Don't feel bad, Ludovsky. Lucius did not want to be famous. He wanted to be great, which is something entirely different.

He was an amazing man in many respects, and one of the great prose stylists of his generation. He wrote beautifully in any genre, and science fiction, fantasy and horror were lucky to have him once in a while.
I was his copyeditor on
The Golden, his one foray into vampire fiction--essentially a murder mystery in which all the major characters are vampires. For anyone who is a very serious reader of science fiction--and by "serious", I mean a reader who can do the heavy lifting, and can also handle serious mainstream literature like Hemingway, Marquez, Borges etc.--I would recommend a great many of his works.
Green Eyes, his take on a "zombie" novel.
Life During Wartime, near future military SF.
Kalimantan, a magical realist/SF homage to Joseph Conrad.
The Jaguar Hunter, a fantastic multi-genre short story collection.
Beast of the Heartland, another fantastic multi-genre short story collection.
Most recently I also picked up
A Handbook of American Prayer, which is best described as magic realism. It's fantasy, but it has a very believable modern setting and characters, like a lot of his work. He published it with a press that prints books for charity, so that he would not have to accept any money for sales or readership. After reading it, I could see why. I think he didn't want to inherit the karma of cashing a paycheck associated with the book and its subject matter.
He was a gigantic talent and could often be larger-than-life in person, in many ways. He spent countless days and hours at my various homes in Seattle and Vancouver when my two daughters were children, playing baseball video games on the PC, smoking, talking, telling jokes and stories. I remember most of them, particularly the ones that were horrific or funny.
I had already lost touch with him for many years when he passed. But I am sad nonetheless.
--Arinn