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Category: Editor’s Blog

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

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.

The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in September

The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in September

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dunsanyThe top article on the Black Gate blog last month was Foz Meadows’s debut piece for us, “Challenging the Classics: Questioning the Arbitrary Browsing Mechanism,” an unflinching examination of the value of the classic fantasy canon to the modern reader.

The classics were a popular subject last month: second on the list was M. Harold Page’s article “(Not) Recommending SF&F Classics to the Young Person or Novice.”

Third was Connor Gormley’s salute to the prose of Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, and Michael Moorcock, “Who Took the Flowers out of My Prose?” Still sticking with the classic theme, I see. You folks are nothing if not consistent.

Fletcher Vredenburgh’s look at Karl Edward Wagner’s Night Winds was in 4th place, and Jon Sprunk finally broke us out of our September fascination with fantasy classics with his post “War – What is it Good For? Violence in Fantasy Literature.”

The complete Top 50 Black Gate posts in September were:

  1. Challenging the Classics: Questioning the Arbitrary Browsing Mechanism
  2. (Not) Recommending SFF Classics to the Young Person or Novice
  3. Who Took the Flowers out of my Prose?
  4. Night Winds by Karl Edward Wagner
  5. War — What is it Good For? Violence in Fantasy Literature
  6. Why I Write Fantasy
  7. “It’s Your Job to Make it Interesting. Just Do Your Job“
  8. Vintage Treasures: The List of 7 by Mark Frost
  9. The Other Appendix N
  10. Andre Norton, Michael Moorcock and Appendix N: Advanced Readings in D&D

     

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The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in September

The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in September

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Pathfinder Tales King of Chaos-smallDave Gross shot to the top of our fiction charts last month, with an exclusive excerpt from his new Pathfinder Tales novel King of Chaos. The halo affect also lifted his previous book in the series, Queen of Thorns, into an impressive 4th place.

There were a few other new faces on the list. BG regular Peadar Ó Guilín debuts in 6th place with his fourth story for us, “The Dowry,” the tale of an artist caught with a wizard’s daughter who soon finds himself in the body of a dog, and Michael Shea makes the list for the first time with his novella of Lovecraftian horror “Tsathoggua.” John C. Hocking leaps into the list despite the fact that his “Vestments of Pestilence” appeared with only two days left in the month, with a story that author James Reasoner called “An absolute joy to read… If you’re a fan of action-packed heroic fantasy, I guarantee you’ll be entertained.”

Ryan Harvey returns with his new Ahn-Tarqa tale “Stand at Dubun-Geb,” which Tangent Online called “A fun story that reminded me of Conan.” It joins the first Ahn-Tarqa tale in the Top 20, “The Sorrowless Thief,” published in April.

Also making the list were exciting stories by Joe Bonadonna, Howard Andrew Jones, E.E. Knight, Mike Allen, Vaughn Heppner, Aaron Bradford Starr, Jamie McEwan, Martha Wells, John R. Fultz, Gregory Bierly, and David C. Smith and Joe Bonadonna.

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

  1. An excerpt from Pathfinder Tales: King of Chaos, by Dave Gross
  2. “The Moonstones of Sor Lunarum,” by Joe Bonadonna
  3. An excerpt from The Bones of the Old Ones, by Howard Andrew Jones
  4. An excerpt from Pathfinder Tales: Queen of Thorns, by Dave Gross
  5. “The Terror in the Vale,” by E.E. Knight
  6. “The Dowry,” by Peadar Ó Guilín
  7. “Stand at Dubun-Geb,” by Ryan Harvey
  8. An excerpt from The Black Fire Concerto, by Mike Allen
  9. “Tsathoggua,” by Michael Shea
  10. “The Pit Slave,” by Vaughn Heppner

     

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Nebula Award-winning Author Eugie Foster Diagnosed with Cancer

Nebula Award-winning Author Eugie Foster Diagnosed with Cancer

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Eugie FosterThe tireless Eugie Foster, author and genre powerhouse, announced this week on her blog that she has been diagnosed with cancer.

Eugie first came to my attention while she was running Tangent Online, after Dave Truesdale stepped down. She reorganized the field’s premiere short-fiction review site, recruited a great team of reviewers, and returned it to a regular schedule — and industry prominence. At the same time, her own writing appeared in Interzone, Apex, Fantasy Magazine, Realms of Fantasy, and other places; her Interzone story “Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast” won the 2009 Nebula Award and was nominated for the Hugo. Her first collection, Returning My Sister’s Face and Other Far Eastern Tales of Whimsy and Malice, was published the same year.

Jason Waltz introduced me to Eugie at Dragon*Con in 2010, at her busy press station deep in the con’s hive center, where she produced the onsite newsletter, the Daily Dragon. Eugie was even more impressive in person — charming and highly articulate, filled with drive and energy.

Eugie made the following announcement on Tuesday:

I’ve been struggling with blinding headaches for the last several months – since June – that has recently also become persistent sinus congestion and significant loss of hearing in my right ear. I thought originally it was a bad dental crown, since the timing coincided, or possibly TMJ, since the symptoms seemed to point in that direction.

After seeing a dentist, general practitioner, ENT, and oral surgeon; and being prescribed three (now four) courses of antibiotics, steroids, and a variety of narcotics to help alleviate my pain, they took CT scans yesterday.

As it turns out, the culprit is a malignant, fast-growing tumor, around 6cm, in my sinuses and hard and soft palate regions. In short, it’s cancer. They don’t know what kind yet so can’t make a prognosis. The ENT who ordered the CT scan said that surgery – ASAP, immediate, urgent – to remove the tumor is my only treatment alternative at this point. Whether I require chemo afterwards depends on the type of cancer it ends up being.

She is only 41 years old. Read the complete details, and the latest updates, on her blog.

The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in August

The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in August

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Lonesome Wyatt-smallThe top article on the Black Gate blog last month was Patty Templeton’s interview with enigmatic author/musician Lonesome Wyatt, guitarist and vocalist for the gothic country music band Those Poor Bastards, and author of the pulp horror novel The Terrible Tale of Edgar Switchblade.

Second on the list was our look at the first volume in the Classics of Science Fiction line, The Best of Stanley G. Weinbaum, followed by Bryan Thomas Schmidt’s massive roundtable interview with the editors of four Year’s Best volumes: Ellen Datlow, Paula Guran, Rich Horton and Gardner Dozois.

Roundtable interviews seem to be popular this month. Next on the list was Garrett Calcaterra’s hard look at the life of a fantasy midlister, a conversation with authors M. Todd Gallowglas, Patrick Hester, Wendy N. Wagner, and David B. Coe. Rounding out the Top Five for the month was Nick Ozment’s look at the eldritch work of H.P. Lovecraft.

The complete Top 50 Black Gate posts in August were:

  1. An Interview with Lonesome Wyatt of Those Poor Bastards
  2. Vintage Treasures: The Best of Stanley G. Weinbaum
  3. Finding the Best: An Interview with Year’s Best Editors Ellen Datlow, Paula Guran, Rich Horton and Gardner Dozois
  4. Gallowglass, Hester, Wagner, Coe: Four Authors Sound Off on the Writing Life of a Midlister
  5. So You’re a Horror fan and You’ve Never Read…
  6. L. Sprague de Camp, Fletcher Pratt, Gardner Fox and Appendix N: Advanced Readings in D&D
  7. Weird of Oz Conjures up Some Other Horrors
  8. When Ideas Collide
  9. More Than Whodunit: The Science Fiction Mystery
  10. The Exploding World of Castles and Crusades

     

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The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in August

The Top 20 Black Gate Fiction Posts in August

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The Black Fire Concerto-smallThere’s a few new faces on the Top Fiction list this month.

Mark Rigney’s “The Keystone,” third and final chapter of his epic fantasy series The Tales of Gemen, broke into the Top Five. Tangent Online called it “Masterfully told… The tension never stops, starting with nightmares, followed by chases across half the world… Once I started reading, I couldn’t stop.” Both of the previous chapters made the list as well, including the opener “The Trade,” which Tangent Online called “Marvelous!” and “The Find,” which it described as “Reminiscent of the old sword & sorcery classics… A must read.”

Also making the Top Five for the first time was our excerpt from Mike Allen’s new dark fantasy The Black Fire Concerto, which Tanith Lee called “A prize for the multitude of fans who relish strong Grand Guignol with their sword and sorcery.” And Vaughn Heppner had two of his Tales of Lod in the Top 10:  “The Serpent of Thep” and “The Pit Slave.”

Also making the list were exciting stories by Howard Andrew Jones, Joe Bonadonna, E.E. Knight, Paul Abbamondi, Martha Wells, Aaron Bradford Starr,  David C. Smith and Joe Bonadonna, Ryan Harvey, Judith Berman, Robert Rhodes, Emily Mah, John R. Fultz, and Jamie McEwan.

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

  1. An excerpt from The Bones of the Old Ones, by Howard Andrew Jones
  2. “The Moonstones of Sor Lunarum,” by Joe Bonadonna
  3. “The Terror in the Vale,” by E.E. Knight
  4. “The Keystone,” Part III of The Tales of Gemen, by Mark Rigney
  5. An excerpt from The Black Fire Concerto, by Mike Allen
  6. “The Serpent of Thep,” by Vaughn Heppner
  7. “So Go the Seasons,” by Paul Abbamondi
  8. “The Pit Slave,” by Vaughn Heppner
  9. The Death of the Necromancer, a complete novel by Martha Wells
  10. “The Find,” Part II of The Tales of Gemen, by Mark Rigney

     

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