Well Worth Remembering

One of the unwelcome responsibilities essential to the full practice of journalism is penning obituaries. I had hoped to reserve these announcements of recent passings for my next news wrap-up. But since it’s clear that other obligations will inhibit my penning that post at any time soon, allow me to lay out the information now.

• Author Patti Abbott spread word this morning that Pennsylvania short-story writer Sandra J. Seamans died on May 23 at age 68. Abbott notes that “Seamans served the writing community selflessly by posting contests and calls for stories on her blog, My Little Corner. She wrote wonderful stories herself until the dual deaths in 2015 of her husband and mother. She never bounced back from her grief. I am sure she died before her time due to that blow. A collection of her stories [Cold Rifts] was published as an e-book by Snubnose Press, but when the press closed, her e-book disappeared. Some are lucky enough to have it on their e-reader.” Seamans’ official obit can be found here; look here for a 2012 interview with her.

• The Gumshoe Site reported earlier that American-born novelist W. Glenn Duncan passed away on May 7 “in Australia (where he emigrated in 1975 with his wife and three children) ‘after a long struggle with health issues.’ The former journalist and pilot wrote six books featuring Rafferty, [a] tough ex-cop private eye in Dallas, Texas, which started with Rafferty's Rules (1987) and ended with Fatal Sisters (1990, all six from Fawcett/Gold Medal). The sixth Rafferty novel won the 1991 Shamus Award for best paperback. His son W. Glenn Duncan, Jr. has continued the Rafferty [series] with False Gods (d square publishing e-book, 2018). Duncan Sr. was 78.”

• Finally, I received a note recently from Oakland, California, author Mark Coggins—creator of the August Riordan P.I. series—saying that his China-born wife of almost 20 years, Lin “Linda” Zhou, died on April 14, 2019, at age 49. “The cause,” he explained, “was complications from an autoimmune disease.” An obituary of Zhou, a software quality assurance specialist, can be found on Coggins’ Web site.

I offer my condolences to all three families.