Worst Cover Ever I will admit that I was very nervous about delving into Omni Magazine. For years, decades! I’ve heard people talk about Omni in breathless tones of awe! Yet I knew very little about it. Not to say that it was entirely unknown to me; I have distinct memories, back in like 1983, of being at the doctor’s office and they had several issues of Omni in the waiting room. I even flipped through some of them. Here…
Sad news for the science fiction and fantasy writing world. James Edwin Gunn, writer, scholar, teacher and Science Fiction Grandmaster, died of congestive heart failure Wednesday December 23, 2020. James Gunn founded the University of Kansas Center for Science Fiction Studies, and from their site Center Director Chris McKitterick wrote: The Center’s Associate Director, Kij Johnson, and I offer our deepest condolences to everyone who cared about Jim, whose lives he touched – and there were many – and whose…
Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #45 was released on an unsuspecting world on the second of August. Four works of fiction, one outstanding poem, plus artwork and audio. A great issue that you should check out! What have we got? This is what we’ve got: Fiction Contents Assailing the Garden of Pleasure, by Danial Ausema, with audio by Karen Bovenmeyer. The wounded apprentices of a corrupt teacher must gather what little power and skill they have to attempt to wrest the stolen…
Part One: Analog Back in the Before Times, I strolled, maskless and blissful, into Barnes and Noble and bought the Analog Science Fiction, January/February 2020 issue. It is a super-sized double issue with a reprint of a classic story from the 90s. I’ve read it in bits and pieces over the months and one tale stuck out at me — the cover story: “The Quest for the Great Gray Mossy” by Harry Turtledove. Turtledove mines the classics with an enviable…
Art by Frank Frazetta, Michael Whelan, and Jeffrey Catherine Jones An adventure tale isn’t good just because it features a bare-chested hero and a sword, and neither is a painting. Stories and art are successful because they are created by talented people who have devoted long hours (usually 10,000 or more) to educate themselves about their field and develop the proper skills and style to express that talent. And the presentation of that talent is absolutely vital to the success of the…
It’s not the way I would have done it. But it is pretty close! Star Trek: Picard (ST:P), now available for free at CBS All Access, is the antidote to Star Trek: Discovery. As opposed to the heedless headlong rush of Discovery, Picard takes its time, building a story slowly and meticulously. Others have said it before and likely better, but I’m going to say it myself — ST:P is made to appeal to people of, well, a certain age….
Issue banner by Rengin Tumer The ancient druids used to use gigantic standing stones to precisely chart the passing of the seasons. Me, I have a more accurate and satisfying method. I rely on the mystical and inexorable cosmic cycle that gives birth to a new issue of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, every quarter, without fail. HFQ 44 is a special treat as it contains a complete story by our very own Greg Mele, whose most recent article for Black Gate,…
Every month for roughly the past 40 years I’ve made a pilgrimage to the nearest newsstand to purchase my favorite fiction magazines. The newsstands have changed over the years, and the mix of magazines has too. But it’s a tradition I’ve come to cherish. Well, this is a time of broken traditions. All the local bookstores are closed (not that there were many to begin with), and I find myself at a loss. New issues of Asimov’s SF, Analog, and The Magazine of…
Review’s Log, Stardate 2020.3.18 It’s not how I would have done it. Honestly, any review/criticism of a beloved franchise that doesn’t begin with those eight words is committing a significant lie of omission. Indeed, I feel that all future reviews should be required to begin with those words, or the INHIWHDI acronym. Consider it a new Prime Directive for our wounded age. Reviewer’s Log, Supplemental Timing is everything, and Star Trek: Discovery (ST:D) really drew the short end of the…
Act I — A Year In Review Heroic Fantasy Quarterly punches well above its weight in the Tangent Online 2019 Recommended Reading List with SEVEN stories. Don’t want to search through their list? I got ya! “Then, Stars” by Michael Meyerhofer (Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #41, 8/19) “Echo of the Siren” by Richard Zwicker (Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #42, 11/19) “A Stone’s Throw” by Howard Andrew Jones, (Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #40, 5/19) “Trail of Ashes” by Caleb Williams (Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #40, 5/19)…