I learned in the last few hours that Howard Andrew Jones had finally succumbed to terminal brain cancer. I posted about when this started months ago. I can say—for me—that it has been a long-simmering horror, with no good outcome in sight. A slow-motion trainwreck. I am glad that Howard’s suffering is finally over.

I have gone through this once before. A good friend from high school—described by one and all as an “All-American guy”—went to the Gulf War a perfect physical specimen and came back dead…he just didn’t know it. Neither side of his family had any tendency toward brain cancer, but that is what he died of. Five Blackhawks flew over his hospice center an hour after he passed on…because his former unit respected him that much.

I first ‘met’ Howard in 2005 online via the Official Robert E. Howard Forum. We then met in person at the World Fantasy Convention in 2006. We kept in touch from then on. I last spoke to him on the phone in April of 2024, discussing his and John C. Hocking’s upcoming trip to Howard Days.

Since early 2021, I have lost five friends of especial note to me. Howard is just the latest. I don’t feel quite ready to write a ‘memorial’ post at this point. I’ll just say that one would have to look far and wide to find a more upbeat and genuinely good man. He deserved better. Take that as a lesson. We are all mortal and nothing can be taken for granted.

Requiescat in pace, Howard. You were a good friend to me.