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Author: John ONeill

Why Amazon Lists Books For Over $20 Million

Why Amazon Lists Books For Over $20 Million

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Sandkings George RR Martin-smallIf you’ve been buying used and rare books online for any period of time, I’m certain you’ve run into strange pricing anomalies. I’m not just talking about George R.R. Martin’s paperback collection Sandkings listed for $2,000 at Amazon, or Philip K. Dick’s Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said for $7,700 (although there’s plenty anomalous about those prices, as anyone with a copy will tell you.)

No, I’m talking about the instances where prices for books inexplicably spiral out of control, as UC Berkeley biologist Michael Eisen noted on his blog:

A few weeks ago a postdoc in my lab logged on to Amazon to buy the lab an extra copy of Peter Lawrence’s The Making of a Fly … Amazon listed 17 copies for sale: 15 used from $35.54, and 2 new from $1,730,045.91 (+$3.99 shipping)… the two sellers seemed not only legit, but fairly big time (over 8,000 and 125,000 ratings in the last year respectively). The prices looked random – suggesting they were set by a computer. But how did they get so out of whack?

Intrigued, Eisen began to track the prices.

I started to follow the page incessantly. By the end of the day the higher priced copy had gone up again. This time to $3,536,675.57. And now a pattern was emerging.

On the day we discovered the million dollar prices, the copy offered by bordeebook was 1.270589 times the price of the copy offered by profnath. And now the bordeebook copy was 1.270589 times profnath again. So clearly at least one of the sellers was setting their price algorithmically in response to changes in the other’s price…

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New Treasures: Jalizar, City of Thieves by Umberto Pignatelli

New Treasures: Jalizar, City of Thieves by Umberto Pignatelli

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Jalizar City of Thieves-smallAbout a month ago, I wrote an enthusiastic review of Haven — The Free City, a complete fantasy city designed and published by now-defunct Gamelords way back in 1984. One of the things I mentioned is that detailed, usable, interesting city settings are relatively rare.

I thought I’d test that theory by hunting around for a more modern urban setting and taking it for a spin. Sure enough, they were a little sparse — a lot harder to find than another megadungeon, for sure. But there were a few. And the first to catch my eye was Jalizar, City of Thieves, a Savage Worlds setting very different from the player sanctuary of Haven. Jalizar promises danger and intrigue in spades, inviting players to don the cloak of thieves waging a righteous battle for profit and glory against a corrupt establishment.

Jalizar, City of Thieves, the Rotten Flower of the North, is revealed to your eyes in this book!

In its pages, you’ll learn the seedy ways of the Thieves’ Guild. You’ll smuggle goods into the city, fooling the Copper Helms, the corrupt city watch of Jalizar, vie for power with the Merchant Houses or, if you are really bold, venture into the dark Sewers of Jalizar where an age-old evil lurks undisturbed.

Twenty new Edges, new trappings and tweaks for the arcane backgrounds, an additional list of gear, and much more await you in this book! So sharpen your dagger, put on your black cloak, and step outside into the dark alleys of the City of Thieves!!

That’s a lot of exclamation points. Also, I’m not familiar with Savage Worlds and I don’t know what the heck “Twenty new Edges” means. Still, I like what I see. My copy arrived this week, and first impressions are excellent. The book is beautifully designed and the interior artwork is plentiful and top-notch. We’ll see if it holds up to a closer reading.

Jalizar, City of Thieves was written by Umberto Pignatelli and published by Gramel on October 1, 2013. It is a Sword and Sorcery Savage Worlds sourcebook for Beasts & Barbarians, whatever that means (but it sounds good). It is 199 pages, priced at $24.99 in paperback. It’s also available as a watermarked PDF at RPGNow for $10.54 (or $7.36, if you buy before March 16).

The Games Plus 2013 Spring Auction

The Games Plus 2013 Spring Auction

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Some of the loot I brought home from the Spring 2013 Games Plus auction
  Some of the loot I brought home from the Spring Games Plus auction last year (click for bigger version)

Tomorrow is one of the highlights of my year — the Spring Auction at Games Plus in Mount Prospect, Illinois, one of the finest game stores in the Midwest, about an hour’s drive from my house.

I’ve written about the Spring and Fall 2012 auctions (in “Spring in Illinois brings… Auction Fever” and The Paris Fashion Week of Fantasy Games, respectively) and I’ve been looking forward to returning this year.

The Games Plus auctions are just about the friendliest I’ve ever attended. The store is run by a group of dedicated and professional gamers who know their stuff and they keep the proceedings running with an experienced hand — and a quick wit. Even if I were unable to bid, I think I’d enjoy sitting in the audience, just for the entertainment value.

Of course, it’s a lot more fun to be able to bid.

As I mentioned in the previous articles, it’s important to have a budget for these things, and to conserve funds for those items you really want.

Ha, ha. A budget! Excuse me while I regain control of my writing limbs.  A budget — that’s a good one.

Let me put it another way: It’s important to keep a running total of your purchases and always to be aware of how much money you’ve spent. Why? All that constant arithmetic will distract you from non-stop bidding. Eventually, you’ll crumble up the sheet and abandon it as futile, but for a while it will help you keep a lid on things.

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The Novels of Michael Shea: In Yana, The Touch of Undying

The Novels of Michael Shea: In Yana, The Touch of Undying

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In Yana-smallAround Christmas in 1985, I walked into The House of Speculative Fiction in Ottawa, Ontario, and after browsing the shelves for a while, selected a volume. The man behind the counter that Saturday was Rodger Turner, who years later would head up the Hugo and World Fantasy Award-nominated SF Site. But back then, Rodger was a humble bookseller — and a very good one.

I asked Rodger what he thought of my selection. He shrugged. “It won’t change your life,” he said. That was one of the marvelous things about Rodger: he always gave his honest opinion. And his taste was excellent.

“You know what will change your life?” he asked. And without another word, he handed me a copy of In Yana, The Touch of Undying. That was my first exposure to the magical worlds of Michael Shea, but it was by no means my last. Today, In Yana is considered a classic of darkly humorous fantasy; it is well worth seeking out.

Bramt Hex is a student of ancient lore until a chance meeting at an inn opens infinite pathways of possibility and, touched by destiny, Bramt abandons his ivory tower for the greater world, hoping to become a maker of legends in his own right.

But the world is a fearful place peopled by cunning nobles and wily wizards, demons and ogres, vampires and vengeful ghosts, sword-wielding warriors and flesh-craving giants. And soon, Bramt’s quest for fame and wealth becomes a battle for survival — and a desperate, magic-led search for a treasure far greater than gold… the secret of immortality which can only be found in the dangerous, illusive realm called Yana…

In Yana was published by DAW Books in December 1985. It is 318 pages, priced at $3.50. The cover is by Terry Oakes. It has never been reprinted.

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Dabir and Asim Return in Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters

Dabir and Asim Return in Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters

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Kaiju Rising Age of Monsters-smallYou want to know my three favorite things? (It’s a rhetorical question; you don’t actually have to email an answer. Seriously, don’t.) Dabir, Asim, and Kaiju. Sometimes Kaiju is #2, ’cause Asim is occasionally kind of a lunkhead.

So how awesome would it be to have Howard Andrew Jones’s Arabian adventurers Dabir and Asim in the same volume as some of the most diabolical Kaiju of the decade? (Again, rhetorical question. Stop e-mailing me stuff.) For the record, if would be thoroughly awesome.

Well, I think you can tell where this is going. Kaiju Rising, the Kickstarter-funded anthology we pulled the lid back on last September, has finally landed — and left a Godzilla-sized footprint on the industry. The Kickstarter campaign was a rousing success, raising $18,562 against a $10,0000 goal, and one of the unlocked stretch goals was a new Dabir and Asim story from the distinguished Mr. Jones. Here’s what Howard had to say about his contribution:

Monsters turn up a lot in my fiction, and Kaiju style critters wandered across the stage in the first two Dabir and Asim novels. In true Ray Harryhausen fashion, The Bones of the Old Ones features a titanic battle between a Roc (the giant predatory bird of Arabian Nights fame) and a huge spirit wolf fashioned of snow and ice.

Given my interests, I naturally jumped at the chance to create a story for Kaiju Rising. In one or two of the Dabir and Asim stories I’ve referenced a deadly encounter the boys had on the ocean, and now I’m finally setting the tale down.

Howard’s story is “The Serpent’s Heart,” and it appears alongside 22 other stories focused on the theme of gargantuan creatures in the vein of Pacific Rim, Godzilla, and Cloverfield. The authors include Larry Correia, James Lovegrove, Gini Koch (as J.C. Koch), James Maxey, C.L. Werner, Joshua Reynolds, Jaym Gates, Shane Berryhill, Natania Barron, Paul Genesse & Patrick Tracy, and many others. Howard’s tale isn’t the only one to draw on existing characters; Edward M. Erdelac’s story is set in the world of the Dead West and James Swallow contributes a Colossal Kaiju Combat tie-in.

Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters was published February 9, 2014 by Ragnarok Publications. It is a massive 493 pages, priced at $4.99 for the digital version. The print version is forthcoming; its price has not yet been announced.

New Treasures: Tin Star by Cecil Castellucci

New Treasures: Tin Star by Cecil Castellucci

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Tin Star-smallWe tend to focus on fantasy here at Black Gate. Nothing against science fiction, but there are plenty of other sites that cover that ground pretty well.

Of course, the line between SF and fantasy gets blurred pretty quickly. Roger Zelazny’s Lord of Light is technically SF, for example, but we include it here because it’s pure-bred fantasy adventure with a science fiction reveal late in the text. Plus, it’s awesome. Most folks consider Star Wars SF, but we know it’s fantasy because it has light sabers, rancors, and a babe like Natalie Portman marrying a whiney kid ten years younger than she is. Admit it, that’s a big fat fantasy.

Which leads me to what I like to call the O’Neill Fantasy Inclusion Principle: if it’s set in the far future, there’s adventure and stuff, maybe alien monsters (especially monsters), it’s exciting like a fantasy novel, maybe there’s swords (or any cool weapons, really) and a spiffy alien planet or space station, Black Gate readers would like to know about it, and it’s past deadline and you don’t have any decent fantasy novels handy, or it has a cool cover, or if Ian McKellen, Johnny Depp, Jennifer Lawrence, Vin Diesel or Benedict Cumberbatch could conceivably be cast in the film version, then it’s practically fantasy. Q.E.D. Write that baby up.

In that spirit, I’d like to direct your attention to Tin Star by Cecil Castellucci, which has a gorgeous cover, a plucky heroine, a remote space station, and mysterious aliens. Frankly, I was sold the moment I saw the cover, but the space station is a definite plus.

On their way to start a new life, Tula and her family travel on the Prairie Rose, a colony ship headed to a planet in the outer reaches of the galaxy. All is going well until the ship makes a stop at a remote space station, the Yertina Feray, and the colonist’s leader, Brother Blue, beats Tula within an inch of her life. An alien, Heckleck, saves her and teaches her the ways of life on the space station.

When three humans crash land onto the station, Tula’s desire for escape becomes irresistible, and her desire for companionship becomes unavoidable. But just as Tula begins to concoct a plan to get off the space station and kill Brother Blue, everything goes awry, and suddenly romance is the farthest thing from her mind.

Tin Star was published February 25, 2014 by Roaring Brook Press. It is 234 pages, priced at $16.99 in hardcover and $9.99 for the digital version. See all of our recent New Treasures here.

Future Treasures: Coldbrook by Tim Lebbon

Future Treasures: Coldbrook by Tim Lebbon

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Coldbrook-smallI’ve been very intrigued by the novels of Tim Lebbon, especially in the last few years as he’s turned to more overt dark fantasies. Echo City was an ambitious post-apocalyptic fantasy set in a sprawling, ruined city, and his Noreela novels (Dusk, Fallen, The Island) are epic adventures set in a land of magic and terror.

His latest, hitting the shelves next month, is a zombie novel with echoes of Stephen King’s The Mist and Valve’s classic Half-Life. A secret government lab hidden in the Appalachian Mountains achieves an incredible breakthrough to another dimension… and you know what that means. Grab the flamethrower, Ethel. It’s the end of the world again.

The facility lay deep in the Appalachian Mountains, a secret laboratory called Coldbrook. Its scientists had achieved the impossible: a gateway to a new world. Theirs was to be the greatest discovery in the history of mankind, but they had no idea what they were unleashing.

With their breakthrough comes disease and now it is out and ravaging the human population. The only hope is a cure and the only cure is genetic resistance: an uninfected person amongst the billions dead. In the chaos of destruction there is only one person that can save the human race. But will they find her in time?

Tim Lebbon won the Bram Stoker Award in 2001, for his short story “Reconstructing Amy,” and Dusk won the British Fantasy Society’s August Derleth Award for best novel of the year in 2007. He had a bestseller in 2007 for his novelization of 30 Days of Night. Coldbrook has already received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly and looks like it could be a breakout book for him.

Coldbrook will be published by Titan Books on April 8. It is 512 pages, priced at $14.95 in trade paperback and $9.99 for the digital version.

Vintage Treasures: Doc Sidhe by Aaron Allston

Vintage Treasures: Doc Sidhe by Aaron Allston

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Aaron Allston Doc Sidhe-smallWe lost prolific game designer and author Aaron Allston last week and, as often happens after we lose someone of importance in the industry, I find myself dwelling on their contributions. By the time of his death, Allston was renowned chiefly for his popular Star Wars books. But the first of his novels I ever purchased — and indeed, the one I still think of first — was his homage to Doc Savage, the 2001 novel Doc Sidhe. Doc Sidhe is an unabashed salute to thirties pulp fiction. Here’s the book description:

Olympic kickboxer Harris Greene’s career has just self-destructed, and both his manager and his fiance, Gaby, have dumped him. While looking for Gaby, he interrupts a bizarre trio as they are kidnapping her, and he is hurled into another, very weird, universe. His only hope is Doc Sidhe, this Art Deco universe’s greatest champion of justice.

And here’s Blue Tyson’s spot-on review:

Imagine if there was a counter earth, stuck in the 30s, where, basically, elves and trolls are real. The coolest thing, however, is that Doc Savage is real, too. Except for the fact he is a Daoine Sidhe sorcerer, and has a higher mortality rate for his crew.

A down on his luck kickboxer and his girlfriend end up there, via a conjurer’s circle, and a plot to change the magical rules of relations between the two worlds. Oh, and the evil villain is Doc’s son. This is an excellent homage, a good urban fantasy, and a bit of The Untouchables, to boot…

Doc Sidhe had one sequel: Sidhe-Devil, published by Baen in 2001. It was published by Baen Books in May 2001. It is 352 pages, originally priced at $5.99. It is currently out of print; there is no digital edition. See all of our recent Vintage Treasures here.

Another Crowdfunding Fail: John Campbell Self-Destructs on Kickstarter

Another Crowdfunding Fail: John Campbell Self-Destructs on Kickstarter

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Pictures for Sad ChildrenWe’ve reported here on a handful of Kickstarter failures, including Erik Chevalier, whose Doom That Came To Atlantic City campaign raised an astounding $122,874 on a $35,000 goal, and who managed to spend virtually all the money without producing a single copy of the game. But I don’t think I’ve ever read an example as egregious as John Campbell’s Sad Pictures for Children.

Campbell is the author of the web comic Pictures for Sad Children. He self-published his first book, collecting the first 200 comics, in 2011 and launched a Kickstarter campaign in April 2012 to fund a second volume. He set a goal of $8,000 and raised over $51,000.

Unlike Chevalier, Campbell managed to print the books and began distributing them to backers, but he quickly became disillusioned with the level of effort and cost involved. As complaints from his backers mounted, an apparently furious Campbell posted a video showing him burning 127 copies of the book, one for every e-mail he received requesting an update.

In a rambling and nonsensical Update 32, Campbell vents his wrath at his backers, saying no more books will be mailed, that he’ll burn one copy of the book for every attempt to contact him, and asking for more money — this time with no promises attached.

I shipped about 75% of kickstarter rewards to backers. I will not be shipping any more. I will not be issuing any refunds. For every message I receive about this book through e-mail, social media or any other means, I will burn another book… If you would like a refund, please contact a fan of my work directly for your money. This is where the money would come from anyway. I am cutting out the middle man…

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Expand Your Digital Library with 300 Kindle Books for $3.99 or Less

Expand Your Digital Library with 300 Kindle Books for $3.99 or Less

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three-parts-dead-smallI don’t know about you, but when I first bought my Kindle, I dreamed of having a vast portable library of great new fantasy books, patiently acquired through diligent bargain hunting. Also, I dreamed about Jennifer Lawrence in a Carmen Miranda banana hat, but that’s a different topic.

The Kindle turned out to be pretty great. Huge avalanche of great new digital books over the last few years — also great. But who has time to constantly hunt for the latest discounts?

John DeNardo at SF Signal, that’s who. John regularly keeps up-to-date on digital special offers at Amazon.com and reports on them in fabulous detail. But this morning, he outdid himself, posting a list of 300 Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Kindle eBook deals for $3.99 or less — including some of the most intriguing books we’ve covered in the last few months:

The Winds of Khalakovo by Bradley Beaulieu — $0.99
The Straits of Galahesh by Bradley Beaulieu — $0.99
Legends: Stories in Honor of David Gemmell edited by Ian Whates — $3.99
The Woodcutter by Kate Danley — $0.99
The Death of the Necromancer by Martha Wells — $2.99
Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone — $2.99
Necropolis by Michael Dempsey — $1.99
Clockwork Phoenix edited by Mike Allen — $3.99
The Shambling Guide to New York City by Mur Lafferty — $1.99
Stories, edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio — $3.79
Chrysanthe by Yves Meynard — $1.99
The Lives of Tao by Wesley Chu — $3.79

And many, many others. See John’s detailed list of discount digital delights at SF Signal. And remember to thank him, next time you see him.