Black Gate – Page 1053 – Adventures in Fantasy Literature

Lynne M. Thomas steps down as Editor of Apex Magazine

Thursday, September 12, 2013 John ONeill Comments 0 Comment

Lynne M. Thomas has resigned as editor of Apex Magazine, effective at the end of the year. She made the announcement yesterday on the Apex blog:

While the past two years of editing Apex Magazine have been deeply satisfying both personally and professionally, I will be stepping down as the Editor-in-Chief of Apex Magazine after the December 2013 issue. I’m in need of break, after which I’m looking forward to exploring new opportunities and projects. Managing Editor Michael Damian Thomas will be stepping down with me.

Publisher Jason Sizemore plans on continuing the magazine. Michael and I are working closely with the incoming editor to ensure a smooth transition…

I’d especially like to thank our contributors and readers. You’ve embraced us, and I just want to hug you all back. When we took over, we had no idea that the magazine would grow the way it did. We didn’t expect two Hugo Award nominations.

Lynn has edited Apex since issue 30, when she took the reins from Catherynne M. Valente. The new editor has not been announced.

…

Read More Read More

Win One of Five Copies of King of Chaos by Dave Gross

Thursday, September 12, 2013 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

It’s time to give away some books.

Black Gate has five copies of the brand new Pathfinder Tales book from Dave Gross, author of Prince of Wolves, Master of Devils, and Queen of Thorns, compliments of the great folks at Paizo Publishing. And we want to get them into your hands.

To avoid the usual methods of selecting winners (hand-to-hand combat, best impromptu rendition of Aragon’s speech at the Black Gate of Mordor, etc.), we’ve decided to award the copies to five randomly-selected qualifying entrants. How do you qualify? Easy! Just send us a one-paragraph review of your favorite Pathfinder product, novel, or short story.

Unfamiliar with Pathfinder? No problem! You can check out the latest right here at Black Gate — including the first chapters of both King of Chaos and Queen of Thorns, Bill Ward’s complete four-part story “The Box,” and the 4-part mini-epic “The Walkers from the Crypt” by Howard Andrew Jones. If you want to try a complete novel, may we suggest Howard’s Plague of Shadows, or Tim Pratt’s Liar’s Blade?

You can read Dave’s introduction to King of Chaos here, and his free stories “Killing Time” and “The Lost Pathfinder” at Paizo.com. In fact, check out the complete collection of free Pathfinder Tales web fiction, with stories from Elaine Cunningham, Richard Ford, Tim Pratt, Ari Marmell, Robin D. Laws, James L. Sutter, Monte Cook, Ed Greenwood, Erik Mona, Richard Lee Byers, and many others.

To enter our contest, just send an e-mail to john@blackgate.com with the title “King of Chaos,” and your one-paragraph entry, before October 1, 2013.

All entries become the property of New Epoch Press. No purchase necessary. Must be 12 or older. Decisions of the judges (capricious as they may be) are final. Terms and conditions subject to change. Sorry, US entrants only. Not valid where prohibited by law. Eat your vegetables.

New Treasures: Wisp of a Thing by Alex Bledsoe

Wednesday, September 11, 2013 John ONeill Comments 3 comments

I caught Alex Bledsoe reading from Wisp of a Thing at a small Chicago convention earlier this year, and was immediately riveted. Seriously, if you get the chance, ask Alex to come to your house and read the first chapter. Or just stop him when you run into him at the mall, and impose on him to read a few pages. You won’t regret it (though you may have to buy him lunch).

The first volume in the series, The Hum and the Shiver — which gets my vote for best book title of 2011 — was named one of the Best Fiction Books of 2011 by Kirkus Reviews. The second, Wisp of a Thing, takes us back to the isolated hollows of the Smoky Mountains for another spooky tale of music and very old magic.

Touched by a very public tragedy, musician Rob Quillen comes to Cloud County, Tennessee, in search of a song that might ease his aching heart. All he knows of the mysterious and reclusive Tufa is what he has read on the internet: they are an enigmatic clan of swarthy, black-haired mountain people whose historical roots are lost in myth and controversy. Some people say that when the first white settlers came to the Appalachians centuries ago, they found the Tufa already there. Others hint that Tufa blood brings special gifts.

Rob finds both music and mystery in the mountains. Close-lipped locals guard their secrets, even as Rob gets caught up in a subtle power struggle he can’t begin to comprehend. A vacationing wife goes missing, raising suspicions of foul play, and a strange feral girl runs wild in the woods, howling in the night like a lost spirit.

Change is coming to Cloud County, and only the night wind knows what part Rob will play when the last leaf falls from the Widow’s Tree… and a timeless curse must be broken at last.

Alex’s article on the Appalachian fantasy of Manly Wade Wellman, “How I Discovered Silver John,” appeared at Tor.com back in March. He is the author of the Eddie LaCrosse novels The Sword-Edged Blonde, Dark Jenny, Wake of the Bloody Angel and Burn Me Deadly.

Wisp of a Thing was published by Tor Books on June 18. It is 349 pages, priced at $25.99 in hardcover and $12.99 for the digital version.

Vintage Treasures: The List of 7 by Mark Frost

Tuesday, September 10, 2013 John ONeill Comments 25 comments

I love buying paperback collections. Like this one, which I found online last week. Just look at at all those gorgeous vintage paperbacks. Seriously, click on that link and look at them. I’ll wait.

Twenty-eight volumes in terrific shape, for less than twenty bucks. Including four early volumes from Neal Barrett, Jr; three vintage Lovecraft collections (one of them The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath); both Ballantine volumes of William Hope Hodgson’s The Night Land; one of Lin Carter’s better fantasy collections, Imaginary Worlds; A. Merritt’s The Moon Pool; a smattering of Ursula K. LeGuin, plus C.S. Lewis, Clark Ashton Smith, Ray Bradbury, Edgar Rice Burroughs, John Bellairs, and half a dozen more. There’s even a beautiful copy of Sherlock Holmes Through Time and Space, which I’ve lusted after ever since Violette Malan teased me with the cover in her article on science fiction mysteries last month.

Man, I could just lay these babies down on the floor and roll around in ’em. Except that would probably dog ear the covers.

They finally arrived today, carefully packed in tightly wrapped plastic, and I gently unwrapped them and settled in to examine my new treasures. Many clamored for attention, but the one that practically jumped into my hands was The List of 7, by Mark Frost. That’s the inside front cover above, complete with mummies, gruesome spectres, ghosts, a train chase, and — speaking of Sherlock Holmes — the words “The Game’s Afoot” scrawled on parchment (click for a bigger version).

…

Read More Read More

Challenging the Classics: Questioning the Arbitrary Browsing Mechanism

Tuesday, September 10, 2013 Foz Meadows Comments 10 comments

On what basis, really, do we choose the books we read?

Imagine you’re given a voucher to spend at your favourite bookstore, the value of which is sufficient that, in addition to picking up whichever must-have titles from your favourite authors you’ve been desperate to get your hands on, you’re able to grab some new things, too. The store is well-stocked, you have all day to browse, and a keen desire to spend your voucher all at once, just for the sheer satisfaction of going home with as many books as possible.

So how do you decide what to buy?

Actually, scrap that: there’s a more important question to ask first. Namely: how do you decide what to contemplate buying? Because regardless of how much free time you have or how broad your tastes, it’s highly unlikely you’ll give equal attention to every book on offer. For whatever reason – or sometimes, given the automatic, reflexive nature of our deeper mental processes, for no real reason at all – in a sea of unknown titles and unfamiliar authors, certain works will nonetheless catch our eye. The font, the cover image, the colour scheme, the title; even the author’s name is sometimes enough to have us reaching for one equally unknown story over another, and if the blurb or first page looks promising, too, then why not give it a try? I’ve certainly bought books that way, and while the resulting purchases can be hit and miss, the act of experimentation is always fun.

But there are different gradations of unfamiliarity. Some books we flirt with over time, never quite sure when we’ll finally take the plunge, but ghosting their spines with our fingertips in the interim – a preemptory possession. Other books are so ubiquitous, their titles and themes infest our consciousness, forcing us – sometimes against our better judgement, but more often in keeping with our desire to exercise it fairly – to see what all the fuss is about. There are books we’ve heard about from trusted sources, titles we’ve seen reviewed by favorite blogs or which our friends have raved over; but also books that have caused a stir, whose reviews have been mixed or strident enough that we want to read them just to see which opinion feels right, or to join in the conversation as it happens.

…

Read More Read More

(Not) Recommending SF&F Classics to the Young Person or Novice

Monday, September 9, 2013 M Harold Page Comments 22 comments

We’ve all done it: “Oh you want to read some Fantasy or SF? Here, how about some Lord Dunsany or E.E. Doc Smith?”

And the books vanish for months, then get returned by the shamefaced borrower: “Couldn’t really get into them. Sorry.”

I’m probably typical. My much-loved genre classics are the equivalent of a warm bath, not a subject for literary criticism.

Until recently, that is.

My son – “Kurtzhau” – is 9, at the tail end of Middle Grade. He loves some of the rip-roaring YA novels that are knocking around – Percy Jackson and Time Riders, for example (the Pulp tradition is un-self-consciously alive and well in YA). However, he craves proper stories with swords and/or soldiers and lasers in them. Powered armor is also good.

And that’s a problem. Nobody seems to be writing the mainstream subgenres for YA.

Helpful mates recommend all sorts of adult novels, but often forget that the dénouement – say – takes place in a brothel staffed by surgically modified aliens and that the antagonists are incestuous twins.

That leaves the classics; either mid-20th century YA such as Andre Norton or earlier “Pulp” yarns which were constrained by pre-WWII decency codes; the stuff I grew up on, the stuff that still crams my shelves…

The stuff of which Kurtzhau inevitably bounces. Here’s why.

…

Read More Read More

Blogging Arak 9: Adventure on the High Seas

Monday, September 9, 2013 Nick Ozment Comments 3 comments

With the return of Roy Thomas to the scripting helm, Arak issue 9 has our protagonists Arak and Valda resuming their quest to rescue Malagigi from his demonic imprisonment in far-off White Cathay. After having rescued Pope Hadrian and having rid the world of one Black Pope, our stalwart heroes are set for some adventure on the high seas. It’s time for a one-off pirate tale, but one in which Thomas manages to work in Vesuvius and an encounter with the lost souls of Pompeii.

Arak is about fed up with cities: “He-No take me — I’ll be glad when we’re done with the cities of your world, and I can take to the forests again.”

But first they have to pay a visit to Neapel (modern-day Naples) to find Pope Hadrian’s friend Gallio, who can provide them passage to Byzantium. The Holy Bishop of Rome told them that they would know Gallio by the ring he wears, “which shows two hands grasping but a single cross.”

As with every past arrival at a new city, the first signs are ominous. People are packing up and leaving the port in droves, because “there’s no longer work there for free laborers — or honest seamen!”

They soon discover the reason: Gallio’s ship is now manned mostly by slaves. When they begin inquiring down at the bay, two “lecherous merchants” immediately hone in on Valda, because, as Thomas narrates, “Alas, however, in these unenlightened days, the presence of an attractive woman on the docks usually has but one meaning for the sea-rovers of Neapel…”

Need I tell you how their pawing at her ends? With her knife at the throat of one, of course, and the other one nearly skewered like the pig he is. Their lives are spared, though, in exchange for pointing the way to Gallio’s ship.

…

Read More Read More

The Black Fire Concerto & the Monsters of Memory

Monday, September 9, 2013 Mike Allen Comments 2 comments

I love monsters. Don’t we all?

When it comes to monsters, one of the best things about writing dark fantasy fiction is that it gives you a chance to build your own.

My first novel, The Black Fire Concerto, is packed with monsters. Black Gate overlord John O’Neill has generously invited me to talk about where my creatures came from, in the spirit of the Monstrous Posts on Monsters series I wrote many moons ago for all you denizens of the shadowlands.

The world of The Black Fire Concerto has been ravaged by a ghoul plague (though one could argue that’s the least of its problems.)

My ghouls are yet another riff on the zombie motif (now, now, no need to roll your eyes, just hear me out.) Most zombie plagues in film and in books pay a lip service of sorts to science fiction – the agent that gets dead flesh moving again is a virus, or an alien undeath ray, or something cut from that pseudo-scientific cloth.

Zombie epidemics have become so pervasive in popular culture, at least here in the U.S., that we only need a little hand-waving in the direction of chemical weapons and government conspiracies to suspend our disbelief – never mind that basic biology tells us the concept is ridiculous.

…

Read More Read More

Andre Norton, Michael Moorcock and Appendix N: Advanced Readings in D&D

Monday, September 9, 2013 John ONeill Comments 20 comments

And so we come to two of the most influential and prolific fantasy writers of the 20th Century, Andre Norton and Michael Moorcock, as we follow intrepid literary explorers Mordicai and Tim Callahan on their voyage of discovery through Appendix N at Tor.com.

Tim and Mordicai have been none too gentle to some of the writers in Appendix N, including L. Sprague de Camp, Gardner Fox, and even Roger Zelazny. But in Norton and Moorcock, they find authors they can appreciate.

Here’s Tim on Michael Moorcock:

I read The Swords Trilogy and The Chronicles of Corum early, and they made an impact. They exploded inside my mind in a way I have never forgotten, even if I can’t remember many of the story details from any particular chapter… but I didn’t really feel like I tuned into Elric until halfway through the first reprint volume, when we get the four novellas of Stormbringer…

It’s classic Moorcock, in that imaginative and terrifyingly evocative way that I loved all those years ago when I first picked up The Swords Trilogy off a spinner rack in my hometown general store. Stormbringer begins with agents of chaos abducting Elric’s wife, and it takes off into the realm of mass warfare and conflicts with not-quite-dead-gods soon enough.

Moorcock aims for the mythic.

Read the complete article here.

Good to see a little love for classic sword & sorcery, but personally I don’t see a lot of direct influence from Elric on D&D — unless you count the section on powerful artifacts in the Dungeon Masters Guide, which clearly was conceived with weapons like Stormbringer in mind.

…

Read More Read More

Black Gate Online Fiction: “The Dowry” by Peadar Ó Guilín

Sunday, September 8, 2013 John ONeill Comments 3 comments

In which the young lover Fiachra learns it is unwise to seduce a wizard’s daughter… particularly in a wizard’s garden.

Fiachra woke on a bed of straw surrounded by snuffling animals and a melange of stenches that made his eyes water. A boy of maybe eight crouched at a safe distance under a flickering rush light.

“My eyes,” thought Fiachra. He tried to rub them, but could not. Color had leached from his vision, as though he were still under moonlight in the wizard’s garden. The boy, the straw, even the rush light seemed grey to him.

He tried to speak, to ask where he was. Only a whine emerged.

The boy approached and gingerly extended a hand. “Good doggy,” he said, “nice doggy.”

It was then Fiachra realised the awful truth. The garden! What had he done? How had he been so stupid? He howled and howled until a man came to whip him. After, he spent the night whimpering with only the boy’s arms around him for comfort.

Peadar’s first story for us was “The Mourning Trees” (Black Gate 5), followed by “Where Beauty Lies in Wait” (BG 11) and “The Evil Eater” (BG 13), which Serial Distractions called “a lovely little bit of Lovecraftian horror that still haunts me to this day.”

Peadar’s first novel, The Inferior, was published to terrific reviews in 2008; it was followed a sequel, The Deserter, in 2012.

The complete catalog of Black Gate Online Fiction, including stories by Dave Gross, Mike Allen, Paul Abbamondi, Vaughn Heppner, Mark Rigney, Aaron Bradford Starr, Martha Wells, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, E.E. Knight, C.S.E. Cooney, Howard Andrew Jones, and many others, is here.

“The Dowry” is a complete 4,700-word short story of adventure fantasy offered at no cost.

Read the complete story here.