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Category: Editor’s Blog

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

A Fond Look Back at Bluejay Books

A Fond Look Back at Bluejay Books

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Alien Cargo Theodore Sturgeon-smallThe most popular article on the Black Gate website in July was our report on the departure of James Frenkel from Tor Books.

News articles like that are usually good for some decent traffic. It seems everyone had something to say about Frenkel stepping down from his post at the most powerful genre publisher in America and all that attention generated a lot of clicks.

Most conversations, however, dwelled on the circumstances of his departure, and overlooked his many accomplishments. During his years at Tor, Frenkel sure was busy. He acquired and edited some of their most important books, including volumes from Frederik Pohl, Dan Simmons, Jack Williamson, Timothy Zahn, Greg Bear, Andre Norton, Vernor Vinge, and many others.

But even before he joined Tor, Frenkel made major contributions to American SF and fantasy, particularly as publisher at Bluejay Books in the mid-80s. It’s Bluejay, and the beautiful books they produced before going out of business, that I want to talk about today.

Bluejay was active just as I was really discovering American fantasy and SF in the early 80s, haunting bookshops in downtown Ottawa. They were pioneers in the trade paperback market, hired excellent cover artists — including Rowena Morrill, Tom Kidd, Barclay Shaw, John Pierard, Jill Bauman, and others — and published many of the top writers in the field, such as Theodore Sturgeon, Philip K. Dick, Harlan Ellison, Vernor Vinge, and many more.

That was a powerful combination, and it meant that Bluejay was an imprint with enormous prestige — at least in my mind. I kept an eye out for their books on the shelves and always gave them special attention.

That prestige extended to all their titles, not just the authors I recognized (part of the magic of having a strong and easily recognizable visual brand). It also extended to the new authors they discovered and championed.

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The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in October

The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in October

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Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs-smallThe top article on the Black Gate blog last month was our look at Mike Resnick and Robert Garcia’s new anthology Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs. (A few weeks later Robert Garcia wrote his first Saturday blog post for us, a fond look back at The Pulp Art of Virgil Finlay. Do we bring the heavy hitters, or what?)

Second on the list was E.E. Knight’s open letter to Amy Farrah Fowler, a character on The Big Bang Theory, on her controversial theory that Indiana Jones had no impact on the ending of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Fight the good fight, Eric.

Third was Jon Sprunk’s look at his favorite fantasy films, followed by his article on the use of elves in fantasy lit. Way to hog the list, Jon. Rounding out the Top Five was James Maliszewski’s “Appendix T,” an attempt to craft a hypothetical Appendix N for the great Traveller RPG, listing roughly 20 works of classic science fiction that clearly influenced the game’s creators.

The complete Top 50 Black Gate posts in October were:

  1. New Treasures: Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs
  2. An Open Letter to Amy Farrah Fowler, Ph.D
  3. My Favorite Fantasy Movies
  4. To Elf or not to Elf: Races in Fantasy Lit
  5. Appendix T
  6. Richard Kadrey Talks with Black Gate about Dead Set
  7. In Defense of Fantasy Heroes
  8. Campbell’s Reheated Mythopoetic Soup
  9. Remembering Dave
  10. How Many Psychiatrists Does it Take to Change a Genre?

     

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The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in October

The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in October

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The Black Fire Concerto-smallOur exclusive excerpt from Mike Allen’s dark fantasy novel The Black Fire Concerto was our most popular work of fiction in October, its first month at the top of the charts. John R. Fultz called it “A post-apocalyptic melody played on strings of Terror and Sorcery,” and apparently word is getting around.

Joe Bonadonna’s “The Moonstones of Sor Lunarum,” in the number 2 slot, has been steadily creeping up the charts since we posted it last December. It is without a doubt the most consistently popular work of fiction we have ever published.

Last month’s chart topper, Dave Gross’ Pathfinder Tales: King of Chaos, came in third, an entirely respectable showing; and John C. Hocking’s new story “Vestments of Pestilence” broke into the Top Ten for the first time, coming in 4th. Rounding out the Top Five was E.E. Knight’s perennial favorite “The Terror in the Vale,” first published in January.

Also making the list were exciting stories by Janet Morris and Chris Morris, David Evan Harris, Martha Wells, Peadar Ó Guilín, David C. Smith and Joe Bonadonna, David C. Smith, Howard Andrew Jones, Michael Shea, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Mark Rigney, Jamie McEwan, Aaron Bradford Starr, Alex Kreis, and Ryan Harvey.

If you haven’t sampled the adventure fantasy stories offered through our new Black Gate Online Fiction line, you’re missing out. For the past year we’ve presented an original short story or novella from the best writers in the industry every week, all completely free. Here are the Top Twenty most-read stories in October:

  1. An excerpt from The Black Fire Concerto, by Mike Allen
  2. “The Moonstones of Sor Lunarum,” by Joe Bonadonna
  3. An excerpt from Pathfinder Tales: King of Chaos, by Dave Gross
  4. “Vestments of Pestilence,” by John C. Hocking
  5. “The Terror in the Vale,” by E.E. Knight
  6. “The Sacred Band” by Janet Morris and Chris Morris
  7. “The Gentle Sleeper” by David Evan Harris
  8. An excerpt from Pathfinder Tales: Queen of Thorns, by Dave Gross
  9. The Death of the Necromancer, a complete novel by Martha Wells
  10. “The Dowry,” by Peadar Ó Guilín

     

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Vintage Treasures: Pirates and Plunder

Vintage Treasures: Pirates and Plunder

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Pirates and Plunder box-smallBack in the early 80s, publishers were still exploring the boundless possibilities of role playing.

It occurred to more than one designer that sword & sorcery — the tiny genre Gygax and Arneson had chosen to build their fabulously successful Dungeons & Dragons upon — was a niche market at best, with very limited widespread appeal.

Yet if D&D had managed to come so far with source material of such limited public familiarity, what might a game with much broader appeal accomplish?

And so the early 80s was a time when we had an astounding array of new role playing games promoted by a host of hopeful publishers, in a wide range of genres — science fiction, action, spy thrillers, mystery, superhero, and many others. There were gangster games (Gangbusters), Arthurian games (Pendragon), games based on popular action films (Indiana Jones, James Bond), and westerns (Boot Hill). There were horror games (Chill, Beyond the Supernatural), post-apocalyptic survival games (Twilight 2000, Gamma World), games based on prime time soap operas (SPI’s infamous Dallas), and bestsellers like Richard Adams’ Watership Down (Bunnies & Burrows).

Virtually all of them failed. Turns out that D&D didn’t succeed in spite of the fact that it drew inspiration from the classic heroic fantasy listed in the famous Appendix N, but in fact because of it. Sword & sorcery offered the kind of larger-than-life heroes players wanted to play — and more importantly, no other genre came so readily pre-packaged with a catalog of terrific opponents, from orcs to vampires to dragons.

But while most of those games are long forgotten today, a handful are still fondly remembered. Pirates and Plunder, a role playing game set in the golden age of piracy, is one of the latter. At least, it’s fondly remembered by me.

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Vintage Treasures: Prince of Foxes by Samuel Shellabarger

Vintage Treasures: Prince of Foxes by Samuel Shellabarger

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Prince of Foxes-smallIf you’ve been reading my Vintage Treasures posts for any length of time, you’re probably aware I have a weakness for buying small collections. Especially vintage paperback collections.

There are a few ways to find interesting lots on online auctions sites like eBay, but I’ve had the most success recently searching for Bantam Giants, a line which repackaged a lot of popular historical adventure fiction in paperback with terrific covers — and without chopping it up first to fit the smaller format, a common practice in the early days of paperbacks.

Bantam Giants are a great way to learn about new writers (okay, old writers, but new to me), and they’re ridiculously cheap. They sold — by the tens of thousands — on newsstands for 35 cents in the early 1950s. Generally speaking, copies in fine condition are still fairly common, and don’t cost much more than that now.

Last year I talked about discovering the works of Lawrence Schoonover, especially his 13th Century adventure novels The Golden Exile and The Burnished Blade. Tucked into the same collection that contained those volumes was a gorgeous book titled The King’s Cavalier, by someone named Samuel Shellabarger.

My guides through the world of 40s and 50s historical adventures, the Honorable Howard Andrew Jones and John C. Hocking, have been telling me about Shellabarger for years. So I was delighted to find another of his novels in the latest collection of Permabooks and Bantam Giants I acquired last month: Prince of Foxes, a tale of adventure and intrigue in Renaissance Italy.

It follows the exploits of Andrea Orsini, a talented and resourceful peasant who rises through the ranks to become a political agent for the sinister Cesare Borgia. It was filmed in 1949, with Orson Welles as Borgia and Tyrone Power as Orsini.

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Goodbye, Blockbuster

Goodbye, Blockbuster

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Blockbuster is GoneThe Chicago Tribune is reporting today that Blockbuster will close all of its remaining brick-and-mortar outlets.

And so we bid a fond goodbye to an earlier, simpler way of life. When Friday nights meant leaving work a few minutes early to get in line at the rental store, before all the new releases were gone and you were stuck with an Andrew Dice Clay picture.

This is just one more thing that will confuse the hell out of me when I’m old and senile and wander away from the home. I’ll be standing in the parking lot of Best Buy with five bucks in my hand, trying to rent the first season of Kolchak the Night Stalker. Just you wait.

End of an era, for sure. The last remnants of the Old Republic have been swept away. (But how will Google maintain control without the bureaucracy?)

Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy in September 2010. It was purchased by DISH Network Corp. in a bankruptcy auction for $320 million in 2011, back when they were trying to seriously compete with Netflix. The company says it will close all of its 300 remaining U.S. stores by early January and shut down the Blockbuster By Mail service in mid-December.

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New Treasures: Pathfinder Tales: Stalking the Beast by Howard Andrew Jones

New Treasures: Pathfinder Tales: Stalking the Beast by Howard Andrew Jones

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Pathfinder Tales Stalking the Beast-smallIt’s funny. I talked to Howard nearly every day while he was writing this book, and heard the blow-by-blow as he devised the plot and fleshed out the characters, recognized the growing excitement in his voice as the novel came together and he contributed his own unique talents and fine narrative gifts to the collaborative bit of gaming genius that is Pathfinder. It almost felt like reading the book would be superfluous.

And then I read the description below and realized hearing all the behind-the-scenes details meant absolutely nothing. It’s like saying you know how a gourmet dish will turn out because you’ve seen all the ingredients. I may have watched Howard lay all the pieces out on his writing table, but the true magic comes in how they all fit together. I’m excited to find out and I know I’ll be delighted.

When a mysterious monster carves a path of destruction across the southern River Kingdoms, desperate townsfolk look to the famed elven ranger Elyana and her half-orc companion Drelm for salvation. For Drelm, however, the mission is about more than simple justice — it’s about protecting the frontier town he’s adopted as his home, and the woman he plans to marry.

Together with the gunslinging bounty hunter Lisette and several equally deadly allies, the heroes must set off into the wilderness, hunting a terrifying beast that will test their abilities — and their friendships — to the breaking point and beyond. But could it be that there’s more to the murders than a simple rampaging beast?

From critically acclaimed author Howard Andrew Jones comes a new adventure of love, betrayal, and unnatural creatures, set in the award-winning world of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

Interested? Paizo has promised us enough free copies for a giveaway. Stay tuned for details and you could win your own copy.

Pathfinder Tales: Stalking the Beast was published this week by Paizo. It is 400 pages, priced at $8.99 in paperback. No word on the digital edition yet. Howard’s previous Pathfinder book was Plague of Shadows, released in 2011. His most recent novel was The Bones of the Old Ones.

2013 World Fantasy Award Winners Announced

2013 World Fantasy Award Winners Announced

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alif-the-unseenYou’d think that, since I’m unable to attend World Fantasy this year, they’d keep the convention low key. I mean, no sense rubbing it in, right?

No such luck. I hear there was just as much excitement, just as many panels, and just as many fabulous parties as always. It’s like they don’t care.

They even gave out just as many awards as usual. Well, even if I couldn’t attend, at least I can read the same award-winning fantasy as everyone else. See, that’s what’s great about awards — they’re fair to everybody.

This year’s winners of the World Fantasy Awards are:

Novel:

Novella:

  • “Let Maps to Others,” K.J. Parker (Subterranean, Summer 2012)

Short Story:

  • “The Telling,” Gregory Norman Bossert (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Nov 29, 2012)

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Mind Meld: Worthy Media Tie-ins

Mind Meld: Worthy Media Tie-ins

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Splinter of the Mind's Eye-smallI was honored to be invited to participate in a Mind Meld article at SF Signal earlier this month. The topic was “Worthy Media Tie-ins,” so of course I took the chance to expand on my love of James Blish’s Star Trek books — particularly Star Trek 2, one of the very first books I ever owned, which I first mentioned a few weeks back in my review of The Best of James Blish.

What made James Blish’s Star Trek tie-in books so great? They were fun, fast-paced, and most of all, familiar. Before I plucked Star Trek 2 off the rack, the adult section of the bookstores was a strange and unfriendly place, filled with covers of stiff, formally attired men and much less stiff, partially-attired women. In short, Blish’s books were a gateway drug to a much wider world. With phasers.

But the book I was really dying to talk about was Alan Dean Foster’s Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, the very first Star Wars tie-in novel and the book that launched an entire publishing empire:

Splinter Of The Mind’s Eye isn’t just a media tie-in novel. It’s sort of an alternate-world, parallel-universe media tie in novel. A tie-in novel for a Star Wars universe in some time-stream that has nothing at all to do with our universe.

This is because Splinter Of The Mind’s Eye was written well before the release of The Empire Strikes Back. Before we knew that Vader was Luke’s father, before Han and Leia started making goo-goo eyes at each other, and before Leia traded in her princess gowns for a blaster with a full clip.

So Luke and Leia get a little more frisky in this book than you would reasonably expect from long-lost siblings, and Leia is a bit more of a helpless princess than you would anticipate after seeing Empire. Also, Darth Vader is a total dick, and has no compunctions at all about carving Luke up with his glowy red light sabre. Clearly, the paternity results had not arrived yet.

It’s not all about me, of course. There are some excellent discussions of other classic media tie-ins. John Mierau — who also has fond memories of Splinter of the Mind’s Eye — talks about Eric Nylund’s much-loved Halo novel The Fall of Reach; Aaron Rosenberg highlights Max Allan Collins’s Dark Angel trilogy, which tied up the dangling storylines after the TV series was canceled; James L. Sutter explores Richard A. Knaak’s classic DragonLance series The Legend of Huma; and Chadwick Ginther celebrates David Annandale’s entry in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, Death of Antagonis — among many others.

Enjoy the entire article here. Thanks to Andrea Johnson at SF Signal for the invite — I had a blast doing this one.

Try a Free Cold and Dark Adventure

Try a Free Cold and Dark Adventure

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Cold and Dark-smallLast week, I talked about a promising new RPG of science fiction horror, Cold and Dark, from Chronicle City Games.

I say promising because any time an RPG includes stats for alien beasts that scuttle around remote asteroids, deadly secrets from ancient star-faring civilizations, and the threat of genocide through an infectious madness, you know you’re in for some great gaming.

Shortly after the post went live, I heard from Angus Abranson at Chronicle City:

The article on Cold & Dark is great, thanks. The only thing I’ll add is that (yesterday) we posted up a free 65-page Quickplay for the game which also includes an adventure so people can ‘try before they buy.’

You can download the Quickplay via our webstore here.

Woo-hoo! What makes a great game even better? Free stuff! Thanks, Chronicle City. You’re all right.

It’s our duty to pass this news along to you, naturally. Because we look out for you. Especially in regards to great games and free swag.

Now you have no excuse not to check out Cold & Dark. I expect a steady stream of reader reports on epic gaming sessions. Especially ones in which you neglected to bring along sufficient ordinance and your team ran out of ammo somewhere in a dark corridor far, far below the surface. Those are my favorite.

Good hunting, people.