Fafhrd & The Gray Mouser

What I did upstate in between forays into the green jungle of my garden and various domestic intrigueries was read Fritz Leiber's sword and sorcery series. I have all of them and every time I go up I read through some more. I've read them many times, but each time they get better. The colors seem brighter, the humor funnier and the adventures more ridiculous and simultaneously more riveting. Much better than what most summer movies try to do. I love these two guys. They seem to be exaggerations of people I know. They have strange versions of relationships I've had, almost had, wanted to have. I can't imagine Harrison's Viriconium without Lankhmar, nor Gaiman's Sandman without Leiber's structural dance of Gods and interweaving worlds.