Recently I was in Houston, where among other things I visited a couple of bookstores. The first was in The Woodlands, a used bookstore in a converted house. This store is called Good Books in the Woods, https://www.goodbooksinthewoods.com – it appears to have been converted from an old residence into a bookstore with walls and walls of books. The SF section is small. Prices appeared to have no rhyme or reason; some paperbacks were cheap, others expensive. Some hardcovers were close to $100, others under $20.
Although I already had a couple of editions of Jack Vance’s The Eyes of the Overworld, I found a nice paperback edition that I didn’t have. The $8 cost made me hesitate, but these days finding any Vance book in decent shape is next to impossible.
As far as books that I didn’t already have, I came across a 1975 collection of short stories by William Hope Hodgson, Out of the Storm, published by Donald M. Grant. Grant would later publish three more Hodgson collections: The Dream of X, which I don’t have, plus The Haunted Pampero (1991) and Terrors of the Sea (1996) which I already owned.
Out of the Storm contains seven short stories, as well as quite a long biographical introduction from Sam Moskowitz, and is illustrated by Stephen Fabian. The price when published in 1975 was $10. I paid $25. I think was I surprised to see that book there, and not in the glass-enclosed “rare book” section, where books apparently cost $100 and more. Still, I was happy to find the book, as I like Hodgson’s sea stories.
Grant is perhaps better known as a publisher of Robert E. Howard and Stephen King’s Dark Tower series. They seem to have tapered off recently in the number of books published, so likely will become a defunct publisher at some point, if that hasn’t already happened.
It’s unusual to see a hardcover edition limited to just 200 copies. However, that seems to be normal for PS Publishing out of the UK; they even publish books limited to just 26 copies at times.
In October 2022, they published Pennies From Heaven, a new novel from James P. Blaylock. Since I’m not tuned into all small press releases, I almost missed this book. The moment I saw it mentioned somewhere, I quickly placed an order via the PS Publishing web site. I expected it to be sold out, but a few weeks later received my signed and numbered (#13) copy of the book. There’s also a trade paperback edition, but I went for the hardcover.
Sadly, Blaylock now seems to have a niche audience. I thought mainstream publishers, or even Subterranean Press might be the place to find Blaylock books. Subterranean Press has published quite a few Blaylock books over the years, mostly in the Langdon St. Ives series. Sometimes these are signed, limited editions, sometimes a mix of signed and trade editions.
I’m not sure why this happens, but sometimes Subterranean Press seems to drop authors who they’ve carried for many years. Maybe someone more attuned to the small press market knows more about this. It’s not the first time I’ve seen an author having multiple Subterranean Press books and then suddenly switch to a different publisher. I suppose I need to get on PS Publishing’s mailing list now, in case more Blaylock books are on their schedule.
In Pennies from Heaven, we’re introduced to Jane and Jerry Larkin. The former works at a local co-op, while the latter is restoring their old house. Jerry comes across an old gold coin in the aftermath of an earthquake, which sets in motion a series of events. It seems that many years ago in their town a bank heist took place, and Jerry might have found some hidden treasure. They both come up against a battle-axe of a local woman, who turns out to be far more than she appears. It’s a quintessential Blaylock tale; no hint of the supernatural in this one, mostly weird hijinks and odd characters. The hardcover is sold out by now, but Blaylock fans can still get the trade edition from PS Publishing, or both online from the odd dealer or two.
The first full marathon I ever ran was the Austin Marathon, back in February 2011. I finished under four hours, despite hitting the wall relatively early, perhaps around mile 16. I ran three more marathons after Austin, each time pushing that mental and physical wall out a little further. Injuries have halted my marathon running, but it’s a goal of mine to try to run some half-marathons again. Austin’s a hilly course, and you pay the price if you start out too fast. I thought that I’d remembered all about the hills, but I was wrong.
Seven years after that full marathon, in 2018, I ran my first Austin Half Marathon. It was one of my faster times for that distance, and I enjoyed the event immensely. The course is interesting. The first mile and half is flat, then builds with a series of gradual uphills as you ascend Congress Avenue from downtown to the 290 highway access road. The elevation is minor at this point. Then, after a brief moment along the 290 access road, you make another right onto South 1st Street. The next three miles descend back downtown, making up for the previous ascent. After you cross the bridge over what used to be called Town Lake and now is called Lady Bird Lake, you head west. For the next two or so miles the course is pleasantly level. Then, as you make the sharp right turn from Lake Austin Boulevard to Enfield Road, you face a punishing series of hills in West Austin. Enfield, and then as it turns into 15th Street, is a relentless series of rolling hills. To top it off, the massive hill right after you cross North Lamar seems to go on forever. Thankfully, the last half-mile of the Half-Marathon course is downhill, which gives the legs a scant few minutes to recover.
Fast forward to 2025, seven years after that half marathon in 2018, when I ran my second Austin Half Marathon. Older, beset over the past few years by various injuries, I knew I’d never approach that 2018 time. My only two goals were to finish and not walk. My training the past few months has been limited, focused mainly on medium to long runs and no speed or tempo efforts. I ran the Houston Half-Marathon in January, my first half-marathon in seven years, so I was confident that I could complete the 13.1 miles.
The stated temperature at the start was 32F, although according to the weather app it felt like 24F. I wore two layers, plus arms sleeves, gloves, and a beanie. It wasn’t as windy as the Houston half marathon; there it felt like 19F or below at the start. I ran an easy pace along the first three miles along Congress Avenue, dodging some runners, getting passed by others. I passed the 4:00 marathon pacers at some point, as well as the 3:55 and 3:50 pacers before we made the turn going down South 1st Street. The next three miles were downhill, but I tried to keep the pace steady. Halfway down South 1st I passed the 3:45 marathon pacers. The crowds at the end of the South 1st bridge were loud. More crowds lined Cesar Chavez Street as we turned westward. At mile seven I felt a little fatigue set in, and I knew the next six would be tough. Mile eight along Lake Austin Boulevard seemed interminable, but after refueling I felt my pace pick up slightly.
However, I knew that some hills lay ahead, and I dreaded them. The sharp uphill turn onto Enfield as the course shifted back toward downtown didn’t seem too bad. Still, just before I started to congratulate my self, the rolling hills of Enfield began. It was now one hill after another. As we approached the North Lamar overpass there was a moment of relief through the steep downhill. This relief turned to dread when I saw the massive hill on the other side. At the top of that hill, my pace slowed to a near walk, but I soldiered on, ignoring the young runners who passed me along this stretch.
We weren’t done with the hills yet, as even when entering downtown the streets constantly rose up and down. Finally, the last half to quarter of a mile rounding the Capitol area meant no more hills. My pace increased. I saw a sharp turn to the finish and aimed for this corner. Unfortunately, another runner had the same idea, and we almost collided. I switched to the outside, passed that runner, and crossed the finish line in 1:51:16. Of my 13 half marathons this was my fourth-slowest. It was three minutes faster that my Houston half in January, but also more than six minutes slower than my previous Austin half – 1:44:05 – and that time is nowhere near my PR.
Regardless, I felt that progress was made in this event, since it was faster than the Houston half. One downside is that I forgot to save my time on my Garmin watch, so I don’t have the mile splits. I only have each of the 5K splits from the official times. Still, I know the last half of the course was horrible, just because of the hills, so there was no negative split this time. After the race I lingered for just a few minutes, before heading to the hotel for a warm shower and a long wait to pick up my car. Then I crawled my way through downtown traffic to hit some local bookstores.
And, because I want to keep the memory fresh, I’ve signed up for the 2026 half marathon. Maybe this time I can stay at a place where there’s no party two floors below mine the night before the half marathon. And, I plan to train harder on hills knowing what I face the final five miles.
While in Austin Feb. 15 and 16 to run the Austin Half Marathon, I stopped by a few bookstores.
Jor R. Lansdale, Sugar on the Bones (2024). I paid full price for this book, at Book People on Sixth and Lamar. None of the local bookstores in San Antonio had a copy, but Book People still had signed copies from when Lansdale stopped by some time last year to promote his book. I managed to read the Lansdale book in one day. It follows similar plots to previous books in the Hap and Leonard series. Perhaps the next book in the series will be called Long in the Tooth, as those two chaps are getting close to retirement age. This is only a slight dig at the books; since the main characters age with each book, at some point they will need to stop. At this point they’re in their fifties, and it gets tougher to fight and recover at that age.
Dennis Etchison, Red Dreams (1984). A collection of short stories, published by Scream Press. The book is inscribed by Etchison, as well as illustrator J. K. Potter, and signed by Karl Edward Wagner, who wrote the introduction. I wonder what happened to “Joe,” the recipient of the inscriptions when Etchison and Potter signed it in 1985, for this book to end up at Half Price Books forty years later… Red Dreams is the first book by Scream Press that I own. There’s no price listed on this book, though it did come with a slipcase. This small press released some other great books in the 1980s, but I’ve never come across any until now. There’s a note at the front of the book that this is the “Boxed First Edition,” limited to 250 copies. Scream Press, like a few other small press publishers from the 1980s/1990s, lasted just a decade or so before it folded.
Lewis Shiner, The Edges of Things (1991). This book was published by Washington Science Fiction Association in Baltimore as a limited edition. My copy is number 346 of 600, signed by Shiner, illustrator Alicia Austin, as well as editor Mark L. Van Name. It was originally priced at $45 when published in 1991. According to the U.S. Inflation Calculator, this converts to $104.27 in today’s dollars. That’s quite a pricy book. HPB had priced the book at $20, which seemed like an great price to me. I like Shiner’s stories and style, and it was a book long on my watch list. WSFA published a book in honor of the guest of honor at Disclave, a Washington, D.C. area science fiction convention, from 1989 to 1992. Last year I bought the first book they published, Lucius Shepard’s Father of Stones. The book in between these two is by Mike Resnick. I’m not sure if anything was published in 1992, when Pat Cadigan was the guest of honor. [Edit: apparently there was a book published in honor of GoH Cadigan in 1992, the last in this series.]
One of the many mystery/detective series I’ve gotten into over the past few years has been Peter Lovesey’s Peter Diamond books; I’m not sure why Lovesey gave his leading character the same first name as his own, but it’s a bit confusing at times. At this point, I’m no longer sure which of the Diamond books I read first, as there’s now more than twenty of them. It might be Upon a Dark Night, or The Last Detective. According to my library database, the former is the first one entered, and the latter the second. The latter is also the first in the series. I might have started there, maybe not. I tend to start series out of order, since I buy them when I find them. Anyway, I found the first Lovesey book good enough to start looking for all of Peter Lovesey’s books. He has written other books, after all.
Of the 22 books in the Diamond series (if I’m correct regarding that number), I owned—until recently 19 books in the series. The 22nd book was recently published in hardcover, so I’ll discount that one for now. It also might be the last in the series, but I’ll need to wait for the paperback to be sure. Of the other two, one was the 20th in the series. The other, the seventh book in the series, is a far more consequential book. Since I’d read books 8-19, plus book 21, I knew that a singular and major event happened in Diamond’s (fictional) life at some point. Book seven, Diamond Dust, covers that event. It’s a tough read, for sure, knowing the fate in that book of someone close to Diamond.
Most of the books featuring police detective Peter Diamond take place in (or around) Bath, England. I’ve been to Bath twice in my life. The most recent visit was in 2024, where I spent three days in the city, walking the streets (and running through a fair number of them), seeing the sights, and falling in love with the town. My previous visit was in 2000, where I spent just one day there, and saw only a minuscule part of the city. Still, it was an important visit back in 2000, since I connected Bath at that time with Jane Austen. As an English major in college and a Jane Austen fan, that visit meat a great deal to me at the time.
Bath, despite being a touristy town (myself admittedly being one of those tourists), is a wonderful place. The city is ancient. It’s historic. It’s bisected by a river, which always is a thrill in itself. There are hills all around the city. Stonehenge is nearby, London and other places a mere train ride away. There’s the Abbey, the Roman baths, the Crescent, Pulteney Bridge, the weir, so many other features. It has a wonderful Waterstones bookstore, plus far more things that I never got to see. And, lots and lots of tourists. In other words: I love Bath (well, apart from the tourists, even though I was one of them…).
That aside, back to Lovesey’s Peter Diamond series….
All the books I have of Lovesey’s were published by Soho Crime. Once I started to buy and read the trade paperback editions, I had to continue with that format (Okay, so I do have a hardcover or two). I also read them out of order, more or less as I found them. Some, I bought new. Other books, because they weren’t in my local bookstores, I bought used—when and if I came across them in local used bookstores. A handful of the books I found in a specialty bookstore, Murder by the Book, in Houston, Texas. Even there, they didn’t have all the books as new ones.
In January, 20025 I came across Diamond Dust, one that I’d been hunting for quite some time (viz. book seven). This book was in the small used books section in Murder by the Book. I don’t visit Houston often, but I was able to swing to Murder by the Book for slightly less than an hour in January 2025. While there, I was thrilled to find a copy of Diamond Dust in great condition for a used book. Strangely enough, the other two books in the series that I lacked also were there, but I didn’t realize it at the time for one of them, and I skipped the other as it was a hardcover edition, and I have all the rest in trade paperback.
Part of the delight in the series is the setting: the city of Bath in England. Part of it is the main character himself: the overweight, clumsy, yet efficient and old-fashioned detective, Peter Diamond. He’s such a funny person, bumbling yet not stupid, that one can’t help but like him. In the series you also see the changing landscape of local policing. When I visited Bath in 2024, I walked past the supposed HQ of the Bath police department (or former HQ(, in Manvers Street; it’s near the train station, and close to the “center” of town—the area around the Abbey. I really wanted to go inside and ask if anyone had read Lovesey’s books, and if so, what they had thought of them. However, I’m sure I would have been disappointed. I don’t think I ever saw an officer of the law while in Bath. Would it have mattered? Probably not. Bath in real life is nothing like the fictional world. However much one might wish that someone like Peter Diamond existed—they don’t. Which is sad, I think.
Still, if you like good old fashioned English crime stories, seek out Peter Lovesey’s books. You won’t be disappointed. Meanwhile, I’m going to read Diamond Dust slowly, since I known there are powerful emotions at work in that book. I will try not to skip to the end. It’s hard, sometimes, dealing with the stress in a book like this. But, I must resist that temptation, since Diamond means so much to me. Let it all work out, I tell myself.
And then, once I’ve read this book: onward to those other two remaining books in the series.
I know that I’ll never collect them all, but I do like to pick up Arkham House books when I come across them. In this case, I recently acquired a group of four books by quite disparate authors. When I looked for information about the authors and when their books were published, I turned to Sixty Years of Arkham House by S. T. Joshi. The index in this book isn’t entirely accurate, and each entry is relatively short, covering publication date, number of copies, and a little more. Sometimes there’s an listing of contents for poems and short stories in the volume, but I guess that when covering 200 books there’s not too much room for anything else.
Joshi’s book lists 193 items published by Arkham House; I now own a mere 35 of them. This number is just under 20%, an almost insignificant percentage. I’m quite happy with the ones that I have, though, and I’ll only look for others if a) they’re within my budget and b) the condition looks decent.
The Face in the Mirror, Denys Val Baker Published in 1971, and now the earliest of my Arkham House books; 2045 copies printed. A slim volume of tales set in the author’s native Cornwall. Prior to this book the earliest Arkham House book that I owned was published in 1975. Having now come close to the magic decade of the 1960s, it makes me quite excited to have a copy of this book.
The Height of the Scream, Ramsey Campbell Published in 1976; 4348 copies printed. Campbells third Arkham House collection. I own just a couple of Campbell books. One is part of Borderlands Press “Little Book” series. The other is a collection from Dark Harvest with both Campbell and Charles Grant stories (Dark Harvest’s Black Wine). Aside from that, I may have a few anthologies where Campbell has contributed a story.
Dwellers in Darkness, August Derleth Also published in 1976; 3926 copies printed. The eighth and last Arkham House collection of Derleth stories. Derleth was one of the founders of Arkham House. To acquire the prior seven of his collection likely would bust a few budgets.
The Darkling, David Kesterton Published in 1982; 3126 copies printed. Kesterton’s name doesn’t appear in the index of Joshi’s 1999 book, and the book title’s page number listed in the index is incorrect. Joshi’s also quite dismissive of the book and author in his note, calling it a “‘Slushpile’ submission that made it’s way to publication.”
It’s such a shame that this major publisher of weird fiction fizzled into almost nothing when it had the major IP of the “Arkham House” name behind it. They’ve hardly published anything in the past two decades. Most of their books published prior to 1970 are hard to find or quite expensive. This is as expected, given the name, as well some of the authors works in that group. Arkham House released N copies for each of their books, no special editions. Golden Gryphon did the same. Most other small current presses will have two or three states: trade hardcover, limited, and/or ultra-limited. Trade books in these states don’t list how many are printed. Limited will list the number of copies in this state, while the ultra-limited usually are lettered books limited to 26 copies.
I’m by no means a Lovecraft fan, but recently saw a bidding war online for the first two collections of his letters rise from $0.99 to nearly $150. That’s a pittance if you interested in early Clark Ashton Smith, or Ray Bradbury’s Dark Carnival (I’ve seen these listed upwards of $6,500), or even William Hope Hodgson’s House on the Borderlands book (close to $1,000). Basically, all the early books fetch prices only the serious collector would pay.
This weekend I watched a documentary on the British band, The Jam, a band that came to fame in the UK in 1977. They released a bunch of singles and albums between that year and their breakup in 1982, supposedly became the voice of a generation, and then vanished.
I think the first song that I ever heard by The Jam was the 1982 single, “The Bitterest Pill,” which was their (second-to-last) single, though in my ears a far better send-off than “The Beat Surrender,” their real last single.
Many years later I listened to some older songs. Of those, only “A Town Called Malice” and “That’s Entertainment” stick with me, although I have vague recollections of “Going Underground” and “EtonRifles.” All of these songs came out prior to 1982, the year that I really started to listen to British Top 40—and beyond—songs. At the time, I was a teenager living in Zambia, and picked up British songs by chance and recording from friends. In 1983 I moved to Norway, where I picked up BBC Radio One on my radio. This exposed me to Top 40 songs as well as alternatives. By then, The Jam were history, and Paul Weller’s new band, The Style Council, came to the fore.
At that time, I liked The Style Council more than The Jam, at least when it came to many of the songs. Still, Weller kept changing, and apparently the fifth Style Council album was dropped by the label, due to differences between what the label expected and Weller own tastes. After that, Weller went solo, and released his own stuff; I own several of those solo works, although not all of them.
In terms of The Jam, this was a band created by teenagers. They rose to fame, then the lead person decided to end the band and move on. Weller’s always come across as someone with a massive ego, and this documentary does nothing to dispel than view. Although The Style Council was a huge departure from The Jam, his solo stuff doesn’t seem to have the same drive and energy. In a sense, this mirrors many other bands — the lead writer decides to go his own way, and breaks up the band that made him famous. Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn’t.
The Jam weren’t a huge force in my musical life, but they do have some great songs. The Style Council —well, I tend to favor their tunes. As for Weller the solo artist, not so much. Did he destroy his own legacy? Maybe. The Jam could have morphed into other things, but in terms of the documentary, Weller did his bandmates dirty. He cut off his own bandmates, neither of them spoke to him for decades.
What I gained from the documentary was a little bit of history, but also it diminished Weller in my eyes. I think in the future I’ll be less inclined to look for Weller’s music, which is a sad testimony to his supposed talent.
I’m a huge fan of Haruki Murakami’s fiction. However, I don’t really read manga, the Japanese comic book art form/genre. Still, recently I picked up a pair of Murakami manga books (there’s a third one—at least—out there that I now need to find).
One book—I don’t know if there’s a sequence to them—contains four stories. The other, three stories. Previously, I’ve read all of these in narrative form. “Birthday Girl,” “Where I’m Likely to Find It,” and “The Seventh Man” appeared in the collection Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, while “Super Frog Saves Tokyo” appeared in After the Quake.
In the other collection, “Thailand” was in After the Quake, while “The Second Bakery Attack” was in The Elephant Vanishes. As for “Samsa in Love,” it appears in Men Without Women., which is a strange choice since there’s a woman in that story. Although, how she’s drawn might lead to some confusion. “Samsa in Love” is, after all, an inversion of Kafka’s “Metamorphosis.”
So, several stories all drawn from various sources. I’ve now read four of of the seven manga tales. Maybe it’s my lack of knowledge of that genre, or graphic novels in general (although I do own a dozen or more graphic novels), but the drawings some across as oddly shaped, distorted almost. There are weird “sound-texts” or words that try to represent non-verbal sounds. Some stories are funny, some meander and go nowhere. I love Murakami’s slow and measured prose, how he makes the normal weird, and the weird normal, but I’m not sure about these manga versions. Is this because I prefer my own inner voice, my own vision of the characters and events? Maybe something to think about. Almost all the other graphic novels I own are original, although there are some based on stories or novels. Perhaps the art matters, as those are drawn, well, better.
Of course, now I’ll need to re-read the stories, just to see what was left out of the manga versions, if anything. And, I have just one unread Murakami book to plow through. I do hope his next novel reaches the heights of previous good books, as his latest was a disappointment.
On January 19, 2025 I ran the Houston Half-Marathon. Temperatures at the start hovered around 31 Fahrenheit (just below 0 in Celsius), although a stiff wind from the north supposedly made it feel like 19 F (or -7 in Celsius). Those of us huddled in our corrals before the start certainly felt the wind. I wore two layers everywhere, plus gloves and a beanie, and still felt my face and arms slowly freezing in the morning air. I’m not sure I ever warmed up.
This was my first half-marathon in seven years, and my first in Houston, although 13 years ago I ran the full marathon in Houston. Back then it was my fastest marathon time, at the somewhat pedestrian result of 3 hours and 40 minutes. Now, many years older, and with a series of niggling injuries that have plagued me the past eight or so years (I ran my most recent pair of half-marathons while still dealing with injuries), I wanted to close the triangle with a half-marathon in Houston. That triangle: a marathon and half-marathon in Austin, San Antonio, and Houston. I’ll set aside Dallas for now, although that’s a future goal.
The Houston course is nearly pancake flat. I don’t remember much from the marathon back in 2012, aside from hitting the wall around mile 23 after an underpass and mirrored uphill climb. This year, we started out heading west, then turned south into a neighborhood. The course is sort of out and back, as we run, west, south, north and then east. At mile 8 or so the marathoners turned right, while those of us running the half went straight. Shortly thereafter the half-marathoners made a 270 degree turn around a large roundabout. At this point we fought the wind for 2.5 miles, although thankfully it was not constant. Looking at my splits, this was my slowest section (can I blame the wind?).
Just after mile 11 we headed back east toward downtown, thankfully away from the wind. Through miles 6 and 7 I’d felt fine, even passed quite a few runners. Even so, I tried to hold back; in this event my goal was to not walk, and overall just have fun (ha ha, you say, how is 13.1 miles any fun?). While going into the wind the reverse happened: quite a few runners passed me.
As we reached the towers in downtown, the wind at our backs picked up. I heard people behind me cheering as the tail-wind almost made us fly forward. At this point, I also saw some of the fast marathoner finishers zipping past us in their dedicated lane on the right. Even with half a mile to go, I held back. Stay the course, I told myself. Just get to the finish line. This is not a race, just a fun experience.
At the finish line, I looked at my watch for the first time since the start. Throughout the entire 13.1 miles (or so, as my watch—after the fact—told me that I’d run 13.22 miles) I forced myself not to focus on time, not to check any mile splits. For the past seven or eight years I’d been injured. I was older since I last ran any long distance events. Plus, the past three months had not been great in terms of training, what with the holidays and bad weather where I lived. I expected to finish just around 2 hours, well off my regular 1:43 or so times: instead, I finished in 1:54:06. Although this was my 11th slowest half marathon out of 12 events, I was elated: I had not walked, I was six minutes faster than what I expected. And, I actually finished. A few years ago I quit running, so just finishing this event was, to me at least, a victory.
Could I have run faster? Maybe, maybe not. The Houston course is flat. In fact, aside from the miles 9-11 or so, it was superb. Maybe, in better shape and without various injuries (hip, ankle), I might be able to run a good race and possibly PR. But, that’s all in the past. I’m not really in half-marathon shape at this point. Maybe I could sustain a good pace right now for a 5-miler, at tops, or a 5K if I was ambitious. Still, I felt great through those first miles—the pace was effortless, almost. After that, it was a more a matter of hanging on, not quitting. So, I was happy to finish.
As far as the event itself, I think Houston put on a great one. They can’t control the weather, and the Arctic front hitting that weekend was no fun. I do wish that the signs in the convention center were better, as I walked back and forth to find the entrance to registration. Also, I wish some fast food places were open in downtown on the weekend, as almost all were closed, at least those within walking distance of the hotel. Downtown on the weekend in Houston appears quite dead. Lots of homeless people, though, which is sad. I’m not sure I’ll be back again. I have other goals. The Dallas half-marathon beckons, since I’ve never run there. Also, Houston’s a long way to drive for me, and expensive for just the weekend.
But, if you want a flat course for 13.1 mile — go run the Houston half-marathon. You won’t regret it. I certainly didn’t. I’d love to run it again. I just don’t know if that will happen.
Published in 1986 by Dark Harvest, this anthology contains stories from Ramsey Campbell, Lisa Tuttle, and Clive Barker, and edited by George R. R. Martin (Martin would later have stories in Night Visions 5).
The sole remaining book in the “Night Visions” anthology series from Dark Harvest (1984 through 1991) that I did not own, and long on my want list. Purchased for $42 on the very last day of 2024. Though it’s not pristine, the book is in great condition. As a bonus, it’s signed by Lisa Tuttle, though this copy is the trade edition. Seven stories by Campbell, three by Tuttle, and the first appearance of Barker’s “The Hellbound Heart.”
