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Solomon Kane Crosses the Atlantic to U.S. Movie Theaters in September

Solomon Kane Crosses the Atlantic to U.S. Movie Theaters in September

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solomon-kane-alternate-us-posterUpdate: My review.

Next month, we colonials will finally have the chance to view Solomon Kane, the film version of Robert E. Howard’s famous puritanical hero, in movie theaters. It has been a long sea voyage over the Atlantic: the movie, directed by Michael J. Bassett and starring James Purefoy in the title role, and co-starring Max von Sydow, Rachel Hurd-Wood, and the late Pete Postelthwaite, was released in England and other territories in 2009, but lacked a U.S. distributor. I almost gave up on the movie getting any kind of theatrical release, and expected it would one day find its way to the straight-to-DVD/Blu-ray market.

However, last week, Michael J. Bassett announced on his blog that the Weinstein Company’s new division, Radius Films, had acquired Solomon Kane and would release it first on premium video-on-demand (already available if you want to spring for it) and then give it a theatrical release on September 28th. So mark the date and sharpen your rapier, people of the New World.

No word yet on how wide a release this will be, but I expect it will be “limited”: select theaters in major US cities. As a Los Angeles resident, I’m confident I’ll have it within easy driving range (I live in one of the most heavily theater-populated places in the city, and I can even guess right now which theater it will show at.)

Bassett’s comments on the release pattern:

I currently have no details on the extent of that theatrical run but I suspect it will be what’s called “key” areas — so probably 15 or so cities in the US. Not world beating and it’s going to need lots of support to find the audience but there’ll be enough interest to hopefully put Kane back on the map and in a place where we can sensibly talk of sequels.

Sequels! Ambitious. Not holding my breath.

Bassett also unveiled the amazing alternate poster for the US release, seen here. I’m in love with it: the pulp adoration dripping like the blood from this illustration is intoxicating. I want it on my wall now.

What about the movie itself? Since it’s been available in many English-speaking territories for three years and to anyone who had a region-free DVD or Blu-ray player, there are already numerous reviews and opinions on the ‘net. Here are two of them. Opinions I’ve heard from those I’ve personally talked to range from “dark and great!” to “Howard and Solomon Kane in name only.” Since I haven’t seen the movie, I have no observations to make at the moment, but those who have please weigh in on the comment thread.

Nonetheless, I will be in the theater on September 28 and will give Black Gate readers my opinion soon after.

The Bones of the Old Ones Inches Closer to December Publication Date

The Bones of the Old Ones Inches Closer to December Publication Date

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bones-of-the-old-onesThis week the most exciting item to arrive at the Black Gate rooftop headquarters, bar none, was the Advance Reading Copy of Howard Andrew Jones’s The Bones of the Old Ones, the sequel to his breakout fantasy novel, The Desert of Souls.

I read The Bones of the Old Ones the instant I could get my hands on it, and it was everything I hoped it would be. A rollicking adventure that follows our heroes Dabir and Asim in a daring quest across the landscape of 8th Century Arabia, Bones is packed with ancient secrets, underground lairs, dread pacts, mysterious sorcery, desperate heroism, and moments of laugh-out-loud humor. The cast is much larger than The Desert of Souls, and the stakes are higher, as Dabir and Asim race against time to prevent an ancient sorcerous cabal from plunging the world into eternal winter:

Combining the masterful fantasy of Robert E . Howard with the high-speed action of Bernard Cornwell, Howard Andrew Jones breathes new life into the glittering tradition of sword-and-sorcery with the latest tale of Dabir and Asim’s adventures. As a snowfall blankets 8th century Mosul, a Persian noblewoman arrives at the home of the scholar Dabir and his friend the swordsman Captain Asim. Najya has escaped from a dangerous cabal that has ensorcelled her to track down ancient magical tools of tremendous power, the bones of the old ones.

To stop the cabal and save Najya, Dabir and Asim venture into the worst winter in human memory, hunted by a shape-changing assassin. The stalwart Asim is drawn irresistibly toward the beautiful Persian even as Dabir realizes she may be far more dangerous a threat than anyone who pursues them, for her enchantment worsens with the winter. As their opposition grows, Dabir and Asim have no choice but to ally with their deadliest enemy, the treacherous Greek necromancer, Lydia. But even if they can trust one another long enough to escape their foes, it may be too late for Najya, whose soul is bound up with a vengeful spirit intent on sheathing the world in ice for a thousand years…

The Bones of the Old Ones will be released in hardcover and eBook by Thomas Dunne Books on December 11. It is 307 pages of non-stop action for $24.99 ($12.99 digital), and gets my highest recommendation. Place your advance order now.

Josepha Sherman, December 12, 1946 – August 23, 2012

Josepha Sherman, December 12, 1946 – August 23, 2012

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the-shattered-oath2Reports are pouring in that prolific fantasy writer Josepha Sherman, author of The Prince of the Sidhe novels and numerous licensed tie-in books, died on Thursday. She had been in poor health and struggled with dementia in the final years of her life.

Sherman began her career writing for The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers, the animated Space Western TV series that ran between 1986 and 1989. Her first standalone fantasy novel was Golden Girl and the Crystal of Doom (1986). It was followed by more than a dozen others, including the Compton Crook Award winner The Shining Falcon (1990).

She began a lengthy and productive career writing tie-in novels for popular television and computer gaming properties in 1986 with The Invisibility Factor (Find Your Fate Junior Transformers, No 9). She produced licensed novels for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Trek, Bard’s Tale, Highlander, Mage Knight, and Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda. She also published All I Need To Know I Learned From Xena: Warrior Princess (1998), Greasy Grimy Gopher Guts: The Subversive Folklore of Childhood (with T. K. F. Weisskopf, 1995), Mythology for Storytellers (2002), and more than 30 other non-fiction titles.

Sherman was also a prolific editor with eleven anthologies under her belt, beginning with A Sampler of Jewish-American Folklore (1992) and including Trickster Tales: Forty Folk Stories from Around the World (1996), Urban Nightmares (with Keith R.A. DeCandido, 1997), Merlin’s Kin: World Tales of the Heroic Magician (1998), and Young Warriors: Stories Of Strength (with Tamora Pierce, 2005).

Sherman frequently wrote in collaboration, producing more than a dozen books with a variety of talented partners including Susan M Shwartz (5 Star Trek novels), Laura Anne Gilman (2 Buffy novels), Mercedes Lackey (Bard’s Tale and Bardic Choices), Keith R.A. DeCandido (one anthology), Tamora Pierce (one anthology), T K F Weisskopf (one non-fiction book), and many others.

Writers including Pat Cadigan, Keith DeCandido, Theodora Goss, Nick Pollotta, Vera Nazarian, Ellen Kushner, and David B. Coe have been leaving testimonials on her Facebook page.

Athans & Associates Releases Tales From The Fathomless Abyss

Athans & Associates Releases Tales From The Fathomless Abyss

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tales-of-the-fathomless-abyss2I’ve never been a huge fan of shared-world anthologies — which is strange considering I was a voracious fantasy reader at the height of the genre, the late 80s, the era of Terri Windling’s Borderlands, C. J. Cherryh’s Merovingen Nights, Will Shetterly & Emma Bull’s Liavek, George R.R. Martin’s Wild Cards, and the great granddaddy of them all, Thieve’s World.

But some recent projects have begun changing my mind. It started with Welcome to Bordertown, the 2011 anthology that our own Patty Templeton called, in her own special manner, “Really GD awesome. I freakin’ loved it.” It continued with Scott Taylor’s Tales of the Emerald Serpent, the tremendously successful 2012 project that includes fiction from Lynn Flewelling, Harry Connolly, Juliet McKenna, Martha Wells, Julie Czerneda, and many more.

Now comes word of a shared world project that sounds just as intriguing: Tales From The Fathomless Abyss.

Descend into the world of the Fathomless Abyss, a bottomless pit that opens who-knows-when onto who-knows-where, just long enough for new people from a thousand different worlds and a million different times to fall in and join the fight for survival in a place where the slightest misstep means an everlasting fall into eternity.

Tales from the Fathomless Abyss features six new short stories, and it’s only the beginning. From here, each author will branch out to spin a series of new books sharing this impossible, explosive, infinite setting.

The anthology is edited by Philip Athans. It includes an intro by Ken Scholes and original contributions from Mike Resnick & Brad R. Torgersen, Jay Lake, Mel Odom, J.M. McDermott, Cat Rambo, and Philip Athans. Two of the promised follow-on titles have already been released: Devils of the Endless Deep by Phil Athans, which expands on his short story from the anthology and plays with the strange time travel aspects of the Fathomless Abyss setting, and J.M. McDermott’s Nirvana Gates, which takes the setting to the next, deeper level. It also features an excerpt from the next book by Cat Rambo, due in two months. That one will be followed by standalone novellas by Mel Odom, Mike Resnick and Brad Torgerson, and Jay Lake.

Best of all, the introductory anthology Tales From The Fathomless Abyss has been released at the can’t-turn-it-down price of $0.99 for the digital version. Check it out, and get in on the ground floor on an exciting new series. You can buy it today from Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com.

Weird Tales Pulls Novel Excerpt Following Fan Uproar

Weird Tales Pulls Novel Excerpt Following Fan Uproar

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weird-tales-359aIt’s been an interesting day for Weird Tales, the oldest genre magazine on the market.

It began with the abrupt resignation of Ann VanderMeer as a senior contributing editor, “due to major artistic and philosophical differences with the existing editors.” As reported here last year, VanderMeer was replaced as editor by Marvin Kaye as the magazine transitioned to new Publisher Nth Dimension Media, run by John Harlacher. While Ann commented that her resignation “has been in the works for several months, ever since I was removed as the editor-in-chief,” it was apparently hastened by Kaye’s decision to publish an excerpt from Victoria Foyt’s novel,  Saving the Pearls: Revealing Eden. The “Pearls” in the title refer to whites, who find themselves a persecuted minority after an ecological disaster. In praising the book, Kaye wrote:

Weird Tales seldom prints SF, but this story is a compelling view of a world that didn’t listen to the warnings of ecologists, and a world that has developed a reverse racism: blacks dominating and detesting not just whites, but latinos and albinos, the few that still survive of the latter are hunted down and slaughtered.

[Kaye’s post, and the comments it generated, have since been removed from the WT site; a Google webcache of the page is here.]

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Happy Birthday, H.P. Lovecraft

Happy Birthday, H.P. Lovecraft

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the-call-of-cthulhu-for-beginning-readers122 years ago today, Howard Phillips Lovecraft, the father of modern horror, was born in Providence, Rhode Island.

Here at Black Gate we’ve celebrated Lovecraft’s works in numerous ways over the years. In 2010, John R. Fultz interviewed the authors behind the landmark anthology Cthulhu’s Reign in “Cthulhu Has Risen…”, perhaps the single most popular blog post we’ve ever published, and last year he examined a brand new magazine celebrating Cthulhu’s creator, Lovecraft eZine. Matthew David Surridge took a detailed look at the master’s prose style in H.P. Lovecraft: The Style Adjectival, and Bill Ward told us about the silent movie version of The Call of Cthulhu.

We’ve covered numerous games, books, and audio adaptations, from Andrew Zimmerman Jones’s 2011 article on Age of Cthulhu: Death in Luxor to my review of Dark Adventure Radio Theatre’s superb audio play The Shadow Over Innsmouth. In the last week alone we told you about Ross E. Lockhart’s excellent anthology The Book of Cthulhu and the new RPG setting Clockwork and Cthulhu from Cakebread & Walton.

But there’s always more. So today, in honor of H.P. Lovecraft’s 122nd birthday, we’d like to present to you The Call of Cthulhu (For Beginning Readers), a faithful retelling of the classic horror tale… in the style of Dr. Seuss.

Created by artist Richard John Ivankovic, The Call of Cthulhu (For Beginning Readers) is a full-color illustrated version of the perhaps Lovercraft’s most famous story, originally published in the February 1928 issue of Weird Tales. The complete version can be browsed online here.

We think H.P. Lovecraft would have enjoyed it.

2012 ENnie Award Winners Announced at Gen Con

2012 ENnie Award Winners Announced at Gen Con

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ashen-stars2The winners of the 2012 EN World RPG Awards (“ENnies”), an annual fan-based celebration of excellence in tabletop roleplaying, have been announced at Gen Con in Indianapolis. The winners include:

Best Adventure

  • Madness at Gardmore Abbey (Wizards of the Coast) *Silver Winner*
  • Streets of Zobeck (Open Design) *Gold Winner*

Best Art, Cover

  • Cthulhu by Gaslight (Chaosium Inc.) *Silver Winner*
  • Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Beginner Box (Paizo) *Gold Winner*

Best Game

  • Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Basic Game (Margaret Weis Productions) *Silver Winner*
  • Savage Worlds Deluxe (Pinnacle Entertainment Group) *Gold Winner*

Best RPG Related Product

  • Lords of Waterdeep (Wizards of the Coast) *Silver Winner*
  • Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design (Open Design) *Gold Winner*

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Michael Penkas Promoted to Black Gate Website Editor

Michael Penkas Promoted to Black Gate Website Editor

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michael-penkasWe are very pleased to announce that, effective August 15, Michael Penkas has been promoted to Black Gate Website editor.

Michael Penkas moved to Chicago in 2004 and since then has performed at various open mic events. He previously worked as a copy editor and general assistant for the long-running Twilight Tales book/reading series. His short stories have been published in Midnight Echo, One Buck Horror, Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader, and Shock Totem, among others.

Michael sold his first short story to Black Gate in 2011. His first blog post for us was a review of Brendan Detzner’s short story collection Scarce Resources in November of 2011; in the last few months he’s reviewed Matt Wagner’s Mage: The Hero Discovered, Ted Naifeh’s Courtney Crumrin and the Night Things, and Jonathan Carroll’s The Land of Laughs, among others.

Michael takes over from C.S.E. (Claire) Cooney, who was promoted to website editor in January of 2011. Claire’s relocation to Rhode Island — and the growing success of her recent books, including How to Flirt in Faerieland & Other Wild Rhymes — has left her less time for other activities. Claire brought enormous energy and drive to the role, and she attracted many new bloggers to our small community. She will be much missed, although she promises to continue to blog for us when time permits.

Michael Penkas has been working hard behind the scenes for the past few months as Assistant Website Editor, bringing a new level of professionalism to the blog. We are pleased and very proud to have him officially take over the reins as our new Website Editor.

For a complete list of the folks responsible for Black Gate, visit our Staff Page.

James Enge’s A Guile of Dragons Arrives

James Enge’s A Guile of Dragons Arrives

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a-guile-of-dragonsThe official on-sale date isn’t until August 24, but I’ve now received multiple reports that James Enge’s A Guile of Dragons has arrived in stores. It’s also available for purchase online. We can’t postpone the party any longer.

James Enge’s first published story “Turn Up This Crooked Way” — the tale that introduced Morlock the Maker to the world — was in Black Gate 8. Morlock appeared in virtually every issue of Black Gate for the next five years; his last appearance was the novella “Destroyer” in BG 14.

James’ first Morlock novel, Blood of Ambrose, was nominated for the World Fantasy Award in 2010. It was followed by This Crooked Way, which collected a dozen short stories, including all six published in Black Gate, and The Wolf Age. A Guile of Dragons is the fourth in the series, and the first new Morlock book in almost two years. As we reported back in February, it is Morlock’s origin story:

Before history began, the dwarves of Thrymhaiam fought against the dragons as the Longest War raged in the deep roads beneath the Northhold. Now the dragons have returned, allied with the dead kings of Cor and backed by the masked gods of Fate and Chaos.

The dwarves are cut off from the Graith of Guardians in the south. Their defenders are taken prisoner or corrupted by dragonspells. The weight of guarding the Northhold now rests on the crooked shoulders of a traitor’s son, Morlock syr Theorn (also called Ambrosius).

But his wounded mind has learned a dark secret in the hidden ways under the mountains. Regin and Fafnir were brothers, and the Longest War can never be over…

The gorgeous cover is by Steve Stone. Click on the image at right to see the complete wrap-around image in HD.

A Guile of Dragons is 320 pages in trade paperback, published by Pyr Books. It is $17.95, and has an official on-sale date of August 24. But if you find it for sale and whisk it home before then, we won’t tell anyone.

GenCon 2012 – Dungeons & Dragons Next Keynote Liveblog

GenCon 2012 – Dungeons & Dragons Next Keynote Liveblog

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Waiting for the D&D Next keynote to begin at GenCon 2012. Check it out on the big screen!
Waiting for the D&D Next keynote to begin at GenCon 2012. Check it out on the big screen!

For the first time in GenCon history, the week began with a keynote event on Thursday evening. And who gave the keynote? None other than the folks behind Dungeons & Dragons.

For the last several months, Dungeons & Dragons has been undergoing a transformation into their Dungeons & Dragons Next format (which they are loathe to officially call 5th edition).

The event was delayed a bit due to rain and venue change, but once things are moving, I’ll be liveblogging about the event. I know I won’t catch everything, but I’m sure there’ll be a link to video of the event online shortly and I’ll post it (and other background links) in an update over the next day or so, when I have more stable net access.

The Event Begins

7:25 pm – Peter Adkison, founder of Wizards of the Coast, runs onstage and discusses how this inaugural keynote came into being. Basically, Adkison strong-armed Greg Leeds (current CEO of Wizards of the Coast) into doing it, and made it clear that he expected Greg himself to get on stage and start the event off. So, with that ….

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