small crypts Before we start on the Snippet — I just now finished the first full draft of SHADOW RITES, JY book 10. It is 109,000+ words and about 347 pages. Tomorrow, I start the revisions. WHOOT!

(Photos from one of many cemeteries in NOLA, though not the one described here.)

An SUV pulled up, a short distance away, the headlights visible through small buildings. We were no longer on St. Charles Ave, but just off Loyola Ave, in an area of town where cemeteries were on either side of the road. We were actually inside one cemetery however, and I caught a glimpse of the mausoleum belonging to H Meyer. The crypt was constructed of brick covered with cement, shaped to look like stone. There were once-white marble architectural elements and a pediment on top. If the cement parts of the burial place had ever been painted or whitewashed, the pigments were long gone. Low beds of white clover grew everywhere between the resting places of the long dead, and taller weeds pushed through the broken concrete walks. Bracken and more weeds grew from the walls and roofs of even older crypts. Neglect and decay and useless decadence. There was no one to keep the place of the dead nice, not anymore. It was falling to ruin. St-Louis-Cemetery-new-orleansphoto_2 (1)