31 Terrifying Flavors

I was wrong about going to a gothic ice cream social. Instead, I was going to Lovecraftian ice cream social, which skews more to the "geek and hipster" end of the scale. Stuffed C'thulhus were carried by multiple people, and no two were alike. Not that I talked to any of them. I've discovered that my mad social skillz pretty much evaporate when I've had an hour and a half of sleep in the past day.

The event was planned by a local bookstore in honor of the seventieth anniversary of Lovecraft's death. Apparently, Lovecraft gorged himself on ice cream whenever the opportunity presented itself. They had also assembled a pair of local authors to do readings. I'm willing to bet you haven't heard of either of them. However, other authors supposedly have, including Poppy Z. Brite, who will have "Author of a The Crow novelization," following her name until the end of time.

Santoro read from the ending of "The Colour Out Of Space," and almost made Lovecraft's dialogue work. I would say more, but I'm already in trouble for violating rule four.

Mundt read from Lord of a Visible World: An Autobiography In Letters. It turned out to be unexpectedly fascinating stuff, which is why as I left, the bookstore was having to tell multiple people that they didn't actually have any copies of that book, but they could always order some. I doubt that the bookstore was excited that their collection of freely purchasable books had been upstaged, but it's a lesson learned; When you tell an author to read anything he wants to, he might just do it.

But before I left, I discovered that the latest Richard Stark novel had come out. One day, I'll actually buy one of his stories. This will probably be the day they stop charging twenty bucks for a book I can finish in four hours.