Search Results for: adrian simmons

Watch the Windycon Sword & Sorcery Panel with Mike Penkas, David C. Smith, Adrian Simmons, and John O’Neill

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Mike Penkas moderates the Sword & Sorcery panel at Windycon 47 Windycon 47 was held in Lombard, IL from November 12-14. I was a guest of the convention, with a reading and several panels, and it was an absolute delight to attend an in-person convention again. Carlos Hernandez was the Author Guest of Honor, and his wife Claire Suzanne Elizabeth Cooney (former Managing Editor of Black Gate) was the Poetry G.O.H. In addition to their other activities, the two conducted…

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Discussing All Things Fantasy, Past, Present, and Future: An Interview with Adrian Simmons and David Farney of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly

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Heroic Fantasy Quarterly is an ezine dedicated to publishing short works of heroic fantasy. More than that, through both prose and poetry we hope to hearken an older age of storytelling – an age when a story well told enthralled audiences. Traits of great oral storytelling survive the ages to influence treasures of literature, the pulps, radio plays, late-night game sessions, and now Heroic Fantasy Quarterly. So reads the “Mission Statement “of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly. Like Black Gate e-magazine, Heroic…

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Adrian Simmons on Pseudopod

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Adrian Simmons is one of our favorite editors. With his team of cohorts he edits the marvelous Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, which you should be reading. He’s also a prolific and popular blogger, and his articles for Black Gate — including Fools in the Hotzone and Frodo Baggins, Lady Galadriel, and the Games of the Mighty — are some of the most popular pieces we’ve ever published. But he’s also a fine fiction writer. This week Pseudopod, the premier horror fiction…

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A to Z Reviews: “Bad Luck,” by Vance Aandahl

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Over the past several years, I’ve embarked on a series of year-long review cycles at Black Gate. In 2018, I reviewed a story-a-day to coincide with an author whose birthday it was. In 2022, I selected stories completely at random from my collection to review. In both of those cases, the projects served to find forgotten and minor works of science fiction that spanned a range of years. They also served to make me read stories and authors who I…

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Kickstarter for The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Volume IV Launched!

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HFQ powered through the pandemic and stuck to our regular publishing schedule; but we fell behind on getting our best-of anthologies put together — a situation we aimed to correct with the August 19th launch of our Kickstarter to fund Best-of 4. As of this writing, we are 85% to our goal of $1,500.  Check out our campaign and help us out if you can! — Adrian Simmons and the HFQ crew. P.S. On the fence?  Head over to issue…

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Vintage Treasures: The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Third Annual Collection, edited by Gardner Dozois

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The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Third Annual Collection (Bluejay Books, April 1986). Cover by Tom Kidd I saw a copy of the third volume in Gardner Dozois’ Year’s Best Science Fiction anthology series on eBay for $11.45 last week, and decided to take a chance. Turned out to be the Book Club edition, a reprint that’s a smaller size than my other volumes, which was a disappointment. But at least I finally had a copy. On the back of the…

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Quatro-Decadal Review: Asimov’s Science Fiction, November 1989, edited by Gardner Dozois

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An unappealing cover by Wayne Barlowe, more on that in a second After the somewhat uninspiring November 1989 Analog, I turned next to Asimov’s, and found it to be pretty good. Editorial — “Half Done” by Isaac Asimov Starting with the quote ‘Half done is hardly begun,’ Isaac Asimov (That’s Dr. Asimov, if you’re nasty) jumps into looking at how we conceptualize and compare time. Starting with the fact the Earth is 15 billion years old, half of that is…

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Prequels, Poetry, Plying the South Seas and Double Wolves—Heroic Fantasy Quarterly # 53

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Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #53 broke its bonds in August, and it runs amok, featuring three stories, three sort poems, with art and audio. We’ve got two prequal tales: “The Path of Two Entwined” returns to Gregory Mele’s fantasy Meso-American world of Azaltlán, delving into one of the pre–piracy adventures of Sarrumos Koródu. “The Crown of Azt’nyr” returns us to Mike Adamson’s ringed world of Malovar with the story of how Derros and Princess Therolynn  met before their hard-fought return to the…

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Analog Science Fiction and Science Fact, November 1989: A Retro Review

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Analog Science Fiction and Science Fact, November 1989. Cover by Janet Aulisio My quatro-decadal-review system for vintage magazines broke down for a while. What can I say? 2021 was a tough year for everybody! But I’m back in the game with Analog November 1989, which 20-year old me might have enjoyed back in the day. Let’s jump back and jump right in! First off, though, that cover. It really has an 80s look — like those are Members Only jackets…

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The Big 50! Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Issue #50

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Heroic Fantasy Quarterly’s big 50th issue hit the world in early November and we’ve already had two rounds of great reviews! Tangent Online delves into our five fiction works, then Quick Sip Reviews follows it up reviewing both fiction and poetry The pieces range but do manage a pretty good thematic cohesion, with issues of inheritance and theft being front and center in almost all of them. This might take the shape of a Shakespearean tragedy, an uncle usurping a…

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