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And I can breathe a sigh of relief. I was mostly worried because of the weather report, but it turned out to be not icy at all, not really sleet, just a bit of cold rain.

We had a fine turnout and no one seemed to get lost (the event was not in the usual Melville Gallery but the museum itself was easy to find...and very interesting in layout and design. I suspect it's only half finished with exposed brick and wooden jousts and some weird large wooden doors. It's got amazing personality. Mobile Libris, the freelance book sellers brought 20 copies of the trade pb (US edition and first time I'd seen it) and sold out. The book looks gorgeous in the trade pb edition. Same cover but because the books are bigger they just look better.

Jim Freund introduced the NYRSF reading series and then Veronica Schanoes (who is a professor at Queens College and an sf/f writer) gave a brief, informative, and charming lecture about Poe's life and a bit about contemporary critical study of his work.
Simon Loekle (who has a show on WBAI) then did a terrific, very powerful dramatic reading of "The Cask of Amontadillo"
We took a break, drank up the two bottles of Amontadillo that Jim supplied, signed some books, chatted and then went on.

Next up, I talked for a few minutes about the anthology, reading from the introduction, and then introduced in turn, the three readers/contributors from the book: Delia Sherman, who read from "The Red Piano," Barbara Roden, who read from "The Brink of Eternity," and John Langan, who read from "Technicolor."
More signing of books and a bunch of us went to dinner.
Here are the photos