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Talking Out of School About Dark Academia: Katabasis by R. F. Kuang and We Love You, Bunny by Mona Awad

Talking Out of School About Dark Academia: Katabasis by R. F. Kuang and We Love You, Bunny by Mona Awad

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Katabasis by R. F. Kuang (Harper Voyager, August 26, 2025) and We Love You, Bunny by
Mona Awad (S&S/Marysue Rucci Books, September 23, 2025). Covers: Patrick Arrasmith, uncredited

The New York Times traces the inception of the “dark academia” genre to Donna Tart’s The Secret History, a Gothic murder mystery involving Classics students at a liberal arts college. The novel was published in the early 1990s, at about the time an entire generation was getting weaned on Harry Potter and Hogwarts, leading perhaps to an audience primed for settings of shadowy collegiate intrigue.

Perhaps not coincidentally, many dark academia authors hold graduate degrees and professorships at the very elite institutions whose campus culture and academic politics they mock. Which might seem like biting the hand that feeds you. Case in point are two recent novels, Katabasis by R.F. Kuang and We Love You, Bunny by Mona Awad.

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A Skillful Handling of a Standard Mystery:Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers

A Skillful Handling of a Standard Mystery:Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers

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Whose Body? by Dorothy Sayers (Avon Books, 1948)

Mysteries aren’t my first choice in genre fiction; science fiction and fantasy appeal to me more consistently. Even so, I’ve read a fair number of mysteries, by authors from Dashiell Hammett to P.D. James. (I’ve also enjoyed science fiction and fantasy mysteries such as Randall Garrett’s Lord Darcy stories and Lois McMaster Bujold’s Memory.)

But two things happen to me over and over with mysteries: When I read a series by the same author, I lose interest before I’ve read the entire series, and I don’t come back to a series after I’ve put it down. The great exception on both counts is Dorothy Sayers’ Peter Wimsey novels. Of course I think that I come back to her because she’s especially good; at any rate her writing is to my personal taste. But my getting through the whole series, I think, has a more specific cause: Mystery writers tend to develop a formula for their novels, and at a certain point the investigations of V.I. Warshawski or Adam Dalgleish go stale for my mental palate; but it seems to me that Sayers, despite recurrent elements in the Wimsey novels, is taking up a different formula with each novel. They may not all be equally good, but they all offer the pleasure of novelty and experiment.

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The Sword & Planet of Roland Green: Blade by “Jeffrey Lord”

The Sword & Planet of Roland Green: Blade by “Jeffrey Lord”

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Jeffrey Lord’s Blade paperbacks, published by Macfadden-Bartell (1971) and Pinnacle Books (June 1973 – March 1976). Covers by Tony Destefano, Tran Mawicke, and others

Jeffrey Lord was a house name used for a series of 37 fantasy/SF novels published between 1969 and 1984. They were billed as an “adult” fantasy series, meaning that they had sex in them. However the sex was pretty mild by today’s standards. The hero is Richard Blade, an agent who works for the British Intelligence service MI6. He’s a combination of James Bond and Conan, although he doesn’t have much of the anti-hero aspects of those characters. He’s pretty much of a white hat guy.

Despite the character and general setting being British, the books were published by Pinnacle Books, an American Publisher, and all written by American authors. The three authors involved were Manning Lee Stokes (1911- 1976), Roland J. Green (1944 – 2021), and Ray Nelson (1931 – 1922). Stokes wrote the first 8 and then Green (apparently) wrote the rest except for #30: Dimension of Horror, by Ray Nelson.

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This is Silly. Book Goals Are Not Personal

This is Silly. Book Goals Are Not Personal

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A tea cup sits atop a stack of artfully placed old books.
Image by Ylanite Koppens from Pixabay

Good afterevenmorn, Readers!

How was your winter holidays? I hope you found it gentle and restful and full of the things that make you happy. I spent some time with family, which is always lovely, and more time by myself recovering (the joys of being a massive introvert). It seems that the end of the year was more fraught for others than myself, though.

I’m speaking of the BookTok community. There have been a few ruffled feathers with folks getting angry at other folks for the massive number of books they may (or may not, as one of the accusations proclaim) have read.

If that sounds silly to you, you are not alone. I’ve been watching from the sidelines giggling or rolling my eyes, depending. Let’s get into this nonsense… because sometimes watching train wrecks in slow motion is mildly amusing. And so I am here after another adventure into social media to report on what’s going on over there.

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The Best of Bob: 2025

The Best of Bob: 2025

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Happy 2026! Let’s kick butt for another year. Or at least, limp to the finish in 52 weeks. I really enjoy ‘meeting’ with my friends – and some strangers – here at Black Gate every Monday morning. Keep checking in, and let’s keep the discourse going on things we love. Or at least that catches our eye. Black Gate really is a family. My time writing here has almost been longer than my marriage was!

I continued to evade the Firewall at Black Gate (no, I do not earn a cent a word every time I mention ‘Black Gate.’ like some kind of blogging Pulpster), so I showed up every Monday morning. I had a much harder time conning other folks into writing my column for me – they’re catching on. Drat! So, I had to do my own work this past year.

Here are what I thought were ten of my better efforts in 2025. Hopefully you saw them back when I first posted them. But if not, maybe you’ll check out a few now. Ranking them seemed a bit egotistical, so they’re in chronological order. Let’s go!

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Catching My Breath & Some Things to Recommend

Catching My Breath & Some Things to Recommend

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Blessed are the legend-makers with their  rhyme of things not found within  recorded  time.

from ‘Mythopoeia‘ (1931) by JRR Tolkien

The impetus to write my Tolkien series came from rewatching Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and realizing just how much I dislike them. That realization drove me back to the actual books. Diving once more into Middle-earth inspired me to begin a deeper exploration of Prof. Tolkien’s works, creation, and their influences.

My original motivation, largely of drafting a retort to the films, was quickly supplanted as soon as I picked up The Fellowship of the Ring and once again read that opening line:

When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton.

I found myself immediately being pulled into the great vortex of Tolkien’s art and ideas. As my previous entries into this series describe, my attention was sometimes drawn to different elements that it had been on previous reading and my appreciation for certain things had grown over the years. What I’m not sure I brought up much was how much enjoyment I get from actually reading Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

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Tor Doubles: Wrap Up: Other Doubles series

Tor Doubles: Wrap Up: Other Doubles series

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A selection of Ace Doubles covers

Now that I’ve looked at all of the official Tor Doubles, plus the proto-version and the unpublished version, where to next if you like the double format. Obviously, there are the Ace Doubles, which ran from 1952 until 1978.  That series provides the reader with at least 261 additional volumes of science fiction, plus a similar number of westerns and numerous mystery novels. You can read Black Gate publisher John O’Neill’s thoughts about collecting and selling Ace Doubles in this article from 2017.

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The Sword & Planet of Dave Van Arnam: Star Barbarian and Lord of Blood

The Sword & Planet of Dave Van Arnam: Star Barbarian and Lord of Blood

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Star Barbarian (Lancer Books, 1969). Cover by Jeff Jones

I picked up a couple of books by Dave Van Arnam called Star Barbarian and Lord of Blood that have connections to the Sword & Planet genre.

They’re set in a future time after Earth has colonized many planets. Some of those planets have fallen back into barbarism, and that is the case with the planet Morkath. So, the heroes are earthmen on an alien planet, although not modern day individuals transported to that planet.

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Some Holiday Shelfies

Some Holiday Shelfies

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A few of my book shelves

I’ll get back to regular posts next week but one of my readers asked if I had any shelfies to show of my collection. I took a few and will post them but these only represent a portion of all my books.

I’m lucky that my wife doesn’t mind a house full of books. Above are pics of my biggest individual collection, which is Robert E. Howard related. (The top shelf with the stuffed dog toy contains some SF/Fantasy encyclopedias and my inspirational shelf, which are books that I take down and read passages from when I feel the need to be inspired in my own writing. Favorite books, I guess you’d say.)

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Tor Doubles #37: Esther Friesner’s Yesterday We Saw Mermaids and Lawrence Watt-Evans’ The Final Folly of Captain Dancy

Tor Doubles #37: Esther Friesner’s Yesterday We Saw Mermaids and Lawrence Watt-Evans’ The Final Folly of Captain Dancy

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Cover for The Final Folly of Captain Dancy and Yesterday We Saw Mermaids by Pat Morressey

This volumes  was originally scheduled for September 1991, but the series was cancelled before it would see print. Both stories were eventually published by Tor in different formats. Had this volume been printed, it would have been the first volume in the series to include two original stories. Although published separately, both were coincidentally first published in the same month.

Yesterday We Saw Mermaids was eventually published as a stand-alone novel by Tor Books in October, 1992. Set in 1492, Friesner tells the story of a magical ship that seems to be racing Christopher Columbus’ expedition to the new world. The ship is mostly crewed by a group of nuns from Porto in Spain, but there is also a monk, Brother Garcilaso, a woman named Rasha, and two unnamed women, one called La Zagala and one called the Jewess. The story is told from the point of view of a young nun, Sister Ana, who has been appointed the scribe for the voyage.

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