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Vintage Treasures: The Masters of Solitude by Marvin Kaye and Parke Godwin

Vintage Treasures: The Masters of Solitude by Marvin Kaye and Parke Godwin

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Marvin Kaye and Parke Godwin made a powerful combination in 1978. Kaye already had a growing reputation as an anthologist, with Fiends and Creatures (Popular Library, 1974) and Brother Theodore’s Chamber of Horrors (Pinnacle, 1974) under his belt; he would produce dozens more over the next 30 years, including Ghosts – A Treasury of Chilling Tales Old and New (Doubleday, 1981), Weird Tales, The Magazine That Never Dies (Doubleday, 1988), and The Fair Folk (Science Fiction Book Club, 2005). Parke Godwin was already an established novelist, with Darker Places (1973) and A Memory of Lions (1976); he would go on to win a World Fantasy Award for his 1981 novella “The Fire When It Comes,” and gained lasting recognition for his Firelord trilogy (the opening novel of which was also a World Fantasy Award nominee) and his Robin Hood novels Sherwood (1991) and Robin and the King (1993).

Their collaborative novel The Masters of Solitude was serialized in Galileo magazine in 1977/78, and published in hardcover by Doubleday in 1978. A postapocalyptic tale of two disparate cultures that are all that remains of humanity after a “great devastation,” it drew comparisons to Tolkien. It has been out of print since the 1985 Bantam paperback (above), but has a surprising 166 ratings on Goodreads, and some lively reviews.

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Vintage Treasures: Study War No More, edited by Joe Haldeman

Vintage Treasures: Study War No More, edited by Joe Haldeman

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By 1977 Joe Haldeman had already won three Hugo Awards, for his novella “Hero” (1972), his debut SF novel The Forever War, and his short story “Tricentennial” (1976), and one Nebula, also for The Forever War. He was a fast-rising star, and in November of that year he added the anthology Study War No More to his fast-growing SF catalog. It contained stories by some of the greatest SF writers of the time — including Poul Anderson, Harry Harrison, Isaac Asimov, George Alec Effinger, Damon Knight, and Mack Reynolds — that addressed the problem of war. Here a snippet from his introduction:

Fear of the atom was such an effective deterrent that it was over two weeks before war broke out again. A fellow with a wispy beard seized control of Hanoi. The editor of this anthology was in diapers when that happened; it lasted long enough to give him his first white hairs, and then five years more…

But why this anthology? The absurdity and outrage of war may be quite obvious, but trying to find a solution to it has occupied the energies of the race’s finest philosophers and poets for thousands of years, to no conspicious success.

Science fiction writers are generally renowned neither for the depth of their philosophy nor the fineness of their poetry, so isn’t it presumptuous of them to take on so formidable, yet subtle, an opponent? The answer is a duet: a soft “no,” and a loud “Hell, no!”

Haldeman was intimately familiar with war; he was a combat engineer in Vietnam who was wounded and received a Purple Heart. The inside cover of Study War No More addressed his experience, and how it had influenced his writing. Here it is.

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Witch World by Andre Norton

Witch World by Andre Norton

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Witch World 1963-smallThis isn’t merely an excercise in cross-promotion (it is that, just not only that), but also a chance to redress a failing in my reviews of Andre Norton’s Witch World books. Neither here at Black Gate nor back at my own site, Stuff I Like, have I ever actually written about the first book in the series, Witch World. Now that I’m a “special guest” on the just released episode of the Appendix N Book Club podcast about the book, I believe I have a responsibility to write it up, too.

I’ve written a fair amount about Andre Norton’s classic Witch World series over the past six years. So far, I’ve read five of the Estcarp books, two of the High Hallack books, and two collections of short stories. While several of the books are less than stellar, overall the series is terrific.

Sadly, instead of being one of the salient series from sword & sorcery of the 1960s and 70s, it’s a half-forgotten afterthought. While I want to say that that’s a savage indictment of the nature of contemporary readers, really it’s the lamentable reality of the fate of the vast sum of popular fiction, no matter how objectively good it is or how much we love it. All a fan can do is put it out there that these are good books, still worth reading, and hope for the best.

Born in 1912, Alice Mary Norton worked as a teacher, a librarian, and finally a reader for Gnome Press before becoming a full-time writer in 1958. By then she’d already had a dozen books published, including such classics as Star Man’s Son, 2250 A.D. and Star Rangers. Based on their easy style and simpler characterizations, most of her early books would probably be classified as YA today. It was with 1963’s Witch World that Norton first wrote a full-fledged sword & sorcery book, steeped in pulp gloriousness.

The opening of Witch World is straight out of a Third Man-style film noir. Some years after the close of WWII, Simon Tregarth is a disgraced ex-US Army Lieutenant Colonel and desperate black marketeer on the run from his own associates. He’s just killed two of them, but the worst and most dangerous is still hunting for him.

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Vintage Treasures: Copernick’s Rebellion by Leo A. Frankowski

Vintage Treasures: Copernick’s Rebellion by Leo A. Frankowski

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I don’t know much about Leo A. Frankowski. But when I saw his 1987 novel Copernick’s Rebellion on eBay, I knew I had to have it. It belongs to that peculiar sub-genre of science fiction my friends and I used to call, “Explore the universe and meet strange new aliens. And then ride them like a pony.”

Frankowski was an engineer who sold his first novel, The Cross-Time Engineer, to Del Rey in 1986. It became the opening book in a 7-volume series eventually known as the Adventures of Conrad Stargard, which also included The Flying Warlord (1989), Lord Conrad’s Lady (1990), and others. His other novels include A Boy and His Tank (1999) and The Fata Morgana (1999), both for Baen. He died in December 2008.

Virtually all of Frankowski’s work is out of print, and there aren’t a lot of publishers who would take a chance on him today. On his website he claimed “males with military and technical backgrounds often approach me as though I were something holy… [with an] excess of almost worship,” and famously identified those who disliked his work as “feminists, liberals, and homosexuals.” And anyone who objects to riding aliens like a pony, I’m willing to wager.

Copernick’s Rebellion was published by Del Rey in April 1987. It is 202 pages, priced at $2.95 in paperback. The cover art is by the great Ralph McQuarrie. It has been out of print since 1989, and there is no digital edition. See all our recent Vintage Treasures here.

Birthday Reviews: March Index

Birthday Reviews: March Index

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January index
February index

At the one quarter mark in our journey through the year, here’s a look back at the birthday reviews that appeared at Black Gate in March.

March 1, Wyman Guin: “Trigger Tide”
March 2, Ann Leckie: “The Unknown God”
March 3, Arthur Machen: “The Coming of the Terror ”
March 4, Patricia Kennealy-Morrison: “The Last Voyage”
March 5, Mike Resnick: “The Evening Line”
March 6, William F. Nolan: “Starblood”
March 7, Paul Preuss: “Rhea’s Time”
March 8, No Birthday Review published.
March 9, Pat Murphy: “On a Hot Summer Night in a Place Far Away”
March 10, Theodore Cogswell: “The Wall Around the World”
March 11, F.M. Busby: “Tundra Moss”
March 12, Harry Harrison: “The Mothballed Spaceship”

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Birthday Reviews: Elizabeth Hand’s “Calypso in Berlin”

Birthday Reviews: Elizabeth Hand’s “Calypso in Berlin”

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Cover by B. A. Bosaiya
Cover by B. A. Bosaiya

Elizabeth Hand was born on March 29, 1957.

She won the World fantasy Award and the Nebula Award for her novella “Last Summer at Mars Hill.” She has won an additional Nebula for her short story “Echo” and three more World Fantasy Awards for her novellas Ilyria and The Maiden Flight of McCauley’s Bellerophon, which was also a Hugo nominee.  Her collection Bibliomancy also earned her a World Fantasy Award. Hand received the James Tiptiree  Jr. Memorial Award and the Mythopoei Award for her novel Waking the Moon and she has won three Shirley Jackson Awards. Her stories “Pavane for a Prince of the Air” and “Cleopatra Brimstone” have both won the International Horror Guild Award.

“Calypso in Berlin” was originally published by Ellen Datlow in the July 13, 2005 issue of Sci Fiction. Paula Guran included it in her Best Paranormal Romance anthology the following year. It is included in Hand’s collection Saffron and Brimstone: Strange Stories. In 2007, the story was translated into German for publication in the Spring issue of Pandora.

In Greek mythology, Calypso was a nymph who lived on the island of Ogygia and kept Odysseus captive for seven years. Her name is a variation of the word “concealed.” In Elizabeth Hand’s “Calypso in Berlin,” the nymph has survived into the modern era and taken as her lover a man named Philip, whose business requires him to travel, so they only see each other occasionally. Philip is also married, which doesn’t particularly seem to bother Calypso.

When Philip ends their relationship, Calypso decides to relocate to Berlin, a city he loved. Once there, she realizes that Philip has become something of a muse to her, inspiring her paintings of him and without his presence, she can no longer paint. Using an old sweater of his and sympathetic magic, she draws him to her, regaining her muse. The magic Hand describes as Calypso ensures that he will always be in Berlin to inspire her feels very much in keeping with the motifs of Greek mythology.

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Space Pirates, Stowaways, and a New Frontier: Rich Horton on The Planet Strappers by Raymond Z. Gallun

Space Pirates, Stowaways, and a New Frontier: Rich Horton on The Planet Strappers by Raymond Z. Gallun

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Over at his website Strange at Ecbatan, Rich Horton continues to do excellent work highlighting books old and new. Check out his review of John Crowley’s new novel Ka earlier this week to see what I mean. Rich calls it “Wonderful… I feel humbled by my inability to truly capture the wonder of this book.”

Of course, for crusty old vintage paperback fans like myself, the real joy of Rich’s blog is in his almost whimsical selections of older titles. While he makes a focused effort to read the major new novels each year in preparation for Hugo voting (see his detailed thoughts on the 2018 Hugos here), when it comes to older books he seems perfectly content to review whatever library discard falls into his hands each week.

That gives his blog a delightfully unpredictable quality. No one in their right mind, for example, would review Raymond Z. Gallun’s The Planet Strappers, an undistinguished novel that was hurriedly forgotten a few short weeks after it appeared in 1961. But Rich would. You have to salute that kind of undaunted faith in the genre.

The truly marvelous thing about Rich’s exploration into the dimmest recesses of science fiction is how he manages to find so much genuine enjoyment in it all. And it ain’t generally due to the books. Rich has an almost unique ability to make fascinating connections between writers, pick up the nearly invisible threads of evolving tropes, and find enjoyment in the echoes of great ideas lost in muddled plot lines. A ridiculous plot, Rich has taught me, needn’t trouble you so much when it’s paired with a fascinating setting or a clever idea — especially when you can see how that idea was harvested and put to use years later by the writers that follow.

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Time Travelers, Witches, and Prophets: The Clingerman Files by Mildred Clingerman

Time Travelers, Witches, and Prophets: The Clingerman Files by Mildred Clingerman

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Last week I received an e-mail from someone named Mark Bradley. He said he’d gotten my address from Gordon Van Gelder, publisher of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and that he’d recently self-published a collection of stories written by his grandmother, Mildred Clingerman, in the 50’s, 60’s and early 70’s. It contained all of the stories from her 1961 collection A Cupful of Space as well as many unpublished works.

I remember Mildred Clingerman! I’d tracked down A Cupful of Space decades ago, and her name popped up frequently in the vintage science fiction magazines I obsess over. I asked Mark for more info, and this is what he sent me.

First off, Mildred is my grandmother on my mom’s side. A few years ago I was contacted about renewing a copyright on one of Mildred’s stories from a school book company. I started rooting around on the internet and saw that Mildred still had a fairly active following. During a visit to San Diego I saw my cousin who had a stack of old F&SF magazines that I had never seen. I talked to my mom about possibly re-releasing her stories because maybe there was still a fan base. My mom had a good many stories that had never been published and sent them to me. At some point I started talking to Gordon about publishing possibilities. We went down a road with a university press that didn’t work so I looked to self publish. I put the book together, my wife did the cover art, had it printed in Austin and here we are. My mother and I participated on a panel at the World Fantasy Convention in San Antonio and the reception was very gratifying. We are very excited about the project and our hope is to re-introduce Mildred to an entirely new audience as well as give long time fans some new stories.

This is exactly the kind of project we heartily endorse here at Black Gate, and I’m delighted to have the opportunity to showcase Mark’s new book The Clingerman Files.

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Birthday Reviews: Patricia C. Wrede’s “Rakiki and the Wizard”

Birthday Reviews: Patricia C. Wrede’s “Rakiki and the Wizard”

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Cover by Collette Slade
Cover by Collette Slade

Patricia C. Wrede was born on March 27, 1953. Her novel Calling on Dragons was nominated for a Mythopoeic Award for Best Children’s Fantasy and her story “Utensile Strength” was long-listed for the James Tiptree, Jr. Memorial Award.

“Rikiki and the Wizard” was written for the Liavek shared world series edited by Will Shetterly and Emma Bull. It appeared in the second volume, The Players of Luck, published in 1986. Wrede included the story in her collection Book of Enchantments and in Points of Departure: Liavek Stories, which collects Wrede and Pamela Dean’s Liavek stories.

Wrede tells a fable with the story of “Rikiki and the Wizard,” a pleasant take on a traditional lesson. Extremely powerful and lucky (for luck is magic in Liavek), the Wizard can never satisfy his need for fame and decides to trade his daughter Ryvenna to any god who will grant him the enduring fame he desires. In his hubris, the Wizard failed to consult with his daughter about this plan, which annoyed the gods, who feel that she should have some say in her own fate, and they agree to ignore his summons.

Rikiki, however, while a god, is also a blue chipmunk, with a short attention span about anything except his quest for nuts. Forgetting the bargain of the gods, Rikiki seeks out the Wizard and asks for nuts. While the Wizard tries to get rid of the chipmunk (causing the creation of the world’s geographic features, the way it happens in fables about gods), his daughter eventually gives Rikiki nuts.

Of course, there are different types of luck and different types of fame and in the end the Wizard gains his fame (although Wrede cleverly never gives him a name), and Ryvenna lives happily ever after.

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Vintage Treasures: Annals of Klepsis by R.A. Lafferty

Vintage Treasures: Annals of Klepsis by R.A. Lafferty

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I haven’t used Goodreads much, but I’m beginning to see that’s a mistake. It truly is a marvelous resource for those looking for a wide range of opinions about books — especially those that have been out of print for decades. For example, here’s a small sample of reviews for R. A. Lafferty’s gonzo space-pirate novel Annals of Klepsis, published as an Ace paperback original in 1983. First up is Andrew:

A surrealistic apocalypse from a master of surreal apocalyptic fantasy. Lafferty’s novels function with the logic of a Bugs Bunny cartoon written by Kafka.

Astonishing how on-point that is a 2-sentence review. Here’s a snippet from a much more in-depth review by Printable Tire.

The book’s setting is sort of a blend of science fiction, in that it takes place on another planet, with “zap guns” (not called that) and everything, and fantasy, in the way Alice in Wonderland is fantasy. The very loose sprawling story takes place on Klepsis, a pirate planet, who for the last 200 hundred years has been in a state of pre-history, a state of legend. One of the thousands of things Lafferty postulates is that all pre-history and pre-legend does not take place in linear time, but because it is pre-history it all takes place at the same time; thus Hercules was a contemporary of Achilles, and thus the proportion of ghosts in this book.

And finally, here’s a sample from my favorite Goodreads review, from Raymond St.

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