Okay, before I head out the door on another trip, yes, I am planning a Fritz Leiber Tour for Sunday October 28th — details to follow.
I figure it won’t begin any earlier than noon, no later than 3 p.m. It will go for four hours or as long as it takes — the Fritz Tour isn’t a science like the Hammett walks.
It isn’t a science because I almost never do Fritz Tours any more. It’s been years since I offered one. And I’m only doing this one because an enthusiastic Fritz fan came out on the last Hammett walk last month and really wanted to do it.
Why not? Fritz deserves the effort, and it’ll be a great excuse to do yet another reread on his novel of supernatural horror set in San Francisco, Our Lady of Darkness. And just in time for Halloween.
I knew Fritz pretty well in the era he was working on that book, know some of the people his characters are modeled on — when I tell you about the deep and possibly arcane chuckle emitted when ordering the bunny pastries, or the stuff that was stolen from storage in the Family Sunshine house, some of which later showed up with Fritz’s inscriptions to his wife erased out (by some idiot), hey, it’s info I have yet to put in any kind of memoir.
(Another factor that makes me inclined to do a Fritz Tour once more is that I just finished yet another proofing of John Haefele’s upcoming book on H. P. Lovecraft and August Derleth and the Cthulhu Mythos — great book, but like hell to proof — where Fritz gets mentioned many, many times for his early role in Lovecraft Studies. Really put me in the mood for the eldritch and unspeakable. . . .)
