Charles Saunders, the Father of Sword & Soul, was one of the most talented and beloved heroic fantasy writers of the last fifty years. That he died unknown, and was buried in an unmarked grave in Nova Scotia in June 2020, is one of the great tragedies of our genre.

The thing about great writers is that they don’t stay buried. When the news of Charles’ untimely death began to spread, it was met with an outpouring of grief and heartfelt tributes. David C. Smith wrote the touching memorial Charles, My Friend in December 2020, and Michael de Adder produced a superb comic strip bio for the Washington Post three years after his death. Greg Mele wrote Black Gate‘s obituary, and Seth Lindberg crafted a detailed survey of his most famous work in the Imaro Series Tour Guide. And a year after Charles’s death, Jon Tattrie raised $17,000 to erect a gravestone to mark his grave.

Now comes word of a more enduring tribute, and one that I hope will help the world understand and appreciate Charles’ remarkable legacy. Jon Tattrie, who worked alongside Charles for two years at the Halifax Daily News, has written To Leave a Warrior Behind: The Life and Stories of Charles R. Saunders, the Man Who Rewrote Fantasy, which will be released in hardcover next month from McClelland & Stewart.

Imaro (December 1981 reissue edition, which removed the problematic blurb “The Epic Novel
of a Black Tarzan”), Imaro II: The Quest for Cush (1984), and Imaro III: The Trail of Boho
(1985). DAW paperback originals; covers by Ken Kelly, James Gurney, and James Gurney

Blending biography with a tribute to Saunders’ enduring legacy of African fantasy, To Leave a Warrior Behind explores the life of q reclusive literary genius, and the worlds he left behind. Charles Saunders is celebrated today as the Father of Sword and Soul, a sub-genre built on Black heroes steeped in African myth and history. His books included the acclaimed Imaro trilogy, Dossouye, and the 2017 collection Nyumbani Tales.

To create To Leave a Warrior Behind, Jon Tattrie interviewed many people in Charles’ life, piecing together the tale a Black man in America who fled to Canada during the Vietnam War, and who came to create some of the most original and enduring fantasy of our generation. It is a memorial to a larger-than-life literary figure, a salute to a good friend, and a remembrance of a writer who deserves to be more widely known.

In his obituary for Black Gate, Greg Mele wrote in part,

Saunders wanted heroes that looked like him, but he wanted everyone to see why Africa was a rich, beautiful setting for fantasy that everyone could love, just as he, a Black man, had loved the works of Howard or Bradbury. Because of him, I have books on African Arms and Armour, the history of Ethiopia and the great empires of Benin and Ghana; I have investigated African martial arts and learned about heroes like Sundiata. Imaro opened that world up for me, and I will be forever grateful.

Long before we were celebrating Marlon James’s Black Leopard-Red Wolf and its portrayal of mythic Africa, Saunders was doing it better, first. He is one of the towering figures of that third generation of Sword & Sorcery, but he is also the Father of Sword & Soul, an innovator and fine writer, who deserves to remain in print, and be long remembered. The world has grown a little dimmer, the path to Nyumbani more tenuous… the griots calls for others to take up torches and light the way.

To Leave a Warrior Behind will be released in hardcover by McClelland & Stewart on January 20, 2026. Get full details here.