I had a bad shock earlier this evening, when I learned that Joel Lane has died.

Joel was just fifty years old. He never enjoyed the best of health, and he’d been under some strain recently because his mother has not been well, but his tragically early death is something no one could have anticipated, never in a million years. It’s truly awful. I can still scarcely take in the news.

Joel’s name first became known to me in the late 1990s, when I started reading The Third Alternative and many of the Year’s Best fantasy and horror anthologies. Joel rapidly became one of my favourite new writers. I identified with his style at once – his anxiety at being, ingrained awareness of the numinous and the rock solid sense of place that was always a prominent characteristic of his work sang out to me, the weird, dark music of a comrade in arms, and I began to actively seek out his stories.

I read his first novel, From Blue to Black, with grateful astonishment as one of the finest pieces of writing about music I have ever encountered. How this work is not better known is an absolute mystery to me, and I know was a source of disappointment to him. The novel that followed it, The Blue Mask, was very nearly as fine. I read him with delighted envy as a core inspiration, recognising him as someone I wanted to emulate.

I first became acquainted with Joel personally at a book launch in 2007, and was thrilled when he later invited me to submit a story to the anthology he edited with Allyson Bird, Never Again, stories against tyranny in aid of the Sophie Lancaster Foundation. I was delighted to meet up with Joel again properly at the Nottingham FantasyCon in 2010, where the book was launched. We corresponded regularly after that, and met up many times at various events. I found him to be the most gentle of men, a self deprecating, wryly humorous presence. He always had a story to tell, he was always generous with his time, and with himself. I remember we especially enjoyed sitting on the ghost story panel together at last year’s FantasyCon – two Aickmanites against the Jamesians, we loved every moment.

One of the highlights of this year’s World Fantasy Convention was hearing Joel’s name read out as winner of the World Fantasy Award for his most recent collection, Where Furnaces Burn. Not only is it a beautiful collection, but the award was so well deserved, so much the right choice, it was a fitting moment. Sadly Joel could not be there to collect the award as his mother was in hospital, but I wrote to him about it afterwards and I know he was thrilled.

Joel and I last exchanged emails just a few days ago. I was eager to know when the second part of the extended essay he was writing on Robert Aickman was going to be ready for me to read – Joel’s knowledge of and passion for weird fiction was incredibly extensive, and more insightful than I can easily describe. I loved his non-fiction almost as much as I loved his fiction, and I was looking forward to that essay with genuine excitement. He told me he’d been sleeping better, and presented me with a short and gritty poem he’d recently written on the passing of Margaret Thatcher. He also said something that now seems eerily prescient, and I’m sure he wouldn’t mind me sharing these words, which sum up Joel and his attitude to life with a wonderful perfection:

“A crude, dogmatic pessimism has now become so prevalent on the internet that I’m becoming more focused on a sort of critical optimism, a sense of ‘seize the day before ithe night comes back’, that I think has always been my core attitude, and that’s helping me a lot at the moment.”

A treasured friend and colleague, a beautiful writer, a special person. I am already missing him very much.

EDIT 30/11/13: read heartfelt tributes to Joel from Simon Bestwick, Lynda Rucker, and Conrad Williams, among many others.