Planet Stories: Sojan the Swordsman/Under the Warrior Star by Michael Moorcock and Joe R. Lansdale
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Planet Stories #29: Sojan the Swordsman by Michael Moorcock/ Under the Warrior Star
by Joe R. Landsale (Paizo Publishing, October 5, 2010). Cover by Kieran Yanner
When I saw this book, I immediately had to have it. A “Planet Stories Double Feature!” Planet Stories published quite a bit of Sword & Planet fiction back in the day, and of all the pulps, if I could have had a subscription to just one it probably would have been that one.
This “Planet Stories,” however, is a modern effort from Paizo Publishing that started out reprinting old tales from the original magazine, including some great stuff by Leigh Brackett.
This particular work contains two novellas, “Sojan the Swordsman” from Michael Moorcock, and “Under the Warrior Star” by Joe Lansdale. “Sojan” reprints a bunch of old Sojan tales from Michael Moorcock, which were linked together to make something of a longer tale. It was printed first in the collection, probably because he’s the better known of the two authors, but I think they should have done the Lansdale piece first. It’s considerably better.
The Sojan stories, which take place on a planet called “Zylor,” were written when Moorcock was “fourteen or fifteen,” according to a note in the beginning from the author. They are certainly not of as high a quality as Moorcock later achieved with his Elric tales.
The Joe Lansdale piece, “Under the Warrior Star,” is quite good. It is even dedicated by Lansdale to ERB, OAK, and REH (who I’ve mentioned in previous posts here to be the first generation of Sword & Planet writers).
The Nightrunners (Tor, March 1989). Cover by Joanie Schwarz & Gary Smith
Lansdale knows his stuff. I started with his horror oriented works, including one of my favorite horror novels — The Nightrunners — then moved on to his noir mystery stuff featuring “Hap and Leonard.” All of it is very fine.
This tale is a bit of a departure for Lansdale in style but I also liked it. An earthman named Braxton Booker ends up being transported to another planet called Juna with a matter transference machine — kind of like the Star Trek transporters. His experiences there are very ERBian and the ending is quite poignant so I won’t give it away.
Charles Gramlich administers The Swords & Planet League group on Facebook, where this post first appeared. His last article for Black Gate was Crafting Sword & Planet: Swords of Talera and Other Tales by Charles Gramlich.