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Vintage Treasures: Under the Moons of Mars, edited by Sam Moskowitz

Vintage Treasures: Under the Moons of Mars, edited by Sam Moskowitz

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Under the Moons of Mars Moskowitz-smallSome folks I know date the creation of modern SF and Fantasy to Star Trek in the mid-60, or the release of Star Wars in 1977. Those who are a little more knowledgeable date it to the first issue of Amazing Stories, in April 1926.

Folks who are really knowledgeable date it even earlier, to the “Scientific Romances” that became popular in early pulp magazines — so popular, in fact, that a young entrepreneur named Hugo Gernsback decided that the time was right for a magazine devoted exclusively to them. That magazine was Amazing Stories, and the rest, as they say, is history.

When editors first began combing the old pulps for stories to anthologize in the late 40 and early 50s, virtually all of them began with Amazing Stories #1. There was a great deal of popular SF and fantasy published well before that, but it was overlooked. And, as the decades went by, it was gradually forgotten.

Where did it appear? I have no idea — the really knowledgeable could tell you, but I’m not one of them. As we look backwards through history, my vision goes dark right around Lost in Space.

Fortunately, the great genre historian Sam Moskowitz was one of the really knowledgeable. And he used his vast knowledge for good. Specifically, he used it to assemble the anthology Under the Moons of Mars, which collected some of the very best of the early science fiction and fantasy from the days before there were magazines dedicated to such things — including stories and novel excerpts from Edgar Rice Burroughs, A. Merritt, Ray Cummings, Murray Leinster, Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint, and many others.

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The Vorrh, Redux

The Vorrh, Redux

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The Vorrh-smallEarly in 2013 I wrote a post about The Vorrh, a novel by sculptor, artist, and poet Brian Catling. I thought it was a powerful, fascinating book that defied easy categorisation; epic fantasy or epic horror, magic realism or magic surrealism, it seemed bigger and stranger than whatever one might think to call it. Set mostly in Africa and mostly in the years after World War I, it deals with a forest called the Vorrh, where reality and time and logic become confused. A hunter tries to cross the forest, another man tries to stop him, yet another man tries to stop the second. Meanwhile, in a colonial German city that exists inside the forest, a young cyclops is educated by peculiar automata. Alternating with these plot strands we follow the fictionalised life of the actual Victorian photographer Eadweard Muybridge, as well as the unreal experiences of the quite real French surrealist writer Raymond Roussel, whose equally real 1910 novel Impressions d’Afrique first introduced the Vorrh.

Catling’s novel first came out in late 2012. Now, almost three years later, it’s being republished (as reported here by Black Gate supreme overlord John O’Neil). Catling’s edited the book extensively, slimming it down and moving sections around. He’s also found a new publisher. The original version of the book came from UK small press Honest Publishing; the new one’s published by Vintage.

The edits make a more direct narrative. The maze-like interleaving of scenes and moments has been reworked into an armature of chapters. Crucially, though, much of the original’s tonal strangeness remains. The prose has been pruned of some detail, some paradox, and some side reflections, and this tends to make the story clearer. Many of the losses were fascinating bits of writing in and of themselves, but also complicated sentences, paragraphs, or concepts. Sometimes those complications were worthwhile. But if the new Vorrh is a little less rich, it’s also much more vivid.

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Catching Up With Numenera

Catching Up With Numenera

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Numenera-smallI got to know Monte Cook back when Black Gate was still publishing fiction. He’s a talented writer, and he sent me a short story I would have loved to have published. Alas, the magazine was already dying at that point, and we weren’t able to do business.

But I’ve kept an eye on his publishing ventures and, like everyone else, was astounded when his Numenera Kickstarter raised an almost unprecedented $517,255 in September 2012. He used the money to launch Monte Cook Games, which in August 2013 delivered the Numenera Corebook, a gorgeous 416-page full color rule book and campaign guide. I finally bought a copy at the Games Plus auction in March, and I’ve spent the last few weeks pouring over it.

What’s so special about Numenera? Monte had an enviable reputation in the gaming industry — he was an editor at Iron Crown Enterprises and, with Jonathan Tweet and Skip Williams, co-authored the famous third Edition of Dungeons and Dragons. Some of his more notable creations are the D&D modules Labyrinth of Madness and Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, as well as many Planescape adventures and the mammoth Ptolus campaign setting, based on the home game used to playtest third edition.

But it’s far more than just Monte’s reputation that’s fueled the success of his latest endeavor. Numenera has a great premise. The setting is Earth, a billion years in the future. The inhabitants of our planet live amidst the ruins of eight unimaginably powerful civilizations, each of which mastered arts and technologies they cannot even begin to understand. Artifacts from those civilizations lie in the earth — or walk the land. Some of them are incredibly powerful; some are unspeakably dangerous. And some of them are alive.

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Dragonfly: A Tale of the Counter-Earth at the Cosmic Antipodes by Raphael Ordoñez

Dragonfly: A Tale of the Counter-Earth at the Cosmic Antipodes by Raphael Ordoñez

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oie_113524h6c8tSPCMuch of my reading is for sheer entertainment. It’s like a carnival ride: you pay your money, get whipped around a little, then deposited back on the ground. The next day a fond memory of the overall experience lingers on but the details have faded away. And that’s cool. I have never regretted the time or money spent on an Agatha Christie or Stephen King novel. I’ve passed many an enjoyable hour reading (or watching) a decent bit of fiction for a transient thrill. But sometimes, there’s something so compelling about about a book that I’m drawn to it again and again over the years.

There are certain books on my shelf that have an aura around them. Three that leap to mind are The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, The Last Coin by James Blaylock, and Faces in the Crowd by William Marshall. In each, the combination of prose, plot, and character drew me in so deeply that I feel the desire, for various reasons, to revisit them from time to time.

With the first, I’m looking each time to absorb and understand a bit more of Bulgakov’s dense work. It’s a great story, rich with ideas on art, politics, love, and religion. With the second two I recapture a bit of the sheer joy I felt the first time I encountered the vivid characters and utterly bonkers plots. When it comes to books in this class, I can remember when I first read them, under what circumstances, and where I got them (Science Fiction Book Club, The Forbidden Planet (NYC), and borrowed from the St. George Public Library, Staten Island). I suspect Raphael Ordoñez’ Dragonfly will get added to this list.

Dragonfly is the first of a planned tetralogy. In this day of calculated, mass-marketed, trend-following books, here is a self-published adventure, practically handcrafted, with cover, map, and interior art all done by Ordoñez himself. It tells of a young prince let loose in a world of steam engines, complacent aristocrats, and tunnel-dwelling workers, and a social order on the verge of being overthrown. Ordoñez’ style hearkens back to the likes of A. E. van Vogt and Jack Vance, as well as Edgar Rice Burroughs. Heck, as you can see from the cover, Dragonfly would look right at home on a shelf full of volumes from the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series.

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Future Treasures: The Hanged Man by P.N. Elrod

Future Treasures: The Hanged Man by P.N. Elrod

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The Hanged Man P N Elrod-smallP.N. Elrod is known chiefly for her series about Chicago vampire detective Jack Fleming, whose first case is to solve his own murder. The Vampire Files ran for a dozen novels between 1990 and 2009, starting with Bloodlist.

Her new series, Her Majesty’s Psychic Service, opens with The Hanged Man, a Victorian urban fantasy thriller, on sale next week.

On a freezing Christmas Eve in 1879, a forensic psychic reader is summoned from her Baker Street lodgings to the scene of a questionable death. Alexandrina Victoria Pendlebury (named after her godmother, the current Queen of England) is adamant that the death in question is a magically compromised murder and not a suicide, as the police had assumed. After the shocking revelation contained by the body in question, Alex must put her personal loss aside to uncover the deeper issues at stake, before more bodies turn up.

Turning to some choice allies — the handsome, prescient Lieutenant Brooks, the brilliant, enigmatic Lord Desmond, and her rapscallion cousin James — Alex will have to marshal all of her magical and mental acumen to save Queen and Country from a shadowy threat. Our singular heroine is caught up in this rousing gaslamp adventure of cloaked assassins, meddlesome family, and dark magic.

The Hanged Man will be published by Tor Books on May 19, 2015. It is 336 pages, priced at $24.99 in hardcover and $11.99 for the digital edition.

See our complete survey of the top releases in May here.

New Treasures: The Daedalus Series by Michael J Martinez

New Treasures: The Daedalus Series by Michael J Martinez

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The Daedalus Incident-small The Enceladus Crisis-small The Venusian Gambit-small

I overlooked Michael J. Martinez’s The Daedalus Incident, the opening volume of The Daedalus Series, when it first appeared in 2013. That turned out to be a mistake. By the time The Enceladus Crisis arrived last May, it was clear that this was a major new science fantasy series. Tor. com called it “adventurous, original, and a blast to read,” and GeekDad summed up the second volume splendidly:

Wooden sailing ships battling it out in space, Earth astronauts discovering an ancient alien temple on one of Saturn’s moons, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, undead French soldiers, Venusian jungles, and corporate espionage… This isn’t steampunk, okay? This is something new and unique and completely entertaining.

The third volume — featuring undead soldiers, Royal Navy frigates sailing the Void between worlds, dark alchemy, alien slave trade, and extra-dimensional incursions — was published last week, bringing the story to a climax deep in the jungles of Venus. It’s hard for me to keep up with everything that crosses my desk these days, but I think I might just have to make time for this entire series. The Venusian Gambit was published by Night Shade Books on May 5, 2015. It is 320 pages, priced at $15.99 in trade paperback and $10.99 for the digital version.

Vintage Treasures: Crompton Divided by Robert Sheckley

Vintage Treasures: Crompton Divided by Robert Sheckley

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Crompton Divided-smallRobert Sheckley (July 16, 1928 – December 9, 2005) was primarily a science fiction writer, producing hundreds of short stories and roughly two dozen novels, including The Status Civilization (1960), The 10th Victim (1966), and Dimension of Miracles (1968). From time to time, however, he turned his hand to fantasy, as in a trio of comic fantasies written with Roger Zelazny, Bring Me the Head of Prince Charming (1991), If at Faust You Don’t Succeed (1993), and A Farce to Be Reckoned With (1995).

In Crompton Divided (1978), published in the UK as The Alchemical Marriage of Alistair Crompton, Sheckley stepped into Philip K Dick territory. Alastair Crompton is diagnosed with virus schizophrenia in his youth, and two dangerous aspects of his personality are medically separated from him and allowed to grow and develop on their own: the self-indulgent Loomis, who embodies all of Crompton’s lust, and the dangerously violent Stack, who got all of his rage. When he reaches adulthood the mild Crompton, despite the fact that he is repulsed by them, sets out on a Jungian quest to re-integrate his personalities and become a whole person.

The bizarre case of Alistair Crompton

He is a tortured soul. Separated at an early age from two conflicting personalities, Alistair Crompton has hatched a daring scheme to reintegrate himself. Installed in different host bodies and dispatched to distant planets, the two other Alistairs have developed lives of their own: Loomis — as grossly self-indulgent and amoral as Alistair is moderate and prim. Stack — as vicious and impulsive as Alistair is meek and cautious. What happens when the original Alistair reengages himself first with Loomis, then with Stack? Discover for yourself in this odyssey by one of the grand masters of science fiction. It’s mind-bending.

Crompton Divided is an expanded version of the novella “Join Now,” originally published in the December 1958 issue of Galaxy. It was published by Bantam Books in November 1979. It is 182 pages, priced at $1.95. I bought an unread copy online for about 50 cents earlier this month. The cover is by Paul Lehr.

A World With Larger Teeth and Sharper Claws: Marie Bilodeau’s Nigh, the First Great Serialized Novel of 2015

A World With Larger Teeth and Sharper Claws: Marie Bilodeau’s Nigh, the First Great Serialized Novel of 2015

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Nigh Marie Bilodeau Book 2-small Nigh Marie Bilodeau Book 3-small Nigh Marie Bilodeau Book 4-small

Back in January I told you about Nigh, Book One, the first installment in a terrific new serialized fantasy novel from Marie Bilodeau, the author of the Heirs of a Broken Land trilogy. New chapters have arrived every month since, and there are now four full installments available. The most recent, Nigh Book Four, shot up the Amazon bestseller charts the week of its release, and has been getting some great press. Here’s the description:

With the hopes of the faerie realm turned to dust, Alva Viola Taverner and Hector Henry Featherson strike the final blow to the veil between worlds, shattering it and returning them to the human realm. But one hundred years has passed for humanity, and things have changed. The world awaiting them now bears larger teeth and sharper claws, and it hungers for much more than their lives.

Marie’s space fantasy Destiny’s Blood was nominated for the Aurora Award, and she blogs here at Black Gate every second Friday. Nigh, Book 4 was published on May 7 by S&G Publishing. It is 57 pages, priced at 99 cents. It’s available at Amazon.com, B&N.com, and other fine digital bookstores.

Future Treasures: Storm and Steel by Jon Sprunk

Future Treasures: Storm and Steel by Jon Sprunk

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Storm and Steel-smallStorm and Steel, the long-awaited sequel to Blood and Iron — which Sarah Avery said “takes the prize for strange worldbuilding… full of powerful imagery and a vivid sense of place,” will be released in just a few weeks. Jon Sprunk is also the author of the popular Shadow Saga (Shadow’s Son, Shadow’s Lure, Shadow’s Master), and expectations are running high for the second volume of his new trilogy, The Book of the Black Earth.

An empire at war. Three fates intertwined.

The Magician. Horace has destroyed the Temple of the Sun, but now he finds his slave chains have been replaced by bonds of honor, duty, and love. Caught between two women and two cultures, he must contend with deadly forces from the unseen world.

The Rebel. Jirom has thrown in his lot with the slave uprising, but his road to freedom becomes ever more dangerous as the rebels expand their campaign against the empire. Even worse, he feels his connection with Emanon slipping away with every blow they strike in the name of freedom. The Spy. Alyra has severed her ties to the underground network that brought her to Akeshia, but she continues the mission on her own. Yet, with Horace’s connection to the queen and the rebellion’s escalation of violence, she finds herself treading a knife’s edge between love and duty.

Dark conspiracies bubble to the surface as war and zealotry spread across the empire. Old alliances are shattered, new vendettas are born, and all peoples — citizen and slave alike — must endure the ravages of storm and steel.

Storm and Steel will be published by Pyr on June 2, 2015. It is 479 pages, priced at $18 in trade paperback and $11.99 for the digital edition. The cover is by Jason Chan. Learn more at Pyr Books or read our exclusive excerpt of the first novel here.

Knock, Knock: Or, The Portal Fantasy Revisited

Knock, Knock: Or, The Portal Fantasy Revisited

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Moonheart-smallThis week I participated in a Mild Meld over on SFSignal on the theme of portal fantasies. I’m not the only person who did, and you can see the whole post here, but, as is so often the case when you’re asked to consider an intriguing idea, I’m still thinking about it. Warning: For the sake of clarity I repeat some of my SFSignal observations, but I don’t overlap much.

Working on that post, and thinking about classic portal fantasies such as the The Wizard of Oz or the The Chronicles of Narnia, or the more recent Chronicles of Thomas Covenant (though even they aren’t particularly “recent,” are they?) got me wondering about the evolution of the portal fantasy over the last 35 years.

Let me review the classic version: Human beings from our world find an entrance to a secondary world where magic works, the supernatural exists, etc., and adventures are undertaken. Often there’s a kind “quest” element involved as well, in that the protagonists have to complete a task in order to be able to return to our world. These are often called “primary world fantasies” even though most or all of the action takes place in the other world.

Again, in the classic version of the portal fantasy, the reader is riding the shoulder of the protagonist, seeing and learning everything about the new world at the same time the protagonist does. CS Lewis even introduced new protagonists, so that he could keep explaining things in later books without seeming repetitious. Of course we all recognize this as a use of the stranger-in-a-strange-land trope (SISL), which is invariably interdependent with the portal trope.

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