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Month: August 2012

GenCon 2012 – Dungeons & Dragons Next Keynote Liveblog

GenCon 2012 – Dungeons & Dragons Next Keynote Liveblog

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Waiting for the D&D Next keynote to begin at GenCon 2012. Check it out on the big screen!
Waiting for the D&D Next keynote to begin at GenCon 2012. Check it out on the big screen!

For the first time in GenCon history, the week began with a keynote event on Thursday evening. And who gave the keynote? None other than the folks behind Dungeons & Dragons.

For the last several months, Dungeons & Dragons has been undergoing a transformation into their Dungeons & Dragons Next format (which they are loathe to officially call 5th edition).

The event was delayed a bit due to rain and venue change, but once things are moving, I’ll be liveblogging about the event. I know I won’t catch everything, but I’m sure there’ll be a link to video of the event online shortly and I’ll post it (and other background links) in an update over the next day or so, when I have more stable net access.

The Event Begins

7:25 pm – Peter Adkison, founder of Wizards of the Coast, runs onstage and discusses how this inaugural keynote came into being. Basically, Adkison strong-armed Greg Leeds (current CEO of Wizards of the Coast) into doing it, and made it clear that he expected Greg himself to get on stage and start the event off. So, with that ….

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A Brick-and-Mortar Bookstore Score

A Brick-and-Mortar Bookstore Score

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coverthelongships_norstedtsBrick and mortar bookstores are as rare as hen’s teeth these days, it seems, and that’s a shame. I enjoy the instantaneous convenience and enormous selection of Amazon and Abebooks, but there’s something about musty old bookstores that online shopping cannot replace. The tactile sensation of picking up books, the joy of utterly unexpected finds, and the atmosphere of a shop devoted to reading and book-selling, are experiences that online delivery mechanisms cannot replicate.

Yesterday, I found a wonderful bookstore that reminded me of the unique advantages and pleasures of the real over the virtual: Mansfield’s Books and More in Tilton, New Hampshire. Tilton is a town I had driven through numerous times without a cause to stop, outside of filling a gas tank and the like. But yesterday, while playing chauffer on a back-to-school shopping trip with my wife and kids, I caught a glimpse of a storefront window in Tilton Center that I had previously overlooked. In a brief glance I took in a display of hardcover books in the front window and a few cartons of paperbacks placed outside with a sign indicating a sidewalk sale. My attention piqued, I managed to free myself from the clutches of clothes and shoe shopping with little difficulty and quickly backtracked to Mansfield’s.

Mansfield’s occupies what appears to be a former office building. The main room has a fireplace in one wall with a few overstuffed chairs. A narrow hallway at the back opens up on the left and right to six rooms that were presumably individual offices at one time. Most of these smaller rooms were still hung with old, ornate doors with frosted glass panes and other such details, though one clearly served as a small kitchen at one point, complete with a sink. Each room—the main room in the front and the half-dozen at the back—was overflowing, floor to ceiling, with used books, as well as a scattering of other items (the “More” refers to some old movie posters, knick knacks, and used DVDs and CDs).

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GenCon 2012 Begins

GenCon 2012 Begins

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gencon-emblemTomorrow, I’m headed off to GenCon for a brief stay. My schedule this year has been a little hectic, what with a couple of book promotions, some revisions, some drafting, and an unexpected knee surgery, so I didn’t plan a whole lot of convention time. Now I’m regretting it, because GenCon is a lot of fun, and being there just for Saturday is going to feel a little like seeing the pie and only getting to eat one cherry.

There’s so much to see and do that I only recently learned about the Writing Symposium, a series of tracks about the writing industry for gaming and media fiction and all sorts of genre fiction. Writers and editors far more famous and influential than me will be speaking and offering advice as well as writing critiques, among them Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson, and Mike Stackpole. Next year, I fully plan to be more involved.

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New Treasures: The Book of Cthulhu, edited by Ross E. Lockhart

New Treasures: The Book of Cthulhu, edited by Ross E. Lockhart

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book-of-cthulhuIt’s been a few good years for Cthulhu fans, with a number of high-profile, acclaimed anthologies offering brand new tales of everyone’s favorite genocidal cosmic entity, including Ellen Datlow’s Lovecraft Unbound (2009), Darrell Schweitzer’s Cthulhu’s Reign (2010), S. T. Joshi’s Black Wings of Cthulhu (2010), and Future Lovecraft (2011) edited by Paula R. Stiles and Silvia Moreno-Garcia, among others.

However, if you’re new to the Cthulhu mythos, or just want to sample the best Lovecraftian horror of the last eight decades, your options are a little more limited. Paula Guran’s New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird (2011) offers an excellent cross-section of fiction from the last decade, with short stories by Neil Gaiman, John Langan, China Miéville, Michael Shea, Charles Stross, and many others. At 528 pages, it’s a veritable feast of modern cosmic horror, but since the oldest story dates from the year 2000, it doesn’t really count as a true survey of the very finest Cthulhu fiction.

That title, I think, goes to Ross E. Lockhart’s The Book of Cthulhu. It includes some of the most famous Cthulhu stories of all time, including T.E.D. Klein’s “Black Man With a Horn” (1980), Brian McNaughton’s “The Doom That Came to Innsmouth” (1999), and fiction by Charles R. Saunders, Ramsey Campbell, Bruce Sterling, Laird Barron, Kage Baker, Thomas Ligotti, Gene Wolfe, and many others.

Although Lockhart draws heavily from modern writers, there’s surprisingly little overlap with Guran’s volume — a scant four stories. You could probably get away with getting both, in fact. I’m glad I did.

Ross E. Lockhart is the managing editor of Night Shade Books. A second volume, The Book of Cthulhu 2 — reprinting stories by Fritz Leiber, Neil Gaiman, Laird Barron, Michael Chabon, and many others — is scheduled for release in October.

The Book of Cthulhu is 530 pages in a handsome trade paperback, with cover art by Obrotowy. It was released in August, 2011 by Night Shade Books, with a cover price of $15.99.

Teaching and Fantasy Literature: Uses of Terrible Comic Adaptations

Teaching and Fantasy Literature: Uses of Terrible Comic Adaptations

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taran-wanderer21“Usually the combat scenes are the part I understand best,” said my student. “In this one, I have no idea what’s going on. There’s a wounded character at the end of the scene, and I have no idea how he even got near the fighting.”

We’d made our way to the end of Lloyd Alexander’s Taran Wanderer, the fourth volume in the classic 1960’s YA fantasy series The Chronicles of Prydain. My student and I had sojourned in Prydain for most of a year. The prospect of seeing Taran come into his full powers at last in The High King was so exhilarating that the kid had rushed through the last several chapters of Taran Wanderer and confused himself thoroughly.

I could have assigned the usual remedy — write one page per chapter, explaining who did what to whom and why, flagging anything that’s still confusing — but I had just read Ralph Fletcher’s Boy Writers: Reclaiming Their Voices. Fletcher devotes a chapter to the ways it can help students, especially male students in his experience, to draw illustrations and diagrams alongside their writing. Apparently English teachers in high schools and middle schools are trained to discourage such drawings, on the assumption that they’re a distraction from learning how to write.

“Write me a comic,” I said.

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Discovering Galaxy Science Fiction

Discovering Galaxy Science Fiction

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galaxy-may-1952I’ve known about older speculative magazines for a few years – the pulp fiction magazines from decades ago. I listened to people talk about stories they read from those magazines, and it seemed like I was missing out on something.

I’m Matthew Wuertz, a fiction reader and writer. I’ve been a Black Gate reader since issue 7. I’ve met most of the Black Gate team over the years, and even took part in the 2010 Sword & Sorcery Panel Podcast with them at the World Fantasy Convention in Columbus. I also have my own blog.

My wife’s van had Sirius Satellite Radio for a year, and I liked listening to the station that played old radio shows — including “X Minus One,” which had episodes of science fiction. One of the episodes was “Surface Tension” by James Blish, originally published in Galaxy Science Fiction. When I heard of the episode’s origin, my curiosity in pulp magazines increased. And now I had a title in mind. I recall thinking, “Would it be possible to actually get one of these Galaxy magazines in my hands?”

A short time later, John O’Neill posted the article “How Galaxy Magazine Saved Robert Silverberg from a Life of Smoking,” so I asked how one might acquire an issue. One of the answers was eBay, and John posted several links to active auctions.

At this point, my wife, whose eBay prowess amazes me, became involved. In mere moments, she was saving search results and tracking a number of options. After considering several choices, I chose an auction for 22 issues of Galaxy. So we made a bid. It was a long week until the auction ended, but we won.

When the magazines finally arrived, I was so excited. These were pocketbook-sized magazines with incredible art on the covers, like astronauts mining asteroids with jackhammers while their cylindrical rocket ship floats overhead. This was on the cover of my oldest issue – May, 1952. I was holding a 60-year-old magazine in my hands! I could hardly wait to open the musty, faded pages and read stories written long before I’d been born. See the complete lot here.

What lies within those pages will be revealed another time. I need to stop here. Those astronaut miners are waiting for me.

Harry Harrison, March 12, 1925 – August 15, 2012

Harry Harrison, March 12, 1925 – August 15, 2012

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harry-harrisonHarry Harrison, the prolific author of nearly 60 novels (including Deathworld; Bill, the Galactic Hero; The Hammer and the Cross; and eleven titles in The Stainless Steel Rat series) has died.

Harrison’s first publication was the short story, “Rock Diver,” in the February 1951 issue of Worlds Beyond. But he entered the field as an illustrator, working on some of the most fondly-remembered comics of the 50’s, including EC Comics’ science fiction titles Weird Fantasy and Weird Science. He also wrote a number of syndicated comic strips, creating Rick Random and becoming the main writer of the Flash Gordon newspaper strip in the 50s and 60s.

Harrison also made a name for himself as an important and influential editor, beginning with the September 1953 issue of Rocket Stories. He was the editor of many of the field’s leading magazines, including Amazing Stories (1967 – 1968), Science Fiction Adventures (1953 – 1954), Fantastic (1968), and SF Impulse (1966 – 1967). With Brian Aldiss, he edited Nebula Awards 2, two volumes of SF Horizons, three volumes of the Decade anthology series (1940, 1950, and 1960), and nine volumes of The Year’s Best Science Fiction (1967 – 1975).

But it was as an author that Harrison really made his mark. His first novel was Deathworld (1960), a book that was still in print and much discussed two decades later, when I was in high school. He wrote two more in what was eventually to become The Deathworld Trilogy. His 1966 novel Make Room! Make Room! became the basis for the famous science fiction film Soylent Green (1973), starring Charlton Heston.

Harrison had an affinity for series work, and most of his 58 novels are part of a series including the Brion Brandd novels (2 titles), Tony Hawkin (2), To the Stars (3), The Hammer and the Cross (3), Stars and Stripes (3), Eden (3), Bill, the Galactic Hero (7), and The Stainless Steel Rat (11). Much of his short fiction also followed this pattern, including the nine “Matter Transmitter” stories.

Harrison’s career spanned nearly six decades. The monumental collection 50 in 50 (Tor, 2002) collects 50 stories written over 50 years. His last novel was The Stainless Steel Rat Returns, published by Tor in 2010.

According to The Official Harry Harrison Website, Harry Harrison died today at the age of 87. He was a vastly influential writer and editor during the formative years of the genre, and he will be much missed.

Vintage Treasures: Eleanor Arnason’s The Sword Smith

Vintage Treasures: Eleanor Arnason’s The Sword Smith

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the-sword-smith2I first became acquainted with Eleanor Arnason through her powerful science fiction novels, including To the Resurrection Station (1986), Ring of Swords (1993), and especially A Woman of the Iron People (1991), the novel which won both the first Tiptree Award and the Mythopoeic Award in 1992.

But Arnason has a fine rep as a fantasy author as well. Her Daughter of the Bear King (1987) — the tale of a Minneapolis housewife who finds herself in a strange world where she’s hailed as a long-awaited hero, a true bear and shape-changer called to fight a creeping evil — was her second fantasy novel. Her first, and her first published novel, was The Sword Smith (1978).

The Sword Smith is an odd book in many ways. In begins in media res, with our heroes Limper, a lame smith, and his companion, the young dragon Nargri, in full flight from the King of Eshgorin, who has put a price on their heads. The reasons for all this are gradually revealed in a book that’s more travelogue than tightly-plotted heroic fantasy, with the two companions having a variety of adventures, meeting new companions, getting captured (more than once), and getting in and out of sticky situations. That’s our two heroes on the cover, making a sword (click for bigger version).

The Sword Smith is sometimes described as “low fantasy” (as opposed to high fantasy), chiefly because of the lack of plot. But it’s also praised for its originality; world building; and themes of individual freedom in the face of tyranny, the value of artistic aspirations, and prejudice.

It took me a while to track down a copy, but I finally found one last week. I think this has more to do with the publisher — a tiny outfit called Condor Publishing, who as far as I know published virtually no other fantasy novels — than any lack of quality. For whatever reason, copies are scare, and the book has never been reprinted.

The Sword Smith is 208 pages in paperback. It was published in 1978 by Condor Publishing, with a wraparound cover by A. Echevarria, and had an original cover price of $1.95.

Art of the Genre: Joe Kubert [1926-2012]

Art of the Genre: Joe Kubert [1926-2012]

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Joe Kubert, comic icon and teacher, passed away August 12th 2012
Joe Kubert, comic icon and teacher, passed away August 12th 2012
When I think of Joe Kubert, I think of Sgt. Rock, of comic books and of incredible pencils, but first and foremost I think of an inspirational teacher. Most of the time, artists influence the marketplace and world with their art alone, students of their style learning from observing images, but now and again a great artist also becomes a teacher, and for this their lives, and our world, will be forever changed.

So it was for Joe Kurbert, comic icon, and master of his art. Joe’s school, and all the ‘Kubies,’ as his graduates were called, helped define nearly two generations of art since its inception in 1976. Notable names such as Dave Dorman, Tim Truman, and countless others have studied under this master, and because of that, his rank among the all time greats increases tenfold.

Two of his children, sons Adam and Andy, have gone on to follow in their father’s footsteps as well, now respected comic artists in their own right.

His art, so inspiring to all fans, had a subtle quality that somehow managed to be both hard and soft. Emotion was etched into each line, and the movement found in his figures always had a realism I found astonishing when reading gritty war stories from his formative, post WWII, years in the industry.

He was another outstanding member of ‘The Greatest Generation,’ and the principles for which he lived his life, and the kindness and generosity for which he was known, are a shining example to others who I hope will eventually follow in his footsteps.

To this, beyond talented and incredible father, artist, husband, and teacher, I raise a glass. He will be sorely missed, but his legacy, as well as his teachings, will continue. And for that, the world of art will be forever enriched.

Black Gate Goes to the Summer Movies: The Bourne Legacy

Black Gate Goes to the Summer Movies: The Bourne Legacy

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bourne-legacy-posterThe Bourne Legacy, Paramount’s attempt to extend their successful Jason Bourne franchise — based very loosely on the novels of Robert Ludlum — does give the impression of the first film of a trilogy. It feels like The Bourne Identity (2002), the inaugural movie of the Matt Damon trilogy: it’s a starting point with some excellent sections, but also the nagging sense that all the finest moments are yet to come. Overall, there is something slight about the enterprise, making it a minor disappointment for a film I hoped would salvage August. Will Expendables 2 be this year’s “August Surprise”? I never thought that might be a possibility at the beginning of the season.

Doug Liman directed The Bourne Identity, but it was Paul Greengrass sitting in the folding green chair for the next two films, The Bourne Supremacy (2004) and The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), and it was his work that shoved the series into the high octane world of dazzling foot pursuits, close-quarter pummelings, shaky-cam car chases, and earnest people trying to get control of the world by walking fast while talking on cell phones. And audiences loved it. Those two films are the defining spy movies of the decade, easily besting the re-boot of James Bond (in the Jason Bourne mold, natch).

The Bourne Legacy, under the direction of Tony Gilroy, who wrote all three previous entries and made an impression as a director with Michael Clayton in 2007, collects the elements that made its predecessors work: whipcrack action with jittery cameras, raw global espionage, and top-level actors playing the gray-shaded manipulators attached to their phones and computer displays. What it doesn’t have is a compelling enough character story at the center to hold it together, or a resolution that satisfies beyond the need to signal a sequel.

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