Black Gate – Page 639 – Adventures in Fantasy Literature

Vintage Treasures: The Best of Clifford D. Simak, edited by Angus Wells

Wednesday, June 15, 2016 John ONeill Comments 6 comments

Clifford D. Simak has been experiencing something of a renaissance recently, thanks chiefly to David W. Wixon, editor of the six-volume Complete Short Fiction of Clifford D. Simak from Open Road Media. That’s a delightful series, and it makes Simak’s previous collections largely superfluous. But nonetheless, I still find myself compelled to track down the last few missing titles to complete my Simak collection.

Right now, the most elusive is The Best of Clifford D. Simak, edited by Angus Wells. It was published in paperback by Sphere in 1975 with a knockout wraparound cover by Eddie Jones.

Simak had two Best Of collections in the US, Best Science Fiction Stories of Clifford D. Simak (Paperback Library, 1972) and Skirmish: The Great Short Fiction of Clifford D. Simak (Berkley, 1978). Those contain the classic tales you’d generally expect, including “Huddling Place,” “The Ghost of a Model T,” “All the Traps of Earth,” “Skirmish,” and his masterpiece “The Big Front Yard.”

Angus Wells’ The Best of Clifford D. Simak is a different beast. It skips all the stories I mentioned above, and contains instead an eclectic mix of stories, including a handful of his early pulp tales and two Hugo nominees, “The Thing in the Stone” and “The Autumn Land.” Needless to say, it’s highly prized among Simak collections — yours truly included.

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The Digest Enthusiast #4 Now Available

Wednesday, June 15, 2016 John ONeill Comments 3 comments

The Digest Enthusiast is fast becoming one of my favorite magazines.

Yeah, maybe that’s because I’m an obsessive collector of digest magazines, so finding a publication devoted to my special interests makes me feel all tingly. But seriously, this magazine is a fun read, cover to cover.

Take for example Steve Carper’s excellent article on The Galaxy Science Fiction Novels, 31 SF novels published in magazine format between 1950-1958 and edited by Galaxy‘s legendary editor H.L. Gold. I bought a story from Steve Carper, “Pity the Poor Dybukk,” which appeared in Black Gate 2, and it’s great to be reading him again. In less skilled hands this article might be nothing more than a dry recitation of facts and publishing dates (not that I wouldn’t find that thrilling, mind you), but Steve greatly livens up the proceedings with fascinating and highly informed commentary on the novels Gold chose, and the often surprising history behind them. Here’s a taste.

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Lovecraft’s Dreamlands Via Graphic Novel: Charles Cutting’s Kadath

Tuesday, June 14, 2016 M Harold Page Comments 6 comments

However, unlike Bill Haley, Lovecraft still owns his genre

It's like the lovechild of Brighton Pavilion and Portmeirion as raised by Michael Moorcock — It’s like the lovechild of Brighton Pavilion and Portmeirion as raised by Michael Moorcock

HP Lovecraft is a bit like Bill Haley; he arguably created his own genre, but few people now consume his work for simple pleasure.

Just as modern people typically discover Rock and Roll through [your favourite band here], they come to the Cthulhu Mythos through Charles Stross’s Laundry Files(*), through the madness of the Cthulhu Fluxx cardgame, or through the roleplaying game Call of Cthulhu.

Kids…? Well my daughter (8) has a plush Cthulhu who spends most of his time in the naughty corner for trying to eat the faces of the other toys.

Nobody, typically, just happens to pick up an HP Lovecraft book. If they do, they probably bounce. Let’s just say that speculative fiction has produced better stylists and that “of his time” is proving to be less and less able to explain away his racism.

However, unlike Bill Haley, Lovecraft still owns his genre. He pretty much nailed Cosmic Horror, and though we have chipped off racist carbuncles, all the tropes still bear his mason’s mark.

This means that Lovecraft’s Mythos serves the the same function in the Geek community as the Classical world served amongst educated Victorians. They would remark on somebody being “Hector-like”, we joke that our pasta bake “turned into a Shoggoth”.

This creates the interesting problem that the our shared subculture leans heavily on a set of texts that are increasingly unreadable for both literary and ethical reasons!

The answer, of course, is to retell the stories in other media, which is where books like Charles Cutting’s graphic novel Kadath come in.

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New Treasures: Who Killed Sherlock Holmes?, the Third Shadow Police Novel by Paul Cornell

Tuesday, June 14, 2016 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

I bought a copy of Paul Cornell’s London Falling, the first novel in what was to become his Shadow Police series, shortly after it was released in 2013. It followed Detective Inspector James Quill and his team after they came into contact with a strange artifact and accidentally develop the Sight, enabling them to take on the otherworldly creatures secretly prowling London’s streets. I missed The Severed Streets, the second in the series, completely, so I was very grateful to receive a review copy of the third book, Who Killed Sherlock Holmes?, released in trade paperback by PAN on May 19. This series looks like a lot of fun, and I’ve already started a search for the middle book to complete the set.

The ghost of Sherlock Holmes is dead, but who will solve his murder?

The Great Detective’s ghost has walked London’s streets for an age, given shape by people’s memories. Now someone’s put a ceremonial dagger through his chest. But what’s the motive? And who — or what — could kill a ghost?

When policing London’s supernatural underworld, eliminating the impossible is not an option. DI James Quill and his detectives have learnt this the hard way. Gifted with the Sight, they’ll pursue a criminal genius — who’ll lure them into a Sherlockian maze of clues and evidence. The team also have their own demons to fight. They’ve been to Hell and back (literally) but now the unit is falling apart…

Paul Cornell’s most recent publication here in the US was the acclaimed novella Witches of Lychford, published by Tor.com.

Who Killed Sherlock Holmes? was published by Pan Books on May 19, 2016. It is 358 pages, priced at £8.99 (around $12.76 in the US).

Logical Swords & Sorcery: The Tritonian Ring by L. Sprague de Camp

Tuesday, June 14, 2016 Fletcher Vredenburgh Comments 16 comments

Lyon Sprague de Camp’s first published story was “The Isolinguals” in 1937. During the 1930s and 40s he became a significant author, writing dozens of stories and numerous novels. His time travel novel Lest Darkness Fall (1939) is considered a classic and is still read today. Alongside such genre standard bearers as Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov, he is considered one of the authors responsible for bringing greater sophistication to science fiction. He was the fourth Grand Master as chosen by the Science Fiction Writers of America in 1979, and in 1984 he was given the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement. His 1996 autobiography, Time and Chance, won a Hugo Award. In his lifetime he was well-regarded and successful.

To call de Camp a polarizing figure is an understatement. His control over Robert E. Howard’s Conan character for so many years, his ham-fisted editing of Howard’s stories, his ruthless strangling of any effort to get pure, unadulterated Conan into print, raised the ire of readers. For an incredibly detailed history of de Camp’s relationship with REH’s work and legacy, I highly recommend tracking down Morgan Holmes’ 16-part series, “The de Camp Controversy.”

De Camp first encountered the character of Conan when his friend Fletcher Pratt tossed him a copy of Conan the Conqueror. According to Lin Carter, de Camp “yielded helplessly to Howard’s gusto and driving narrative energies.” In 1951 de Camp decided to try his own hand at Howardian swords & sorcery and wrote The Tritonian Ring. He sold it to the clunkily-titled magazine Two Complete Science-Adventure Books.

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Future Treasures: Disappearance at Devil’s Rock by Paul Tremblay

Monday, June 13, 2016 John ONeill Comments 4 comments

Paul Tremblay wrote what is easily one of the most acclaimed horror novels of last year, A Head Full of Ghosts, about a hit reality TV show that captures a real exorcism, and the investigation into what really happened, 15 years later. Nathan Ballingrud called it “Outstanding. Creepy, surprising, occasionally funny, always compassionate… one of the best horror novels I’ve read in years.” Tremblay’s follow up novel, Disappearance at Devil’s Rock, arrives in hardcover next week from William Morrow, and needless to say, expectations are sky-high.

Late one summer night, Elizabeth Sanderson receives the devastating news that every mother fears: her thirteen-year-old son, Tommy, has vanished without a trace in the woods of a local park.

The search isn’t yielding any answers, and Elizabeth and her young daughter, Kate, struggle to comprehend Tommy’s disappearance. Feeling helpless and alone, their sorrow is compounded by anger and frustration: the local and state police have uncovered no leads. Josh and Luis, the friends who were the last to see Tommy before he vanished, may not be telling the whole truth about that night in Borderland State Park, when they were supposedly hanging out a landmark the local teens have renamed Devil’s Rock.

Living in an all-too-real nightmare, riddled with worry, pain, and guilt, Elizabeth is wholly unprepared for the strange series of events that follow. She believes a ghostly shadow of Tommy materializes in her bedroom, while Kate and other local residents claim to see a shadow peering through their windows in the dead of night. Then, random pages torn from Tommy’s journal begin to mysteriously appear — entries that reveal an introverted teenager obsessed with the phantasmagoric; the loss of his father, killed in a drunk-driving accident a decade earlier; a folktale involving the devil and the woods of Borderland; and a horrific incident that Tommy believed connects them.

As the search grows more desperate, and the implications of what happened become more haunting and sinister, no one is prepared for the shocking truth about that night and Tommy’s disappearance at Devil’s Rock.

Disappearance at Devil’s Rock will be published by William Morrow on June 21, 2016. It is 336 pages, priced at $25.99 in hardcover and $12.99 for the digital edition. Read an excerpt at (of all places) the Wall Street Journal.

Blogging The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer, Part Nine – “The Golden Flask”

Monday, June 13, 2016 William Patrick Maynard Comments 1 comment

NOTE: The following article was first published on June 15, 2010. Thank you to John O’Neill for reprinting these early articles so they are archived at Black Gate which has been my home for nearly 6 years and 270 articles now. Thank you to Deuce Richardson without whom I never would have found my way. Minor editorial changes have been made in some cases to the original text.

“The Golden Flask” was the eighth installment of Sax Rohmer’s serial, Fu-Manchu. First published in The Story-Teller in May 1913, it later comprised Chapters 21-23 of the novel, The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu (initially re-titled The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu for North American publication). Rohmer added brief linking material to the start of this episode for its book publication in an effort to tie the story closer together with its immediate predecessor. “The Golden Flask” is unique in not being centered upon Dr. Petrie’s infatuation with Karamaneh, but rather upon our heroes’ obsession with bringing Dr. Fu-Manchu to justice.

The story harks back to “The Zayat Kiss” in being set in motion with Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie correctly identifying Henry Stradwick, Lord Southery as the next target of assassination, but being too late to prevent his death. Lord Southery’s physician, Sir Frank Narcombe believes the peer to have expired from heart failure. Oddly, Smith states that neither he nor Petrie represents the official police. A reason for this blatant deception is never given and must be concluded as an error on Rohmer’s part. Reference is made to both Smith and Petrie possessing a supernatural ability to detect Fu-Manchu’s presence at the scene of Lord Southery’s death despite the absence of any clues pointing to foul play. When Petrie describes Smith as looking like “a man consumed by a burning fever,” the reader is completely willing to suspend disbelief and go along with Rohmer’s frenzied paranoia. It is the same mania that captivated Petrie (and, by extension, the reader) at the start of “The Zayat Kiss.”

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Mysteries at Hallmark

Monday, June 13, 2016 Bob Byrne Comments 6 comments

My wife and I enjoy watching murder mystery movies on Hallmark. More accurately, the Hallmark Movies and Mystery Channel (HMMC). Many of them had previously run on the Hallmark Channel that most folks are more familiar with. My previous cable provider didn’t provide HMMC at the tier I purchased, and many of my friends don’t have it either. It’s out there, but it’s not a low-tier feature in many systems.

Which is a shame, because there’s a lot of viewing for mystery fans. They air reruns of shows such as Hart to Hart, Matlock, Diagnosis Murder, Murder She Wrote and Perry Mason. And a staple of the schedule is Columbo. I haven’t seen every episode, but I’ve seen many of them several times and I never get tired of watching Peter Falk do his thing. “Uh, say, just one more thing…”

I also like a couple of old Hallmark franchises that have come to rest at HMMC.

Most folks knew Kellie Martin first as cute little Beckie (Becca) Thatcher in Life Goes On (a poignant, well done series) and later on as nurse Lucy Knight in ER. But from 2003 through 2007, she made eleven Mystery Woman movies for Hallmark. She played bookstore owner Samantha Kinsey, who constantly found herself involved in murders (that’s going to be a common theme in this post).

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Blogging Marvel’s Master of Kung Fu, Part One

Sunday, June 12, 2016 William Patrick Maynard Comments 4 comments

Special Mavel Edition is a little remembered comics reprint title of the early 1970s. Its fifteenth and penultimate issue dated December 1973 featured the debut of a new series, Master of Kung Fu. Marvel’s timing was perfect as Bruce Lee was now a major star at the U.S. box office and David Carradine’s Kung Fu series was a critical and ratings success on the small screen.

Marvel had optioned the rights to Sax Rohmer’s Fu Manchu characters several years before when Pyramid paperback reprints of the 13 Rohmer novels were selling strong thanks to the popularity of the Christopher Lee film series. Marvel already had their own Fu Manchu clones in the form of the Yellow Claw and the Mandarin, but Master of Kung Fu gave them the opportunity to build a contemporary martial arts title out of a sequel to Rohmer’s highly influential thriller series.

Conceived by Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin, the decision to incorporate Sax Rohmer’s characters was at the insistence of Marvel editor Roy Thomas. Englehart enlisted the aid of Robert E. Briney, publisher and editor of The Rohmer Review fanzine to ensure the continuity was consistent with Rohmer’s long-running literary series.

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Celebrate 200 issues of Excellence With Beneath Ceaseless Skies

Sunday, June 12, 2016 John ONeill Comments 0 Comment

Black Gate would like to salute editor Scott H. Andrews and the entire team at Beneath Ceaseless Skies for achieving a remarkable milestone: publishing an amazing 200 issues over the last eight years. (To put that in perspective, that’s 185 more than Black Gate, every one of them on time! I get light headed just thinking about it.)

Simultaneous with their landmark 200th issue, the magazine wrapped up their subscription drive aimed at enabling the magazine to publish longer stories, and announced that they are now open to stories up to 11,000 words. Sweet!

But the big news is the big double issue. Issue #200 of Beneath Ceaseless Skies is dated May 26 and features fiction by Catherynne M. Valente, Kameron Hurley, Yoon Ha Lee, and Seth Dickinson, podcasts by Yoon Ha Lee and Seth Dickinson, and a Gaunt and Bone reprint by BG author Chris Willrich. Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

“The Limitless Perspective of Master Peek, or, the Luminescence of Debauchery” by Catherynne M. Valente
So it came to pass that over the weeks remaining until the parturition of Perdita, I fashioned for her, out of crystal and ebony and chips of fine jade, twin organs of sight not the equal of mortal orbs but by far their superior, in clarity, in beauty, even in soulfulness. If you ask me how I accomplished it, I shall show you the door, for I am still a tradesman, however exalted, and tradesmen tell no tales.

“The Judgment of Gods and Monsters” by Kameron Hurley
She shouldn’t have gone to the trial, or talked to that stupid reporter, even for a second. Her father would know, now, that it was her who had his file. It was her who had been called upon to bring him in. She wouldn’t have shown up at the trial otherwise, and he knew it. “Two bits to the one whose family it isn’t,” she said to Merriz, and rolled up to get a look at the shooters.

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