A new episode of HOW TO SURVIVE 2025 — a new podcast I cohost with Dacia M. Arnold and Jim Cobb — is live. It’s free to listen to.

(Dacia wrote this episode description, not me, so don’t yell at me for saying we “schooled her):

Jim and Brian school Dacia on the basics of having a “stocked” pantry and what to prioritize when establishing an inventory of additional food for emergencies. From various ways to store bulk food items, to buying one extra of your dry goods during your next grocery run, this episode is full of actionable nuggets for those not wanting to go without when the unexpected occurs. 

Listen free via: Web Browser ~ Spotify ~ iHeartRadio ~ Apple ~ Amazon/Audible ~ YouTube ~ Podbean ~ Player FM

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Currently Watching: Nothing

Currently Listening: “On The Outside” by Sheryl Crow

Currently Reading: Imminent by Luis Elizondo and Enemy of the State by Robert Swartwood

“On The Outside” is my favorite by Sheryl Crow, a deeply moody and evocative tune that never fails to depress me in the best way possible. Great mood music. Hard to believe it got its start as an X-Files song.

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That does it for this week. Thanks, as always, for reading. I’ll see you back here again next Sunday. Be kind to each other.

— Brian Keene