Mistress of the Catacombs

Acknowledgments

For many years now Dan Breen has been reading the rough drafts of my prose and making it better. Mistress of the Catacombs is the latest beneficiary of his attention.

I didn’t, for a wonder, blow up another computer while writing this novel. Nevertheless, my wife, Jo, found me a backup and my son Jonathan set it up for me. (Mark Van Name and Allyn Vogel, who I believe have been cited for computer help in every book of mine for the past decade, will doubtless be back in the next one.)

Many friends provided this or that bit of information which will show up in the text of Mistress. Thanks very much to everyone who helped. Two whose contribution was even more considerable are Karen Zimmerman, my webmaster, and Sandra Miesel.

Stephanie Lane, my liaison with the machinery of Tor, is a continuing delight to work with. Contact with Stephanie is clear and pleasant, and she invariably follows up her end of whatever business.

And, finally, I owe many debts to historians and to other fiction writers. Readers who are familiar with the work of Clark Ashton Smith will realize that I owe him in particular. Readers who aren’t familiar with Smith should correct that gap in their education at their earliest convenience.