Ellsworth’s Cinema of Swords: The Sign of the Z!

Ellsworth’s Cinema of Swords: The Sign of the Z!

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The Mark of Zorro (1940)

November 27, 1920, a century ago plus a few weeks, saw the release of Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.’s The Mark of Zorro, and the beginning of the swashbuckler film as we know it. There was a lot more Zorro to follow, some of it very good indeed, so this week we’re looking at the early post-silent career of the Masked Man in Black.

The Mark of Zorro

Rating: ***** (Essential)
Origin: USA, 1940
Director: Rouben Mamoulian
Source: Fox Studio Classics DVD

Tyrone Power’s family had been on the stage for generations, and he considered himself a serious actor. He finally broke into the movies in the mid-1930s and became a popular leading man for 20th Century Fox in parts both serious and not-so-serious. Meanwhile Warner Bros. was making a pile from Errol Flynn’s swashbucklers; though Fox didn’t have Flynn, they did have Power, and Darryl F. Zanuck decided Power was going to be Fox’s sword-slinging hero. To launch him in that new role they chose to remake The Mark of Zorro, the film that had launched Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.’s swashbuckling career. It wasn’t the kind of part Power really wanted to play, but he dutifully agreed, and the result was a classic that typecast him, rightly or wrongly, for the rest of his career.

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New Treasures: The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry by C. M. Waggoner

New Treasures: The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry by C. M. Waggoner

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C. M. Waggoner’s debut novel was Unnatural Magic (which we covered here almost exactly a year ago). Her latest, published last month by Ace, is set in the same world. I admit I’m very intrigued by the description for The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry, the tale of a down-and-out fire witch and a young gentlewoman who team up to stop a deadly conspiracy.

Dellaria Wells, petty con artist, occasional thief, and partly educated fire witch, is behind on her rent in the city of Leiscourt — again. Then she sees the “wanted” sign, seeking Female Persons, of Martial or Magical ability, to guard a Lady of some Importance, prior to the celebration of her Marriage. Delly fast-talks her way into the job and joins a team of highly peculiar women tasked with protecting their wealthy charge from unknown assassins.

Delly quickly sets her sights on one of her companions, the confident and well-bred Winn Cynallum. The job looks like nothing but romance and easy money until things take a deadly (and undead) turn. With the help of a bird-loving necromancer, a shapeshifting schoolgirl, and an ill-tempered reanimated mouse named Buttons, Delly and Winn are determined to get the best of an adversary who wields a twisted magic and has friends in the highest of places.

Come on, I know that description is like nothing else you’ve ever read. (Romance, undead, and a reanimated mouse named Buttons! That’s a winning combo right there.) Martin Cahill at Tor.com is very taken with this book:

Waggoner’s characters absolutely shine… Agatha Christie in design and Pratchett-esque in execution… The plot… is [a] daring sequence of events that kept me enthralled and rooted to my seat for hours on end. A protection job turns into a murder mystery, turns into a revenge quest, turns into a courtship, turns into something like Breaking Bad by way of “let’s burn it down from the inside,” and ends up somewhere around the end of a Shakespearean comedy and tragedy combined.

The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry was published by Ace Books on January 12, 2021. It is 384 pages, priced at $17 in trade paperback and $11.99 in digital formats. The cover art and design is by Jess Cruickshank. Read the complete first chapter at Tor.com.

See all our coverage of the best new science fiction and fantasy right here.

Harsh Writing Advice (™)

Harsh Writing Advice (™)

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Image by dae jeung kim from Pixabay

There have been a few hot takes in writing Twitter since the last time I posted. Most of them I’ve already made comment on in older posts either here or on my personal blog; mostly refuting these hot takes… though sometimes with caveats.

Let’s see, there was the ill-conceived screed against fan fiction by an author whose published work is ironically a ‘retelling.’ I don’t have the time or the energy to go over her nonsense and point out all the ways it is, in fact, nonsense, not least of all because writing Twitter did such a thorough job of it on Twitter. It’s highly amusing, if ever you want to seek it out.

The other one I’ve noted is the recent wave of harsh writing advice (™). Twitter immediate took the original poster to task, writing some of the funniest, silliest harsh writing advice (™) I’ve read of late. This gentle mocking of the idea of harsh writing advice is, to my mind, the perfect way to deal with harsh writing advice (™).

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Twilight: 2000 — Roleplaying in a Post-Nuclear Holocaust World

Twilight: 2000 — Roleplaying in a Post-Nuclear Holocaust World

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Nostalgia: noun — a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one’s life, to one’s home or homeland, or to one’s family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time.

Dictionary.com

I have heard about a phenomenon in film making that when the decision makers and creators get into places of power (usually in their 40s and 50s), the public often sees an uptick in nostalgic films about the creator’s formative years. A cycle that repeats itself not unlike the cycle for fashions coming back in style (though, mercifully, some fashions remain purely historical). TV and film reboots are often the result of this nostalgia as well.

RPGs have reached the age where nostalgia is becoming more apparent — at least it is to this long-time RPGer. While Dungeons & Dragons, Traveller, Call of Cthulhu, and a few other games have had an ongoing existence through multiple editions from the late 70s and early 80s, many games have come and gone.

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Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone: 2020 Stay at Home – Days 20 and 21

Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone: 2020 Stay at Home – Days 20 and 21

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So, last year, as the Pandemic settled in like an unwanted relative who just came for a week and is still tying up the bathroom, I did a series of posts for the FB Page of the Nero Wolfe fan club, The Wolfe Pack. I speculated on what Stay at Home would be like for Archie, living in the Brownstone with Nero Wolfe, Fritz Brenner, and Theodore Hortsmann. I have already reposted days one through fifteen. Here are days twenty (April 10) and twenty-one (April 11). It helps if you read the series in order, so I’ve included links to the earlier entries. I enjoy channeling Archie more than any other writing which I do.

DAY TWENTY – 2020 Stay at Home

I tried calling Inspector Cramer after breakfast, but he was out. Apparently my fellow New Yorkers are still committing homicide. I’ll call the station later in the day. I’d like to visit a crime scene and try to do some detecting.

I had more success calling the hospital to check on Bill Gore. I found out that he had gotten through the worst of it and recovered enough to be sent home. I wasn’t going to call him up, but it was good to know he had survived the virus.

It’s Good Friday. I am not religiously inclined, but I will say that I’m glad that those who are, received some hope today. That commodity seems to be in pretty short supply these days. New York City has had more deaths than all but four entire countries. Instead of 32,000 fans watching the Mets at Citi Field, they’re digging mass graves out on Hart Island. If somebody wants to believe that a man dying on a cross is good for mankind, then that’s one death I’ll tip my hat to. Just don’t expect me to kneel.

I’m generally a pretty orderly guy, and I keep my stuff neat and tidy. I don’t like messy. This lock down has given me the opportunity to really organize my things. I was moving a couple boxes around and started looking through some of my old notebooks. I saw my notes on the Adam Nicoll murder. I might type that one up if we’re stuck at home for another couple months. That’s one I worked on while I was self-employed during Wolfe’s ‘great hiatus.’ He had simply vanished as he put operation ‘Get Zeck’ into effect, without even telling me. I opened up shop for myself and kept reasonably busy until Wolfe suddenly reappeared. Lily was the source of the Nicoll case. Indirectly.

I have a Facebook account. I don’t use it much, and I could, and often do, live without it. But I do post occasionally – Often related to baseball. Today, someone left a comment on my post, letting me know they were going to snooze me for 30 days. Now, you don’t have to like what I say. It’s a free country. Well, lately it hasn’t been as free as usual, but still: Why in the world would you tell me, on my own post, that you’re snoozing me? Whether you see my posts or not isn’t going to change my day. Just do it. It reminds me of the Pharisees preaching in the Temple square, so everyone would see them. Hey – I didn’t say I haven’t read the Bible. You don’t grow up in rural Ohio and not get some religion lessons.

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Would You Spend $44 on a Collection of 30 Vintage DAW Paperbacks?

Would You Spend $44 on a Collection of 30 Vintage DAW Paperbacks?

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Would you spend $44 on these 30 vintage DAW paperbacks?

I buy a lot of paperbacks on eBay.  I mean, a lot. But believe it or not, I don’t spend a lot of money. I’ve gotten in the habit of buying small collections; because shipping costs work out better and I spend much less per item. I haven’t done the math recently, but I budget anywhere from $0.25 to $0.50 per book when I go hunting, and usually stick to it.

Of course, there are plenty of expensive paperbacks on eBay. Crazy-priced paperbacks, if you want to go looking for them. But eBay is also a clearing house for hundreds of individuals dumping collections en masse, often with very little description, and if you’re willing to dig a bit and take a chance, you can find bargains every day of the week. (And every hour of the day). In fact, eBay has become my go-to site for bargain-basement vintage paperback collections. Someday collectors will stop dying off, and their put-upon spouses will stop dumping their collections on auction sites at rock-bottom prices as they clean out the attic, but today is not that day.

I can’t remember the last time I spent more than $25 for a lot of paperbacks. But last month I scrambled all over myself to hit the buy button on the lot above: 30 vintage DAW paperbacks priced at $44.

Sure, I love DAW. And I’m happy to welcome all these books into my collection, But if you look carefully, you’ll see exactly why I wrecked my monthly collecting budget to acquire these books — and would’ve been happy to spend a lot more. I didn’t buy this lot because it’s a fine assortment of books (though it is). I spent the money because of one author, and one author only. Do you know which one?

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Future Treasures: Out Past the Stars, Book Three of The Farian War by K. B. Wagers

Future Treasures: Out Past the Stars, Book Three of The Farian War by K. B. Wagers

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The Farian War trilogy K. B. Wagers (Orbit Books). Covers by Stephan Martiniere

You know what I appreciate? When a trilogy wraps up with three books, and the author doesn’t decide to extend it indefinitely. That’s what happens next month with Out Past the Stars, the final novel in K.B. Wagers’ popular The Farian War series. At least according to John the Librarian’s Booklist review, anyway.

Hail, Star of Indrana, seeks to broker peace between the Farian and the Shen, a task made unimaginably more difficult when she meets the Farian gods and discovers they’re not what everyone has long believed. Now, an ancient, dangerous enemy is hunting them down. To preserve peace and save her empire, Hail must discover the truth behind centuries’ worth of lies and avert an all-out war. But the cost might be more than she can bear, just when she was hoping to finally put violence behind her… The story is a compelling mix of action and politics, but Wagers’ strength is crafting character-driven science fiction, and it’s on full display. Everyone, including the villains, are complex and compelling. Relationships, both old and new, are rich. Wagers offers a well-earned, heartfelt, and hopeful conclusion to the Farian War series.

The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog called the opening novel “A perfect blend of political intrigue and realistically-conveyed action…. [with] Kick-butt women, space battles, complex relationships, and fiendish plots.” Here’s the details for all three.

There Before the Chaos (465 pages, $15.99 trade paperback/$9.99 digital, October 9, 2018)
Down Among the Dead (448 pages, $16.99 trade paperback/$9.99 digital, December 3, 2019)
Out Past the Stars (400 pages, $16.99 trade paperback/$9.99 digital, February 23 2021)

The series was published by Orbit, with covers by Stephan Martiniere. We looked at the first two here. See all our recent coverage of the best upcoming SF and fantasy here.

A Modest Little Magazine: Whispers edited by Stuart David Schiff

A Modest Little Magazine: Whispers edited by Stuart David Schiff

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Assorted issues of Whispers, 1973-87. Issues #1, 2, 4, 9, 13-14, 15-17, 17-18, 19-20, and the final issue, 23-24.
Covers by Tim Kirk (1,3), Stephen Fabian (2,9,13-24,23-24), John Stewart (13-15,16-17), and Kevin Eugene Johnson (19-20)

When I started Black Gate magazine, I drew inspiration from small press magazines of the 70s, 80s and 90s that I deeply admired. It was a a fairly short list, but it included W. Paul Ganley’s Weirdbook, the Terminus Weird Tales edited by George H. Scithers, John Gregory Betancourt and Darrell Schweitzer, and Stuart David Schiff’s Whispers.

Whispers was near-legendary by the late 90s, when I was getting serious about starting my own magazine. The last issue had been published in 1987, but in its 15-year run it published original fiction and poems by Stephen King, Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, Robert Bloch, Karl Edward Wagner, Roger Zelazny, Michael Shea, Manly Wade Wellman, Ramsey Campbell, William F. Nolan, David Drake, Ellen Kushner, Steve Rasnic Tem, Carl Jacobi, Hugh B. Cave, Phyllis Eisenstein, Joseph Payne Brennan, Dennis Etchison, Robert Aickman, Glen Cook, Charles L. Grant, Gerald W. Page, Lisa Tuttle, Richard A. Lupoff, Janet Morris, and many, many others.

It also published original artwork by many of the greatest horror and fantasy artists of the 20th Century, including Michael Whelan, Stephen Fabian, Lee Brown Coye, Allen Koszowski, Vincent Di Fate, Charles Vess, Hannes Bok, and numerous others.

One of the many inspirational things about Whispers — apart from its phenomenal success — was that it was virtually a one-man operation. Stuart Schiff grew his tiny magazine from humble beginnings as essentially a slender black-and-white fanzine in 1973 into one of the most influential horror mags of the century, with a spinoff line of paperback anthologies, limited edition hardcovers, magazines supplements, and of course a Best of collection.

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Notes and Quotes: Arthur C. Clarke’s The Deep Range (1957)

Notes and Quotes: Arthur C. Clarke’s The Deep Range (1957)

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The Deep Range (Signet, 1974). Cover art uncredited

Here’s a relatively quick take on a 1950s novel I reread this past week — not as long or as polished as my other Black Gate reviews have been. (I’ll be resuming those in February.)

The Deep Range was the 8th of 11 novels of Clarke’s early period, which I’ll define as everything before 2001 in 1968. (The 11 counts both Against the Fall of Night and the revised version The City and the Stars, and includes his non-SF novel Glide Path.)

This is Clarke’s major novel of the ocean, set in a future that herds whales and farms plankton for consumption by humans. I think the theme of harvesting whales for their meat would make the novel awkward to reprint today, but I see there have been editions from Warner Aspect in 2001 and from Gollancz as recently as 2011. There are countries that still harvest whales, of course, but they do so to the condemnation of many other nations.

Clarke was of course an avid diver and had moved to Sri Lanka in 1956 (according to Science Fiction Encyclopedia), a year before this novel was published. So the descriptions here of diving, of exploring the coral reefs, are likely drawn from first-hand experience.

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