Two Illustrators Meet in The Red Flame

This is long convoluted tale and the title is in fact the end of the story not the beginning of it. I’ll post it now and expand on it later

What is a Sazerac?

I drove to New York City in January 2009 to celebrate Sherlock Holmes (Anno CLIV) Birthday Festivities. I took along The Izbans’ latest book — The Problem of the Nine Sazeracs. Herein Sherlock Holmes and his colleagues travel to New Orleans and break up into teams to solve nine problems in logic which deny explanation at least by his publisher. This book was on sale in the Huckster’s Room on Saturday morning, and it was a wonderful opportunity to renew acquaintances with friends across America, Canada, England and France. After assembling this book I am relatively confident I know what a Sazerac is, but I still don’t know what the drink tastes like. This deficiency will be corrected this Thursday evening when I attend a Dinner Meeting of Hugo’s Companions in Chicago on my way to Sauk City, Wisconsin.

Patricia N. Izban’s Recipe for the Sazerac Cocktail
Ingredients

½ teaspoon Herbsaint
1½ oz. of rye whiskey
2 dashes of Angostura bitters
4 dashes of Peychaud’s bitters
Dash of simple syrup: * The recipe for simple syrup: Combine one cup white table sugar and ½ cup of water in a saucepan and boil for about five minutes. Transfer to a glass jar and store in a refrigerator.
4 to 5 ice cubes: small lemon peel
Pour Herbsaint in an old fashioned glass and swirl the liquer so that it coasts the inside of the glass; then, pour off the excess.
Combine the remaining ingredients, except for the lemon peel, in a cocktail shaker, shake well, and pour into the coated glass.
Finally, rim the glass with the twisted lemon peel, throw the peel into the drink as a garnish, and serve.
Serves one.

That evening I met Donald and Patricia Izban in the lobby of the Marriott Hotel and we traveled to a wonderful Italian Restaurant for dinner with an memorable dry red wine that Patricia selected. The talk revolved around many matters Sherlockian and their next book — about San Francisco and The Red Circles.

A brand new Sherlock Holmes project!

Under the Darkling Sky: A Chrono-Geographic Odyssey through The Holmesian Canon

by John E. Weber

John is from Camillus, just outside Syracuse. I visited him on the way to New York in January 2009 to deliver the galley with an Index.

and I am attaching the first draft of the cover — an evening view of a Tor on Dartmoor.

Hard Cover ISBN-13: 978-1-55246-851-7

Trade Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-55246-852-4

A Cornerstone Proposal

Since my retirement commenced on 1 April 2008, I have been working with my friend Larry Moore to build a Hobby Garage for my books next to my home on Lake Eugenia. The first four months have been entirely occupied with negotiations with the GREY SAUBLE CONSERVATION AUTHORITY and THE MUNICIPALITY OF GREY HIGHLANDS Building Department. The project got underway in September 2008. The footings were poured this week, and the cement for the basement will be poured on Monday. The outside wall cement was plugged and tarred last evening, and I expect the Building Inspector later today! I plan to visit a tombstone place in the very near future to select a marble slab, on which I plan to inscribe “2008 and the Logo of the Battered Silicon Dispatch Box which Peter Ruber gave me back in 1995. This logo was formerly used by his publishing firm “The Candlelight Press” This logo was designed for Peter Ruber by Henry Lauritzen and is pictured above.

Construction of the floor begins next week, and I am planning to include a cornerstone which will contain a TIME CAPSULE. A couple of local newspapers, and some some souvenir coins are appropriate, but I have invited The Sacred Six to propose additional items for the Time Capsule, and that will be a subject of a future post.

Bob Weinberg suggested that I paint a Cthulhu monster on the garage door — I don’t think so. However I could be convinced to set a silhouette of Sherlock Holmes at the corner of the garage. These figures are eye-catchers, and this one was originally used on the Sherlock Holmes Float in the Shelburne Fiddle Contest Parade in August 1992 — but that’s another story!

Larry and I are presently investigating floor to ceiling (8 feet) shelving, since I will have the opportunity to place shelving on 56 feet of straight wall space, from one end of the building to another interrupted by a single 4 foot window, which will also contain a pane of stained glass featuring the staff of AEscalepius.

I have many pictures of the building under construction, but I will spare the reader’s eyes!

… The buildings inspector arrived, and the next visit will be scheduled when the garage is framed up — whatever that means.

Approaching the Victoria Day weekend …

there are so many projects to discuss, I am somewhat at a loss about where to start, and so will try and organize the projects below, and deal with them one at a time: –

The Sacred Six – The Editorial Board for the The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box, Messr. Colombo, Roberts, Schroeter, Vanderbeek, Vanderburgh and Weinberg. Plans for the second meeting in Dayton@Pulpcon.

Six for The Sacred Six – 1. The Polaris Trilogy (Charles B. Stilson) 2. The Palos Trilogy (J.U. Giesy) 3. The Suicide Squad (Emile Temperman) 4. The Tong of Terror: The Chinatown Adventures of Jimmy Wentworth (Sidney Hershel Small) 5. Satan Hall (Carroll John Daly) 6. Luther McGavock (Merle Constiner)

The story behind The Hebrew Hero

The publications of the poet Raymond Souster, the Bard of Toronto.

The publications of Stephen Leacock. A Scandal in Montreal by Ed Hoch scheduled for release on 7 June 2008, at the Leacock Medal Dinner in Orillia at Geneva Park.

The project ideas of John Robert Colombo – Jules Verne’s Canada.

The Uniform Edition of Hugh Hood

The Uniform Edition of Hugh Garner

Future Lost Treasures from the Pulps featuring 1. Strange Ocean Vistas (Philip M. Fisher, Jr.) 2. The Weird Fiction of Otis Adelbert Kline (O.A. Kline) 3. The Don Everhard Omnibus (Gordon Young) 4. Rafferty and Chang (A.E. Apple)

and then there are many other projects at various stages of completion: 1. The Shunned House — Leaf Edition (H.P. Lovecraft) 2. Carnacki The Ghost Finder (William Hope Hodgson) 3. Jumbee and East India Lights (William St.Clair Whitehead) 4. The Adventure Trilogy (A.D. Howden Smith) 5. Ernest Dudley 6. John Russell Fearn

The projects of Martin Gardner 1. The Fantastic Fiction of Gilbert Chesterton 2. The Annotated Casey at the Bat 3. Visitors from Oz 4. Mary Baker Eddy: The Rise and Fall of Christian Science 5. Mr. Belloc Objects and Still Objects to “The Outline of History” 6. The Adventures of Humphrey Huckleberry.

The electronic edition of The Rohmer Review (e-RR)

The Best Short Stories of August Derleth and three other collections.

The Adventures of Rogan Kincaid (Henning Nelms)

Memories of China (1920-1932) by A.R.C. Butson and his Father

The Old Man in the Corner and Other Detective stories (Baroness Emuska Orczy)

Will expand on each of the above soon

David L. Hammer publishes another book on Sherlock Holmes

David Hammer called me last fall and asked if I would be interested in publishing his latest memoir on Sherlock Holmes – essays, presentations, introductions and erudite investigations into Sherlock Holmes and his Literary Agent, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle entitled You Know My Methods Watson. I agreed without hesitation, and when the galley proof was completed, edited by Susan Z. Diamond of Chicago, then David prepared the index. The manuscript was then proof read by Elisabeth Thyne out there on the left coast in California. The book was launched, without fanfare in New York City at the Algonquin Hotel on the Sherlock Holmes birthday weekend in January 2008 (Sherlock is now in his 155th year, living in retirement on The Sussex Downs and practising his passion of Apiculture. The book can be previewed and ordered through my website at www.batteredbox.com. Trade paperback 136 pages. ISBN 978-1-55246-797-8