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Category: Editor’s Blog

The blog posts of Black Gate Managing Editor Howard Andrew Jones and Editor John O’Neill

New Treasures: Henry Kuttner’s Thunder in the Void

New Treasures: Henry Kuttner’s Thunder in the Void

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thunder-in-the-voidThis weekend here in Chicago was the 12th annual Windy City Pulp and Paper Convention, one of my favorite local shows. I met fellow BG bloggers Jason Waltz, Joe Bonadonna, and David C. Smith on Saturday, as well as Bill “Indy” Cavalier, Morgan Holmes, and the always engaging Bob Garcia. Late on Sunday I heard someone call my name and turned to discover none other than William Patrick Maynard, our distinguished Friday blogger, who was selling his new novels The Terror of Fu Manchu and The Destiny of Fu Manchu at an impressively-stocked table. Despite having worked together for years it was the first time we’d ever meet, and I really enjoyed our conversation. He’s a fascinating fellow, and I kept him until well after the show had ended.

But the highlight of the show is always seeing the new titles at the Haffner Press booth, and this year didn’t disappoint. Stephen Haffner’s archival quality hardcovers are works of art, and his taste is excellent. He has published the definitive short fiction collections of many of the finest early pulp writers, including Leigh Brackett, Edmond Hamilton, Jack Williamson, C.L. Moore, and Henry Kuttner.

Still, Stephen may have outdone himself with his newest release, Henry Kuttner’s Thunder in the Void, a massive collection of 16 Space Opera tales from Planet Stories, Weird Tales, Super Science Stories, and other classic pulps. Before Kuttner married C.L. Moore in 1940, he wrote blood-n-thunder Space Opera in the style of one of his favorite authors, Edmond Hamilton — with winning titles like “Raider of the Spaceways,” “We Guard the Black Planet,” and my favorite, “Crypt-City of the Deathless Ones” — all of which are collected here.

The book looks terrific, even by the high standards of Haffner Press. Most of the these tales are appearing in book form for the first time. Also included is a previously unpublished story, “The Interplanetary Limited,” and an introduction by Mike Resnick.

Stephen mention to me that Thunder in the Void may be the fastest-selling book he has ever printed. It was released on April 4th in a printing of 1000 copies, of which only 200 are left. If you want a copy, I urge you to act fast. Thunder in the Void is 612 pages in a high-quality hardcover, with a cover price of $40. Cover art is by Norman Saunders. It is available directly from Haffner Press.

Previous Haffner releases covered here include Kuttner and Moore’s Detour to Otherness, Henry Kuttner’s Terror in the House: The Early Kuttner, Volume One, and the upcoming The Complete John Thunstone, by Manly Wade Wellman.

Matthew Stover returns to Caine with Caine’s Law

Matthew Stover returns to Caine with Caine’s Law

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caines-lawIn 1996, when I founded the SF Site, I became professionally involved with genre science fiction and fantasy for the first time. I covered it virtually in its entirety, publishing 50+ articles and reviews every month, written by over 40 contributors.

It was tremendously exciting. I still remember the first review copies I ever received, from Andy Heidel at Avon Books. By the end of 1998 I was receiving dozens of review copies a week, but that first box in the summer of 1997 meant that publishers were starting to take us seriously for the first time. I still remember every book into that small box; how wonderful they felt in my hands, and how vibrant and alive SF & fantasy publishing seemed at the time.

Something else I remember about those days is the new authors appearing on the scene; how much I envied them, and how closely I watched their careers. Virtually every month an author published her first novel, many to great acclaim. We paid a lot of attention to new authors at the SF Site, and tried to get them as much coverage as we could.

Over a decade later I hate to tell you how many of those authors made it: virtually none. I can count on one hand the writers who started publishing in the first years of the SF Site, and who are still working in the field today.

I’m very glad to report that one of them is Matthew Stover — whom we knew as Matthew Woodring Stover back in the day, when Del Rey published his first brutal and riveting fantasy novels Heroes Die (1998), and Blade of Tyshalle (2001). They were the first two novels in what became known as The Acts of Caine series, which became a trilogy in 2008 with Caine Black Knife. On April 3, Del Rey published the fourth in the series, Caine’s Law:

Caine is washed up and hung out to dry, a crippled husk kept isolated and restrained by the studio that exploited him. Now they have dragged him back for one last deal. But Caine has other plans. Those plans take him back to Overworld, the alternate reality where gods are real and magic is the ultimate weapon. There, in a violent odyssey through time and space, Caine will face the demons of his past, find true love, and just possibly destroy the universe.

Hey, it’s a crappy job, but somebody’s got to do it.

Caine’s Law is 496 pages; it’s now available in trade paperback for $16. Get more details at Del Rey’s site here.

Courtney Crumrin Volume One: The Night Things

Courtney Crumrin Volume One: The Night Things

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courtney-crumrin-volume-one-the-night-things2Far back in the mists of time (March 2002, if you want to be picky), I picked up an intriguing black and white independent title at my local comic shop. It was Courtney Crumrin and the Night Things #1, written and drawn by Ted Naifeh and published by Oni Press.

The first few pages featured cold and uncaring parents, a spooky house, young bullies, sinister night creatures, and a protagonist who was clearly an aspiring criminal and juvenile delinquent. Before the end of the first issue, young Courtney Crumrin had trapped a goblin and forced it to cruelly devour one of her school mates, bones and all.

Man, this was just what I was looking for. I brought it home and read it to my three children, and they immediately clamored for more.

More is what they got. Over the next few years Naifeh produced over a dozen issues following Courtney and her Uncle Aloysius, a powerful warlock who reluctantly teaches her magic. Courtney’s adventures involved the helpful (but hungry) goblins Butterworm and Butterbug; Boo & Quick, talking neighborhood cats who assist the young aspiring witch; a local Coven of witches and warlocks who frequently turn to Aloysius for help with dread problems; night things from the Twilight Kingdom — including The Dreadful Dutchess, Courtney’s friend Skarrow, and The Twilight King — and the terrible Tommy Rawhead, a giant hobgoblin feared by the Coven, and everyone else.

The various issues of Courtney Crumrin were collected into four handsome trade paperbacks, followed by the short-lived spin-off series Courtney Crumrin Tales in 2005. But that was all, and fans were left waiting while Naifeh turned to other projects, like Polly and the Pirates.

The long drought ended two weeks ago with the arrival of Courtney Crumrin Volume 1: The Night Things, the first hardcover edition of Courtney Crumrin. More importantly, it’s also the first time the issues have appeared in color, and the newly colorized pages look terrific. Volume One reprints the first four issues with special bonus material including sketches and covers of all four issues. The second volume, Courtney Crumrin & The Coven of Mystics, reprinting the next four issues in color, is due Aug 29, 2012.

Courtney Crumrin is one of the finest comics produced in the 21st Century. Don’t miss the opportunity to have these early issues in a handsome permanent edition. Courtney Crumrin Volume One: The Night Things is 144 pages in hardcover; it is published by Oni Press for $19.99.

More than a decade after I read them the first issue at bed time, all three of my children are still ardent Courtney Crumrin fans. But they’ll have to wait for this volume, because Dad wants to read it first.

“What’s Become of Screwloose?” and Other Great Short Fiction by Ron Goulart

“What’s Become of Screwloose?” and Other Great Short Fiction by Ron Goulart

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whats-become-of-screwloose1Ron Goulart has written more than 70 novels, most of them science fiction or fantasy, as well as over a dozen non-fiction titles, including Comic Book Culture and the classic history of the pulps, Cheap Thrills: An Informal History of the Pulp Magazines.

I saw his name countless times in the paperback racks where I hunted for science fiction as a teen, on slender DAW volumes like Calling Dr. Patchwork, The Panchronicon Plot, and Big Bang. He had a reputation for light comedy, not something that appealed to me at the time, and I pretty much ignored Goulart for years.

In fact, I truly discovered Ron Goulart for the first time five days ago, shortly before midnight last Wednesday.

I was bagging a collection of Worlds of IF, a science fiction digest that folded in 1974, which I’d gradually accumulated over several weeks on eBay. I was casually flipping through the April 1970 issue when I stumbled on the short story “Swap,” by Ron Goulart, with this editorial teaser:

What happens when you swap love partners — and win a hot, curvy bundle of hate?

As a student of short fiction teasers — I’ve written a few hundred for Black Gate — I know a winner when I see one. I pulled the lever to recline the couch and, surrounded by nearly a dozen stacks of aging science fiction magazines, settled back to enjoy a 42-year old science fiction story.

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Horror Roleplaying in 1890s England: Cthulhu By Gaslight

Horror Roleplaying in 1890s England: Cthulhu By Gaslight

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cthulhu-by-gaslightContrary to what you may read, it’s not all about Barbarian Prince and First Edition AD&D after hours here at the Black Gate rooftop headquarters.

No, sometimes during our friendly evening gatherings we just sit around and reminisce about great gaming sessions of old. I played a bit of Call of Cthulhu in my day; so much so that it’s probably my second favorite RPG (right behind AD&D).

Together with a few close friends I trekked down my fair share of fog-shrouded New England back alleys, trying to sound like Sam Spade while deftly making perception checks and shining feeble torchlight on things better left unseen.

Good times, good times. Except for the failed sanity rolls, of course, and the frequent times I was forced to crumble up my character sheet while Brian Muir, our game master, described how my character was dragged off to the asylum, screaming in wordless horror. Sometimes I wonder how I stumbled into this hobby.

But mostly what I remember about Call of Cthulhu was that Chaosium had hands down the best packaged adventures on the market. Seriously, they were epic. Larry Ditillio’s globe-spanning Masks of Nyarlathotep is still considered the high water mark for RPG adventures in the 1980s, and Keith Herber’s Spawn of Azathoth won the Gamer’s Choice Award for Best Role Playing Adventure in 1987.

Beyond the Mountains of Madness, an enormous 438-page masterwork from Charles and Janyce Engan, commands outrageous collector’s prices today (copies are currently selling at Amazon.com for $555 — and up), and that’s not even the most sought-after. That distinction belongs to Horror on the Orient Express, a fabulous boxed set released in 1991 which sold out quickly and has never been reprinted.

But it was William A. Barton’s Cthulhu By Gaslight that was always my favorite.

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50% Off Sale at Night Shade Books

50% Off Sale at Night Shade Books

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cloud-roadsNight Shade Books, one of the leading small press publishers, is having a 50% off sale. That’s 50% off every book in their catalog, including all existing stock and forthcoming titles.

However the sale only lasts until next Thursday, April 26th, so act fast.

Night Shade publishes some of the most acclaimed authors in the business, including Martha Wells, Manly Wade Wellman, Greg Egan, Glen Cook, David Drake, Paolo Bacigalupi, Kage Baker, Jay Lake, Iain M. Banks, Elizabeth Bear, Charles Saunders, Lucius Shepard, and many more.

Night Shade has also earned a fine reputation for discovering and promoting many of the hottest rising stars in SF and fantasy. Just in the last few years they’ve published Rob Ziegler’s Seed, Cat Valente’s The Habitation of the Blessed, Bradley P. Beaulieu’s The Winds of Khalakovo, J.M. McDermott’s Never Knew Another, Kameron Hurley God’s War, Jon Armstrong’s Philip K. Dick Award nominee Yarn, and the Hugo Award-winning The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, just to name a few.

Looking for recommendations? Here at Black Gate we’ve recently discussed several excellent Night Shade titles, including:

as well as one or two I’m doubtlessly forgetting.

I also highly recommend all four volumes of Jonathan Strahan Eclipse series, perhaps the best original anthology line currently on the market, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s nifty pirate anthology Fast Ships, Black Sails, and Charles Saunders’ legendary sword & sorcery novel Imaro.

To get 50% off you need to purchase at least four titles — which won’t be a problem, considering the rich selection you have to choose from.  Get all the details on the sale here, and start shopping their catalog here.

This Week’s Bargain SF & Fantasy Books at Amazon.com

This Week’s Bargain SF & Fantasy Books at Amazon.com

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zotI don’t know about these weekly Amazon.com reports. I mean, they’re supposed to be public service announcements that steer you towards cool savings on the latest releases.

Instead, they’re fueling my online shopping obsession. I spend hours every afternoon trolling for bargains, and I call it “research.”

Well, not your problem I suppose. You get to benefit from my compulsive behavior, and I get to fill my house with more books and games in the shrinkwrap. Everyone wins.

Terrific bargains this week include the definitive collection of one of the best comics ever made, Zot!: The Complete Black and White Collection: 1987-1991, as well as a nice assortment of Marvel Essentials and Marvel Masterworks (The Silver Surfer, Fantastic Four, X-Men, Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America).

Discounted fantasy and SF novels include Charles Stross’ Rule 34, the first installment in Richard Kadrey’s popular Sandman Slim series, Orson Scott Card’s latest Ender novel Ender in Exile, and Jonathan Lethem’s first novel Gun, with Occasional Music.

It’s a big list this week — thirty titles, all discounted between 60% and 80%. As always, quantities on these bargain books are very limited. All are eligible for free domestic shipping on orders over $25.

Let’s get to the comics first.

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Doug Draa looks at Frank Belknap Long

Doug Draa looks at Frank Belknap Long

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rim-of-the-unknown2Doug Draa has kicked off a new blog dedicated to the golden age of Horror Anthology Paperbacks. His first subject is the much-overlooked pulp master Frank Belknap Long:

I’ve enjoyed Mr. Long’s stories since the middle 70s when I first read “The Space Eaters” in Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, Volume 1. He was a correspondent of Lovecraft’s and wrote several stories incorporating HPL’s Cthulhu Mythos. His attempts at Mythos writing were successful enough that his “Hounds of Tindalos” are more or less accepted as canon.

His stories are pure pulp and crazy enough to stand above the normal horror fare of the 30s and 40s. I find “The Space Eaters” to be one of the very best non-HPL penned Mythos tales ever. It tells of an invasion from beyond (actually from outside and between) in such a cold hearted and nonchalant manner without any of HPL’s typical histrionics that it is truly unsettling without ever being “over the top”. Hats off to the man! But as far as craziness goes, how can you not love such titles as “The Flame Midget,” “The Man with a Thousand Legs” or “The Horror from the Hills”?

Indeed. Frank Belknap Long published a host of stories in the pulps and several fine collections, including The Early Long, Odd Science Fiction, The Hounds of Tindalos, The Rim of the Unknown and Night Fear.

He wrote nearly 30 novels, including Space Station 1 (1957), Mission to a Distant Star, Mars is My Destination (1962), The Horror from the Hills (1963), Monster From Out of Time (1970), and Survival World (1971).

I don’t see a lot of blogs devoted to vintage horror anthologies, but if all the entries are as informative as this one, I’ll be a regular visitor.

You can find Doug’s blog, Uncle Doug’s Bunker of Horror, here.

New Treasures: The Library of America’s A Princess of Mars and Tarzan of the Apes

New Treasures: The Library of America’s A Princess of Mars and Tarzan of the Apes

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a-princess-of-marsSo yeah, I saw John Carter. And I liked it. Liked it enough that I went twice, actually. Been a while since I did that.

Still looks like it’s going to be the biggest box office bomb of the year, but these things happen. Doesn’t mean it’s not a good movie. And let’s face it — it’s helped introduce a whole new generation to the classic science fantasy of Edgar Rice Burroughs.

And not just all those young punks playing video games who don’t read books anymore.  I’m talking about a great many supposedly well-read science fiction and fantasy readers who never bothered to give ERB the time of day.

People like, y’know, me. For instance.

Sure, I’m fairly well read in SF and fantasy. And I have a (nearly) complete set of Edgar Rice Burroughs Mars books in paperback, picked up here and there at garage sales because I liked the covers. But Burroughs just never really appealed to me in my youth, and I never bothered to read them.

I loved the colorful action-adventure of the great pulp serials, but the mid-1930s was about as far back as I went.  Give me Asimov, van Vogt, Clifford D. Simak, Charles Tanner, H.P. Lovecraft. But if you appeared before they did — if your name was H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, or Edgar Rice Burroughs, for example — then you were just old.

Well, it’s never to late to correct past mistakes. Especially when The Library of America is making it easy with two beautiful keepsake volumes celebrating the centenary of Burroughs’ most famous creations: Tarzan of the Apes and John Carter of Mars.

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Rich Horton and Sean Wallace explore War and Space

Rich Horton and Sean Wallace explore War and Space

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warandspace1Rich Horton has been a Contributing Editor for Black Gate since…. you know, I’m not even sure I remember. When we were in Kindergarten, maybe.  Or possibly since that drunken weekend when we assembled Goth Chick in our old laboratory. Good times, good times.

There was a day when I thought Rich and I would conquer science fiction together. We were two freelance journalists telling it like it is. When Tor started printing books with ink made in Singapore sweat shops, we blew the lid off the whole thing. Sleep didn’t matter, friendships didn’t matter. Only the truth mattered. And hot babes. Babes were on us like… like… well, not really. But anyway, we were unstoppable. The world was ours for the taking. At least, that part of the world that didn’t include women.

Then Rich met Sean Wallace, and Sean offered him something I never could: an actual wage. Rich dropped me like a hot potato for a career as one of the hottest anthologists in the field, and never looked back. Last time I saw him he was driving a Lamborghini Diablo and talking to J.K. Rowling on his cell.

I confronted Sean on the front steps of the Prime Books skyscraper in ’06. I was in a snarling rage, and threatened his life. He punched me in the nose and made me cry.  Then he bought me a hot chocolate and a bus ticket back to Chicago, and that was that.

That was nearly a dozen acclaimed anthologies ago, including three volumes of The Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy, my favorite of the annual survey anthologies. Now Rich and Sean have teamed up for War and Space: Recent Combat, a reprint anthology collecting some of the best tales of space warfare from the last few decades, including “Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359” by Ken MacLeod, “Art of War” by Nancy Kress, and “The Political Officer” by Charles Coleman Finlay. This isn’t your typical military SF collection however, as Sean makes clear in a question to a reader in the comments section of his blog:

Will you still like it even if it’s not, well, in the vein of Baen military sf? I have to admit that we went a bit broader with this, and while we love it a lot, I just hope people aren’t expecting something a bit more militaristic?

Coming from a guy with a mean right hook, that sounds great to me.  War and Space will be released on May 2 by Prime Books. It is $15.95 for 384 pages in trade paperback.