A love letter to Gracie

Being between editorial jobs and an operation, I’ve been cleaning out my study this week, a task that was long overdue. Amongst the glory holes and dusty-musties, I found a hard copy of the following, which I wrote for Gracie while we were courting, years before we married, before Lily, who didn’t make it, and Vincent, who’s five in July. Anyway, I am not, by nature a poet – as I’m sure you can tell – but this caught me funny, because it was and remains just so us: Lux and Ivy, Lily and Herman, off in a little world of our own, a cornucopia of love and horror. So this one’s for Gracie – I hope you don’t mind. I’m so glad I found you. I thank the old gods every day. Happy Birthday, babe, I love you…

Theda Bara’s Autograph

For a family that’s not much bothered by celebrity autographs we seem to have nonetheless acquired a few as part of our collection of film and rock ’n’ roll memorabilia, an ongoing hoard that competes for shelf space in a small house with about 2,500 books and god knows how many comics, records and action figures. We’re not serious collectors, like our friends Matt and Ray at Geek Shelf, whose walls are covered in signed convention photos of them beaming next to a positive pantheon of sci-fi and horror legends; our stash is much more limited and, to a certain extent opportunistic, if not downright eclectic.