From: apparent prankster with good line of gab
Subject: The real HOLY FIRE
Date: May 17, 2007 4:13:27 PM PDT
Dear Bruce Sterling,
I bought the hardcover, Holy Fire, after I heard your interview on NPR around 1997-98. I'm not a regular book reader so reading it was pretty much stop-and-go. Finally, I put it on my dresser where it sat partially read for 3-6 months.
I lived with my Golden Retriever and one Sunday night about 8PM I was called out to see a patient. I loaded my dog into my SUV and treated the patient in my office. I returned an hour later to find a cop pulling out of my driveway and my girl friend's car in the driveway. All the lights of my house were on.
Upon exiting my car in my garage I smelled smoke. Cheryl met me and told me I had had a fire. The fire alarm is hard wired to the fire dept. They had arrived, saw no fire from the outside and were about to leave when Cheryl arrived. She had been called by the alarm company.
She opened the door and they smelled smore. 2 firemen went to the basement, two searched the ground floor, and Cheryl and one went to my bedroom. They found 10 inches of fire coming from the cover of the closed book. They put it into a waste basket and flooded it with water from the tub.
There was no smoking material, candles, electrical, or direct sunlight near it at all. The fire had burned through the central portion of the cover through 60 pages never touching the edges of the pages. There was absolutely no damage to anything else in my home, not even soot or smoke damage.
Cheryl was not happy when I said I wanted to keep the book out of curiosity, but relented to have me keep the water logged book frozen in the freezer. Periodically, I would thaw it just to look for clues about the cause. I could find nothing.
I married Cheryl 2 years later and we moved to a new home. She wanted me to get rid of the book. I wanted to keep it. I transported the frozen book to our new home where I placed it into the Ice maker which was not connected. A year later I decided that I wanted to connect the ice cube maker. When I pulled out the ice cube tray I found 2, 2 inch holes burned through the plastic tray. Again no damage, i.e., soot or melted material within the freezer. Perhaps the previous owners had burned this tray and I did not discover the damage until I pulled the frozen book out or something else! At that time I sent the book to the gentleman who owns the Chicago Ghost Tours. I was spooked.
Just thought you would like this true story. I had tried to find a way to send this story to you when it happened but couldn't.
Best wishes,
(signed)
