Browsed by
Author: Bob Byrne

What I’ve Been Watching: October 2025

What I’ve Been Watching: October 2025

Comments 6 comments

Well, August was the last time I shared What I’ve Been Watching, and I know you’re always wondering what is getting my attention.

This week we’ve got three British crime shows, one American comedy cop show, and…an action movie.

RETURN TO PARADISE

I have written more than once about Death in Paradise This British cop show, set in a Caribbean island, is one of my favorites, through 117 episodes over 14 seasons. Click here to read about it.

There have been multiple cast changes, with several Detective Inspectors from Britain assigned. One, Humphrey Goodman (played by Kris Marshall), has his own spin-off, Beyond Paradise. Season three just began dropping on Britbox this week, and has been renewed for a fourth.

There’s another spin-off, set in Australia. It’s a bit different. There’s mild tie to Death in Paradise, but it’s not a sequel, like Beyond Paradise is. More on that below.

Anna Samson is DI Mackenzie Clark. She had been a police officer in her Australian hometown, when she dumped her fiance and went off to work in London. She’s under investigation there and returns home. She ends up working there again, where her ex-fiance is the ME, and his mother is her boss – before and again. So, you get the set-up.

…

Read More Read More

Writing Advice: Creating Character (Red Sneaker Writers)

Writing Advice: Creating Character (Red Sneaker Writers)

Comments 2 comments

It’s been a year, so let’s look at another volume of William Bernhardt’s awesome Red Sneaker Writers books. These things are absolute treasures.

I started reading William Bernhardt’s Ben Kincaid books back in the mid-nineties. I seem to recall I went on a ‘lawyer’ kick and read him, Steve Martini, and Robert K. Tannenbaum, all around the same time. But years later, Bernhardt made a bigger impact on me with his Red Sneaker Writers series. These slim volumes with the brightly attractive colors are jam-packed with great writing advice. The first book I read was on story structure, and I think it’s still my favorite. Though every one has been both interesting to read and thought-provoking. If I ever get my act together, I’ll add “taught me a lot.”

I’ve read through a couple of them more than once, making notes on paper (I CANNOT highlight a physical book. I’m incapable of it). Last year, I decided to be a little more systematic and I went through EVERY title, be it Theme, Plot, Character – all of them: and I outlined the key points in each chapter. I printed them all out and have a very cool binder. Which, if I ever actually sit down and write a novel, will be of great use.

I sent one of the outlines to him, telling him that I’d like to include it in a Black Gate post, promoting the series. He kindly granted his permission. Today, it’s the third outline in this series.

I’m fortunate that many actual, real, Writers (note the capital ‘W’) with books you can buy on Amazon, or at bookstores (if you can find one that is still in business), are friends of mine. And they are FAR more qualified than I am to talk abut writing advice. I think I hold my own as a Black Gate blogger, and there are worse Sherlock Holmes short stories out there than mine (And certainly better ones!). But my unfinished novel is just a bunch of words strung together, until I finish it.

…

Read More Read More

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Will Murray asks, ‘Do Lost Raymond Chandler Stories Exist?’

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Will Murray asks, ‘Do Lost Raymond Chandler Stories Exist?’

Comments 1 comment

“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.
– Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep
(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

Will Murray makes a return to A (Black) Gat in the Hand. Last month, Strand Magazine (who I wrote DVD reviews for in a prior century) published a lost Raymond Chandler story. Which got Will to thinking…

The recent discovery of a previously unknown and unpublished short story by Raymond Chandler reminded me of a question that’s lingered in my mind for a very long time.

How did Chandler in the early years the Depression support himself and his wife writing for Black Mask and other titles when he only sold a two or three stories a year?

Black Mask was then paying only a penny or a penny and a half a word for fiction to any but their top writers. Chandler was writing stories that were roughly 12 to 18,000 words long. He received $180.00 for his first sale, “Blackmailers Don’t Shoot.“ Even considering what a penny could buy in 1933, when a loaf of sliced bread cost 3 cents, Chandler wouldn’t have been able to survive solely writing for Black Mask.

It wasn’t until 1935 that he broke into Munsey’s Detective Fiction Weekly, which probably paid him two cents a word, and possibly more. A considerable raise, but still far short of what was required for subsistence living. And he only sold one story to DFW, “Noon Street Nemesis.“

Since Chandler had been a well-paid oil company executive until he lost his job in 1932, conceivably his savings carried him for some period. But according to Chandler biographer Tom Hiney, by the time he started working on “Blackmailers,“ Chandler’s savings had been all but exhausted. The story took him five months to write. Add another month or so until he received the acceptance check. So that’s $30.00 a month for six months toil, paid at the end of the six-month period. At his old executive position, Chandler’s salary had approached $10,000 a year.

…

Read More Read More

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: A Plethora of Pastiches! In 2 Paragraphs Each

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: A Plethora of Pastiches! In 2 Paragraphs Each

Comments 18 comments

And we are wrapping up Cimmerian September. Which I think will be an annul thing here at Black Gate. Maybe I’ll do a broader Robert E. Howard month around his birth (January) or death (June). But it’s more Conan this week.

If you’re a regular here, you know that I post almost exclusively positive stuff. You can go anywhere on social media for negative stuff. I like to share things I like – with people who wanna comment on it sometimes. It’s cool.

A notable exception is that festering pile of garbage that was Max Landi’s Dirk Gently TV series. Sometimes you gotta call a spade a spade.

I’m gonna give some thoughts on twenty different Conan pastiches from over the years. And some aren’t good. So, not all happy stuff here. But I think a legitimate opinion is worthwhile. Even mine…

Not ranking them, but listing them in alphabetical order by author. I’ll give some info on the story in the first paragraph, and a very short review in the second. I’ve done in-depth reviews here at Black Gate. These are just light looks at a bunch of Conan stories, to put them on your radar. Hopefully, you’ll find this post useful.

There are others I haven’t read at all,

…

Read More Read More

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: Arthurian Elements In the Conan Canon – Part II

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: Arthurian Elements In the Conan Canon – Part II

Comments 2 comments

It’s installment three of Cimmerian September, and I’m going back to Spring of 2018 for today’s post. But it’s not a reprint (Hey: I think people should read last week’s essay on “Rogues in the House”!

I took a fantasy template developed by John Teehan, citing Arthurian elements to be found in almost any fantasy work. Well, at least one element can be, anyways. I applied the principles to the first four Conan stories: “Phoenix on the Sword,” “Frost Giant’s Daughter,” “The God in the Bowl,” and “The Tower of the Elephant.” You can click on this link to see that three of the four scored pretty low.

Well, we’re gonna look at the next three Conan stories: “The Scarlet Citadel,” Queen of the Black Coast,” Black Colossus,” and Iron Shadows in the Moon.”

So, let’s see how the stories shape up.

John Teehan, in The Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy: Volume One, challenges the reader to think of their favorite contemporary fantasy novels. And we’re talking Tolkien-onwards here, not just the past few years. Then he gives a list and says it would be difficult to think of a book that didn’t have any of the five themes on the list. He is making the point that the Arthurian legend, largely brought to popular culture by Thomas Malory, was an interweaving of those five themes. High fantasy epics like David Eddings’ Belgariad still follow this path.

I immediately thought about Robert E. Howard’s Conan tales and how they didn’t really emulate this pattern. Or so it seemed to me. My friend Deuce Richardson immediately pointed out two stories that did significantly incorporate these elements. So, I decided to start at the beginning and take a good look at “The Phoenix on the Sword”: then, do a less detailed survey of the following stories.

This time around, we’ll give “The Scarlet Citadel extra attention, then move on to the other two.

So, here we go!

…

Read More Read More

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: Rogues in the House

By Crom, It’s Cimmerian September: Rogues in the House

Comments 1 comment

We’re rolling through Cimmerian September here at Black Gate. Well, on Monday mornings we sure are! I was fortunate enough to be asked to do some Youtube panels for the Robert E. Howard Foundation folks this month. And we had a great time talking about the first Del Rey Conan volume – The Coming of Conan – in the first one.

I got to give my thoughts on “Rogues in the House,” which was my Hither Came Conan title. That had been a mid-level Conan story for me. But it moved up the ranks after I finished my essay project. So, with some tweaks, here’s my take on a pretty cool story. And HOW was this six years ago??

When I was pitching this series to folks, I was using the title, The Best of Conan. I didn’t come up with Hither Came Conan for about eight months, I think. Yeah, I know… The idea behind the series came from an essay in my first (and so far, only) Nero Wolfe Newsletter. The plan for 3 Good Reasons is to look at a story and list three reasons why it’s the ‘best’ Wolfe story. And I toss in one ‘bad’ reason why it’s not. And finish it off with some quotes.

So, I’m going to take a somewhat different tack from those who have come before me (I doubt I could have measured up, anyways) and pick out two elements that make this story one of Howard’s best accounts of the mighty-thewed Cimmerian. Then, throw a curveball from the Wolfe approach and highlight a few items worthy of note.

OUR STORY

Obviously, you need to read this story, but here’s a Cliff’s Notes version: Nabonidus, the Red Priest, is the real power in this unnamed Corinthian city. He gives a golden cask to Murilo, a young aristocrat. And inside the cask is a human ear (remind you of Sherlock Holmes? It should.). We learn a little later on that Murillo has been selling state secrets, and the ear is from a clerk he had dealings with. The jig is up!

…

Read More Read More

By Crom, it’s Cimmerian September: Roy Thomas & “Out of the Deep”

By Crom, it’s Cimmerian September: Roy Thomas & “Out of the Deep”

Comments 4 comments

Cimmerian September (nod to Michael K. Vaughan for coining that) continues here at A (Black) Gat in the Hand. Spooky season is right around the corner, so let’s combine a little horror with our Conan (albeit, of the Marvel variety). I have been reading Savage Sword of Conan lately. But earlier this year, I finished my reading of the first 115 issues of Conan the Barbarian. Those comprised Roy Thomas’ first run of the series, as he left Marvel. I wrote previously about how he brought Conan to Marvel.

He adapted several non-Conan stories, such as “The Marchers of Valhalla,” The Lost Valley of Iskander,” and “Black Canaan,” among many others.

“Sea Curse” appeared in the May, 1928 issue of Weird Tales. It recounted the death of a young girl and an ensuing curse, in the small coastal village of Faring. That same year, he also wrote another tale set in Faring, but it was rejected by both Weird Tales, and Ghost Story. There was also a short poem called The Legend of Faring Town, which first appeared in 1975.

That second story, “Out of the Deep,” finally found print in the November, 1967 issue of Magazine of Horror. Whereas “Sea Curse” is a tale of revenge, this one is a sea monster story. And the reason I chose this of the two is because Roy Thomas adapted it for Conan the Barbarian.

…

Read More Read More

By Crom, it’s Cimmerian September! (And all my REH essays, too)

By Crom, it’s Cimmerian September! (And all my REH essays, too)

Comments 2 comments
The seriously talented Jim Zub jumped on board last year

It’s Cimmerian September! Youtuber extraordinaire Michael K. Vaughn coined the term, in which he spends the month talking about my second favorite writer, Robert E. Howard (John D. MacDonald still holds the top spot). He’s going beyond Conan this year, and is starting out with my favorite Howard character, El Borak!

A month celebrating REH is the best thing I can think of. John Bullard of the Robert E. Howard Foundation invited me to join a panel with Michael, John Hocking, Mark Finn, Patrice Louinet, and my Hither Came Conan cohort, Jason Waltz. We recorded two long-winded but fun sessions, and I’ll share those links here when they’re online this month.

I mentioned here that I read the issues 1 through 115 of the Conan the Barbarian comic from Marvel. And with each issue, I read the accompanying chapter from Roy Thomas’ terrific three memoir series. I enjoyed it and will blog more about those comics.

I have also been reading some Savage Sword of Conan issues from the Marvel Omnibuses. And I am enjoying them in a different way. The black and white graphics are very different from the CtB color ones. I’m finding the adaptations of the REH stories are pretty faithful. I just finished up “The Treasure of Tranicos,” which was L. Sprague de Camp’s rewrite of Howard’s unpublished story, “The Black Stranger.”

“The Black Stranger” is in my Conan Top Five, and I enjoy de Camp’s version quite a bit. The Savage Sword version is a good read, covering two issues. The first one also has an informative history on the story, by Fred Blosser.

…

Read More Read More

What I’ve Been Listening To: August, 2025

What I’ve Been Listening To: August, 2025

Comments 0 Comment

What I’ve Been Listening To is back for another installment. Audiobooks are omnipresent in my life now. Work, home, car, walking, bedtime: I’m constantly listening to them. Often something I’ve listened to before, which lets my mind half-focus to no ill effect. But I’m still listening.

Some recent plays – all Audible, as I need to get Hoopla set up on my ‘new’ used phone. I have listened to five different Bruce Campbell projects recently, so that’s probably another post.

MIDDLEBRIDGE MYSTERIES

I wrote about Mistletoe Murders, which is an Audible original series. It’s like a Hallmark mystery movie. Emily Lane runs a Christmas-themed store, but she has a secret past. Of course, there’s a local cop boyfriend, with a daughter named Violet.

I like the series, and they turned it into a Hallmark TV series as well, though I’ve not seen that yet. It uses different actors, which I’m not too enthused about.

Well, Violet was trying to get into college at the end of season three, and she did. So, Anna Cathcart is back and starring in Violet’s freshman year in criminal justice studies. Her professor is played by Eric McCormack (Will and Grace). I was a big fan of his show Perception and he’s good as a supporting character here.

…

Read More Read More

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hammett & The Continental Op – Volume 3 (My intro)

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Hammett & The Continental Op – Volume 3 (My intro)

Comments 0 Comment

“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

Pulp Fest took place in Pittsburgh first week of the month. It’s a really cool event, and the Hilton Doubletree is a nice site. I really enjoy it. Steeger Books rolls out its summer line at this event. And for the third year in a row, there was a new Continental Op collection, with a brand new intro by yours truly. Getting to write about Dashiell Hammett remains a definite thrill. This volume wrappd up his pre-Cap Shaw career. Here’s my  new intro. Looking forward to Volume IV. 

Welcome to Volume three of Steeger Books’ series on the Continental Op. Hammett had written fifteen Op stories of varying quality for Black Mask, and one rejection found its way into True Detective Mysteries (though they weren’t actually ‘true’).

He had followed hard on the heels of Caroll John Daly, whose Three-Gun Terry Mack appeared in May of 1923, and just two weeks and one issue later came the first Race Williams story, “Knights of the Open Palm.”

After one more Williams shoot-fest, Black Mask printed “Arson Plus,” and Dash Hammett began reshaping the fresh clay that was the new hardboiled school. The quality of Hammett’s work immediately surpassed that of Daly’s, though it was up-and-down. Hammett’s drinking, health issues, personal life, and problems with (his second) editor Phil Cody, made the Continental Op a bumpy ride.

Here we have the final five stories he wrote for Cody – before he quit Black Mask. Yep. Quit. Had Joseph ‘Cap’ Shaw not been committed to bringing back Hammett, we would not have had Red Harvest, or The Maltese Falcon. Hammett was willing to quit the Pulps, rather than continue to labor under Cody’s financially-unrewarding yoke.

…

Read More Read More