ANNIVERSARY

Yesterday was our second wedding anniversary. Ann has been putting up with my antics for over 13 years, but we finally got married two years ago, in Fort Lauderdale. We first met because she was editing The Silver Web and I'd been editing a magazine out of Gainesville, Florida, called Chimera Connections. I also had been submitting work to SW. For a few years, we were friends, and then started dating. I used to commute up to Tallahassee from Gainesville (about 2.5 hours) every weekend, when I could, before finally making the move up to Tallahassee in 1992. We've lived together ever since.

Ann's my first reader on all of my fiction and has had an enormous influence on every anthology I've ever edited, basically. Certainly, the Leviathan series has benefitted greatly from her experience, and from her expertise--I think she's the best general editor I've met, in terms of being able to read a story, no matter who it's from, and suss out how good it is, what its flaws/strengths are. This has been invaluable on the Leviathan series.

On my fiction, she has, as mentioned, the dubious distinction of reading it first and commenting on it. I'll give her something to read and she'll either take it to her day job to read at lunch or she'll read it at home. In the latter case, I will be trying very hard to project a sense of nonchalance while sweating bullets. She will read it while I'm either absent from the room or pretending to watch TV. Then she won't say anything, usually. She'll set it down and wait for me to ask her what she thought. There's this terrifying moment between asking the question and receiving the response that just opens up like an abyss. Luckily, she's usually fond of it, at the very least, but, still...I can't think of a better way to get my heart rate up...

On the new novel, on which the revisions are going nicely, Ann has been great. After reading it, she had several suggestions with regard to the characters that added so much.

Anyway, I couldn't do what I do without Ann, and I hope I'm as supportive of what she does as she is of what I do.

It's been two years (plus 11) and we're still going strong. I can't imagine life without her.

Jeff