Donar wanted to read the depth of my anger, to plumb my sorrow at the loss of Thusnelda. I shared these things with him. What I do next, Argedestes, I do with pain like a banner above me. It is given to me. It is given to me to be the hammer of Rome. Arminius, Bane of Eagles (2021) is the first volume of Adrian Cole’s new sword & sorcery alternate history trilogy set against the struggle between the Roman…
Tyrandire, the Palace of Pain, moves secretly and silently through unseen tunnels between the many dimensions of the omniverse, traversing any of them that its grim master wishes to visit. A minute moon, perfectly circular, colder than terror, Tyrandire speeds on its way like light, sometimes lingering like a biting frost. The energy that charges this oval missile is greater than that of any sun, indeed greater than the energy contained within an entire universe, for it is the will…
I don’t often hear of fantasy described as “In the tradition of Tolkien and Lovecraft!” Just seems like an odd mix to me. But that’s exactly how Adrian Cole’s first three novels, collectively known as The Dream Lords trilogy, are described. Cole is a British writer also known for his four-volume Omaran Saga, and his more recent trilogy The Voidal, which Fletcher Vredenburgh called “an endless collection of interesting settings: universe-sized dimensions; monster-infested pocket worlds; a realm filled not with…
Last year I reviewed (quite favorably, after an initial aversion to it) The Oblivion Hand (2001), the first collection of Adrian Cole’s stories about the Voidal. To say they’re excessive, over the top, and incredibly phatasmagorical barely does them justice. They are all those things and much more. These traits are carried over into the second volume, The Long Reach of Night (2011), an even better book than the first. The Voidal is a man, cast out by the Dark Gods onto…
Stripped of all his memories for some great transgression against the Dark Gods, the mysterious one called the Voidal, or Fatecaster, endlessly traverses the dimensions of the omniverse. Always he brings vengeance via his Oblivion Hand, an additional punishment of the Dark Gods. And furthermore, any who aid or befriend him are made to suffer. Oblivion Hand (Wildside Press 2001) is a fix-up of eight early stories by Adrian Cole about his dark wanderer, the Voidal. Cole’s amnesiac protagonist was introduced…
Sword & Sorcery is a clenched fist thrust into the sky, a raised middle finger in the face of the Unknown, an epithet spat into the dirt through a rictus of bared teeth. S&S demands an attitude of not merely surviving but of dominating living, all else—everything else—be damned. The heroes of S&S continue living deeply until there are no more breaths to take. The only -ism S&S promotes is LIVE!-ism. Absolutely a rebellion against meaninglessness, it also fully embraces…
David C. Smith and Steven H Silver find priceless treasures in the Dealers Room at Windy City Pulp & Paper A month ago I wrote a short convention report on the 2023 Windy City Pulp & Paper Show, which took place Friday April 21st to Sunday, April 23rd in Lombard, Illinois. In that article I mostly rubber-necked at the gorgeous Weird Tales pulps and other rare magazines sold during the evening auctions, and took covetous pictures of the pre-auction displays….
Terror Tales Of The West Country (Telos Publishing, October 31, 2022). Cover by Neil Williams This is volume 14 in the successful ongoing series Terror Tales, a bunch of anthologies collecting horror short stories set every time in a different area of the United Kingdom. Which, all in all, appears to be a really spooky place where dark and supernatural events occur all the time. For the present book editor Paul Finch (an excellent horror writer himself) has chosen the West…
The first two issues of Startling Stories in 65 years, courtesy of Wildside Press and Douglas Draa. Covers: uncredited, and GrandeDuc. One of the big news stories of last year was the return of Startling Stories, the legendary science fiction pulp mag of the 40s and 50s, which published classic SF by Arthur C. Clarke, Jack Vance, Leigh Brackett, Fletcher Pratt, Henry Kuttner, A.E. van Vogt, Manly Wade Wellman, Edmond Hamilton, Stanley G, Weinbaum, and numerous others. The new venture…
Robert E. Howard Changed My Life (Rogue Blades Foundation, June 9, 2021). Cover by Didier Normand Many of us “older folk” (I’m using that term very broadly) can attest to some experience in their early years — usually somewhere around 13-years old — where some individual, some book or books, some movie, some band or something similar made a huge impact upon our lives, an impact with a positive and profound, lasting influence. For me, it was probably getting my…