Browsed by
Category: Series Fantasy

Death Angel’s Shadow by Karl Edward Wagner

Death Angel’s Shadow by Karl Edward Wagner

Comments 13 comments
Best Kane cover ever – by Stan Zagorski
Best Kane cover ever – by Stan Zagorski

I’ve read  Karl Edward Wagner‘s Death Angel’s Shadow (1973), with its three stories of Kane, the Mystic Swordsman, numerous times since first finding it in my attic in the 1970s. Before Conan’s or Elric’s, Kane’s adventures sparked my interest in swords & sorcery. Only a few years ago, I wrote a long piece about Wagner and this book over at my site, Swords & Sorcery: A Blog. I figured it was time to give it a reread and review here at Black Gate.

For the uninitiated, Kane is, in Wagner’s own words, a villain-hero. Cursed with immortality, over the course of his career he’s been an evil wizard, a crime lord, a bandit, and the general of a demon cult’s army. Sometimes he’s up against someone more diabolical than he is, but he’s never the good guy, never the hero.

This description of him gives you a sense of the wrongness that clings to him even when he’s not embarked on some nefarious plan:

It was his eyes that bothered Troylin. He had noticed them from the first. It was to be expected, for Kane’s eyes were the eyes of Death! They were blue eyes, but eyes that glowed with their own light. In those cold blue gems blazed the fires of blood madness, of the lust to kill and destroy. They poured forth infinite hatred of life and promised violent ruin to those who sought to meet them. Troylin caught an image of that powerful body striding over a battlefield, killer’s eyes blazing and red sword dealing carnage to all before it.

The three Kane novels, Darkness Weaves, Bloodstone, and Dark Crusade, are decent enough, but it’s in the short stories that Wagner’s immense talents shine most brightly. Two years ago I reviewed the collection, Night Winds (1978) at Black Gate. That book contains some of the best and darkest S&S stories ever set to paper. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

…

Read More Read More

Adventures In Shape-Shifting: Robert Stallman’s The Orphan

Adventures In Shape-Shifting: Robert Stallman’s The Orphan

Comments 2 comments

The Orphan Robert Stallman-smallI write this on an emotional high, a plateau from which I never wish to descend, for I’ve just managed the impossible: I’ve gone back in time. The vehicle employed? A book, prose, a worn paperback. It’s Robert Stallman’s The Orphan.

I first encountered this title somewhere in the Dark Ages, probably around 1980. I re-read it perhaps two years later, along with its two sequels, The Captive and The Beast. Even though large swaths of plot have faded from my mind over the years, I have never, ever forgotten the book’s opening lines.

I am and will be. There is no time when I am not.

This is the first lesson.

My need creates myself.

This is the second lesson.

Alone is safe.

This is the third lesson.

I’ve spent the last thirty-five years considering those quotes (and the ideas behind them), polishing each like a gem-cutter finishing off a jewel. I’ve road-tested them, too, as a survival mechanism when, in my earliest teens, I tried out (as actors might try a cape) the attitude of Kipling’s cat, the one that walked by himself. It was necessary, in a way, but also foppish, affected. Even so, I found in The Orphan echoes of that chilly, solo stance — the same adopted in Westerns by virtually every gunslinger known, from Joel McRae to John Wayne and back again.

So once upon a time, my time, these lines held great personal weight. They were talismans, of a sort, and in picking up this gorgeous, dangerous title afresh, I was face to face with my past and the self I have since become.

For a moment, I had to look away.

…

Read More Read More

Future Treasures: The Fifth Season, by N.K. Jemisin

Future Treasures: The Fifth Season, by N.K. Jemisin

Comments 5 comments

The Fifth Season Jemisin-smallIn 2010 I attended a reading at Wiscon, Madison’s premiere SF convention. One of the readers was a relative unknown named N.K. Jemisin, whose first novel, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, was still five months from release. There were many talented readers in the room, but the moment Jemisin began reading it became apparent that she was something very special. Her voice was sure, her prose sparkled, and the story grabbed your attention instantly. I enjoy a lot of things about this hobby, but there’s nothing else quite like stumbling upon a stellar new talent.

If you were one of the early readers of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, you probably have an idea how it felt to be sitting in that room in Madison. In the last five years Jemisin has been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, Tiptree, Crawford, and Gemmell awards — she’s no longer a “new” talent, and expectations for her latest book run very high indeed. But if you still enjoy the thrill of the new, you can get in on the ground floor of a brand new fantasy series from N.K. Jemisin when Orbit releases The Fifth Season, the first volume of The Broken Earth, in early August.

This is the Way the World Ends. For the Last Time.

A season of endings has begun.

It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world’s sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun.

It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter.

It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester.

This is the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where the power of the earth is wielded as a weapon. And where there is no mercy.

The Fifth Season will be published by Orbit on August 4, 2015. It is 512 pages, priced at $15.99 in trade paperback and $9.99 for the digital edition.

New Treasures: Legends of the Duskwalker by Jay Posey

New Treasures: Legends of the Duskwalker by Jay Posey

Comments 0 Comment
Legends of the Duskwalker Three-small Legends of the Duskwalker Morningside Fall-small Legends of the Duskwalker Dawnbreaker-small

Jay Posey’s writing career is rich and varied, and he’s had more success than the vast majority of writers of his generation… but that doesn’t mean you’re likely to have heard of him. That’s because Posey is primarily a videogame writer. As the Senior Narrative Designer at Red Storm Entertainment, he’s spent over eight years writing for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon and Rainbow Six franchises, and his stories have been enjoyed by millions of fans around the world.

For his first novel Three, the opening book in the Legends of the Duskwalker series, Posey tried his hand at a futuristic weird western, and succeeded in reaching a brand new audience. Set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, the series features augmented humans, advanced weaponry, cyborgs, and dangerous creatures known as the Weir.

…

Read More Read More

Vintage Treasures: The Dream Lords by Adrian Cole

Vintage Treasures: The Dream Lords by Adrian Cole

Comments 5 comments
The Dream Lords 1 A Plague of Nightmares-small The Dream Lords 2 Lord of Nightmares-small The Dream Lords 3 Bane of Nightmares-small

I don’t often hear of fantasy described as “In the tradition of Tolkien and Lovecraft!” Just seems like an odd mix to me. But that’s exactly how Adrian Cole’s first three novels, collectively known as The Dream Lords trilogy, are described.

Cole is a British writer also known for his four-volume Omaran Saga, and his more recent trilogy The Voidal, which Fletcher Vredenburgh called “an endless collection of interesting settings: universe-sized dimensions; monster-infested pocket worlds; a realm filled not with planets but islands that float in space.” But I was first introduced to him with The Dream Lords, which he reportedly wrote after reading Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings while working in a library in the mid-seventies.

Interestingly, this series has no second volume. It has a first volume, A Plague of Nightmares, and two third volumes, Lord of Nightmares and Bane of Nightmares, but no second volume. That’s cool.

…

Read More Read More

The Omnibus Volumes of Steven Brust: The Adventures of Vlad Taltos

The Omnibus Volumes of Steven Brust: The Adventures of Vlad Taltos

Comments 11 comments
The Book of Jhereg-small The Book of Taltos-small The Book of Athyra-small


The omnibus editions of The Adventures of Vlad Taltos from Ace Books, collecting
the first seven volumes: The Book of Jhereg (1999), The Book of Taltos (2002), and
The Book of Athyra (2003). Covers by Stephen Hickamn, Kinuko Y. Craft, Ciruelo Cabral

Steven Brust’s Vlad Taltos novels are unique in modern fantasy. They’re caper novels in which a supremely gifted assassin, Vlad Taltos, teams up with a group of like-minded companions (including pickpockets and vampires) to right wrongs, alter the course of destiny, and sometimes make a little coin. The odds are always against them, and things don’t always go their way, but Vlad, our protagonist and narrator, has a wry and self-deprecating sense of humor that makes the books highly entertaining. There are plenty of great reviews out there I could point you to, but one of my favorites is this concise one-paragraph bit from Amazon reviewer Wizard’s Apprentice:

Vlad is a human in a city dominated by eight-foot Dragaerans, who never have to shave and live to be a thousand. It’s their turf, and their rules, and they routinely conquer and abuse “Easterners” like Vlad. He’s not the type to take this, so he becomes a “Jhereg” assassin, working up the ranks of a criminal syndicate until he comes to boss dozens of Dragaerans around, befriending some and terrorizing others. He adopts a new-hatched mini-dragon or jhereg, finding that the cat-sized beast has a humanlike intelligence and a nasty sense of humor, and wins a grudging respect from the dominant species. All his friends are 900 years old, or undead vampires, or legendary thieves; but don’t hold it against them. Vlad solves mysteries and evades death, and cooks fiery fungus-laced omelets, in a bizarre semi-alien milieu. He finds love. He sharpens knives. He gloomily bandages his jhereg bites. He’d be right at home in a Zelazny novel, which is reason enough to buy this or any other Brust book.

…

Read More Read More

Future Treasures: Thrones & Bones: Nightborn by Lou Anders

Future Treasures: Thrones & Bones: Nightborn by Lou Anders

Comments 0 Comment

Thrones & Bones Nightborn-smallLou Anders sent ripples through the entire industry last September when he stepped down as the Editorial Director at Pyr, where he’d launched one of the most successful and acclaimed new SF and fantasy imprints in a decade. What could possibly lure Lou away from such a stellar career? The breakout success of his first novel, Thrones & Bones: Frostborn, a middle-grade fantasy that was the start of an exciting new series. The second volume, Nightborn, finally arrives next month.

Karn Korlundsson is a gamer. Not a riddle solver. But in order to rescue his best friend, Thianna Frostborn, he will need to travel to the faraway city of Castlebriar (by wyvern), learn how to play a new board game called Charioteers (not a problem), decipher the Riddle of the Horn, and tangle with mysterious elves.

Meet Desstra. She’s in training to join the Underhand — the elite agents of the dark elves. When she crosses paths with Karn, she is not all that she appears to be.

Everyone is chasing after the horn of Osius, an ancient artifact with the power to change the world. The lengths to which Karn will go in the name of friendship will be sorely tested. Who knew that solving a riddle could be so deadly?

In an article for Black Gate last August Lou described his ambitions for Thrones & Bones, saying “I set out to build a world that would invoke all the sense of wonder I’d experienced myself as a reader, as large in scope and scale as Nehwon, or Greyhawk, or the Young Kingdoms.” Those ambitions are very clear in Nightborn, which also includes instructions for playing the game Charioteers featured in the novel.

Thrones & Bones: Nightborn will be published by Crown Books for Young Readers on July 14, 2015. It is 351 pages, priced at $16.99 in hardcover and $10.99 for the digital edition. Cover by Justin Gerard. Check out ThronesandBones.com for additional games, maps, character profiles, and more.

The Novels of Tanith Lee: The Secret Books of Paradys

The Novels of Tanith Lee: The Secret Books of Paradys

Comments 11 comments
The Book of the Damned Tanith Lee-small The Book of the Beast Tanith Lee-small The Book of the Dead Tanith Lee-small The Book of the Mad Tanith Lee-small

We’re continuing with our look at the extraordinary 40-year career of Tanith Lee, who passed away on May 24th. We started with The Wars of Vis trilogy and her acclaimed Tales From the Flat Earth, and today we turn to her four-volume saga, The Secret Books of Paradys, published in the US by The Overlook Press between 1990-1993, with a striking series of covers by Wayne Barlowe (above).

Matthew David Surridge wrote a fine summary of the entire series for us two years ago, and I doubt I could do a better job of summarizing them than he did:

The fictive city of Paradys itself seems to accrue layers of meaning and complexity like a recurring landscape in a lucid dream. Above all, the books are weird with the weirdness of nightmare; though written with incredible technical skill, it’s difficult to articulate a single overall theme to the books, though multiple meanings suggest themselves.

Paradys is a city in northern France, originally a Roman settlement based around the exoploitation of soon-played-out silver mines. It developed over time into a major city, with a cathedral and taverns and damned poets and all the appurtenances of decadent gothic romance. The various stories of Paradys take place in different eras of the city’s life, told from different perspectives, using different styles. They’re linked by certain patterns of imagery — notably the ambiguous symbol of the moon — and a concentration on colour: each book, or long story, has a certain colour which defines it, and all colour-references within that story will refer either to white, black, or that specific hue. I can only imagine how difficult that technique is, but it’s incredibly effective at building distinct and distinctive atmospheres…

…

Read More Read More

New Treasures: Dave vs. The Monsters by John Birmingham

New Treasures: Dave vs. The Monsters by John Birmingham

Comments 0 Comment
Dave vs. the Monsters Emergence-small Dave vs. the Monsters Resistance-small Dave vs. the Monsters Ascendance-small

I’m not sure what to make of this new trend of releasing an entire trilogy in two months. In my day, you had to wait years for all three novels in a fantasy trilogy. And the publisher never told you when the last book was coming out because, hell, they didn’t know. Nobody knew. You just walked back and forth to the bookstore every single week, dutifully checking. In the snow. Uphill, both ways. And we liked it that way.

Kids today, they don’t know what waiting is. Take the new fantasy trilogy by John Birmingham, Dave vs. The Monsters, for example. The first volume, Emergence, was released on April 28, and the second one, Resistance, on June 2. And just in case that five week wait between volumes was too traumatic for you, Del Rey is releasing the final volume, Ascendance, just four weeks later, on June 30.

You’re spoiled rotten. You know that, right?

…

Read More Read More

Future Treasures: Iron and Blood by Gail Z. Martin and Larry N. Martin

Future Treasures: Iron and Blood by Gail Z. Martin and Larry N. Martin

Comments 2 comments

Iron and Blood-smallGail Z. Martin is the author of Chronicles of the Necromancer, The Ascendant Kingdoms Saga, and Deadly Curiosities, among other fine novels of heroic fantasy. Her first collaboration with Larry N. Martin was “Airship Down: A Sound and Fury Adventure,” a short story in Patricia Bray and Joshua Palmatier’s 2014 anthology Clockwork Universe: Steampunk vs Aliens.

That apparently worked out well, because the husband and wife writing team has launched a new series together: The Jake Desmet Adventures. The first installment, Iron & Blood, is due next month from Solaris. And it looks pretty darned interesting.

New Pittsburgh, 1898 –- a crucible of invention and intrigue. Born from the ashes of devastating fire, flood and earthquake, the city is ruled by the shadow government of The Oligarchy. In the swarming streets, people of a hundred nations drudge to feed the engines of progress, while in the abandoned tunnels beneath the city, supernatural creatures hide from the light, emerging only to feed.

Jake Desmet and Rick Brand travel the world to secure treasures and unusual items for the collections of wealthy patrons, accompanied by Jake’s cousin, Veronique LeClerque. But when their latest commission leads to Jake’s father’s murder, the three friends are drawn into a conspiracy where dark magic, industrial sabotage and the monsters that prey on the night will ultimately threaten not just New Pittsburgh, but the whole world.

Iron and Blood will be published by Solaris on July 7, 2015. It is 432 pages, priced at $9.99 in paperback and $7.99 for the digital edition. Read more at the Solaris website.