Black Gate – Page 679 – Adventures in Fantasy Literature

Knights of the Dinner Table 227 Now on Sale

Friday, March 4, 2016 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

Knights of the Dinner Table follows the misadventures of a group of misfit gamers from Muncie, Indiana. It is written and drawn by my friend Jolly R. Blackburn, with editorial assistance by his talented wife Barbara. Black Gate readers may remember the KoDT spin-off The Java Joint, which appeared in the back of every issue of BG (and was eventually collected in a single volume in 2012).

KoDT started off in the back of the gaming magazine Shadis, and in short order it became one of the most popular comics in the industry, appearing as a regular feature in Dragon, Kevin Siembieda’s Rifter magazine, and other places. Since 1996 it has appeared as a standalone magazine; it has been published by Kenzer & Company since the fourth issue.

KoDT magazine is published monthly. The core of the publication is the comic strip, but the issues are huge — 64 pages — and rounded out with news, reviews, features, and a variety of entertaining gaming columns. It is, hands down, the best way to stay informed on the adventure gaming hobby each month.

The cover of KoDT 227 is a special treat for old-school video game players. Here’s Jolly:

We’re very excited about this month’s cover — not only is it a parody of the classic 80’s arcade game, Q*bert but it was drawn by Jeff Lee — one of the original co-designers of the game and the man who did the original Q*bert game graphics

Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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Discovering Robert E Howard: Fred Adams Jr. on Esau Cairn – A Man Outside His Epoch

Friday, March 4, 2016 Bob Byrne Comments 4 comments

As you can see from the list of prior essays in this series down below, we’ve wandered all over the Robert E. Howard landscape. But we hadn’t touched on Howard’s science fiction. Dr. Fred Adams goes off-planet for us and examines one of Howard’s cult classics, Almuric. Blasting off…

In his novel Almuric, published in Weird Tales in 1939, Robert E. Howard presents a one-shot protagonist named Esau Cairn, a man in many ways typical of Howard’s barbarian warrior-heroes, but who departs from them in that he is more philosophical than most of Howard’s creations, and perhaps in many ways best speaks to Howard’s personality and philosophy.

Much of the discussion of Esau Cairn and of Almuric hinges on what I call the WWCD? Issue: ‘What Would Conan Do?’ in the modern world. That topic has been exhaustively covered by the discussion threads of the Robert E. Howard Society, and several interpretations have been postulated. To me, the importance of Esau Cairn as a character is that he gives voice to Howard’s own frustration at being a man of action trapped in a relatively genteel world.

Howard wrote, in “The Tower of the Elephant,” “Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” Cairn bears out that rule when his barbarism rises to the surface and he kills a corrupt politician (perhaps rightfully so) with a single blow to the head.

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Vintage Treasures: Worlds Imagined: 14 Short Science Fiction Novels, Compiled by Robert Silverberg and Martin H. Greenberg

Friday, March 4, 2016 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

I bought a fine anthology of science fiction novellas on eBay last week for 5 cents. With $3.99 shipping, that brought the whole thing to $4.04 — about 28 cents per novella. Pretty sweet deal.

The anthology is Worlds Imagined, published by Avenel in April 1989, and edited by Robert Silverberg and Martin H. Greenberg. Excuse me, ‘Compiled by,” not edited by. I guess Silverberg and Greenberg didn’t feel comfortable with the title of editors, for merely selecting the fiction. That’s editorial integrity for you.

One of the things I love about this book is the editors’ (erm, compilers’) impassioned defense of the novella in their intro. I read it years ago, and much of it stayed with me. Here it is, in part.

The short novel — or “novella,” as some prefer to call it — is one of the richest and most rewarding of literary forms. Spanning twenty to thirty thousand words, usually, it allows for more extended development of theme and character than does the short story, without making the elaborate structural demands of the full-length book… Some of the greatest works in modern literature fall into the class of novellas. Consider Mann’s “Death in Venice,” Joyce’s “The Dead,” Melville’s “Billy Budd,” and Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” — or Faulkner’s “The Bear,” Tolstoi’s “The Death of Ivan Ilych,” Carson McCuller’s “Ballad of the Sad Cafe”…

Since a prime task of the science fiction writer is to create carefully detailed worlds of the imagination, room for invention is a necessity. The short story can give only a single vivid glimpse of the invented world; the full-length novel frequently becomes so enmeshed in the obligations of plot and counterplot that the background recedes to a secondary position. But the short novel, leisurely without being discursive, is ideal for the sort of world-creation that is science fiction’s specialty. and since the days of H.G. Wells and his classic novella “The Time Machine” it has exerted a powerful attraction for science fiction writers.

Preach, brothers!

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Goth Chick News: Hip Deep in the Horror

Thursday, March 3, 2016 Sue Granquist Comments 0 Comment

With the holidays over and Chicago immersed in the dark, cold days of March, which precede the somewhat less dark but still cold days of springtime in the Windy City, it is once again time for we here at Goth Chick News to surface from the underground offices at Black Gate headquarters, and venture forth into a new year.

With only six short months until the official kick off of the 2016 “season” (Halloween if you haven’t guessed), the calendar is already filling up with a plethora of gooey event invites from which we will extract, forcibly if necessary, all the steaming fresh tidbits we share with you here each week.

As the city that originated the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, The Eastland Disaster, H.H. Holmes and Resurrection Mary, it should come as no surprise that Chicago is a mecca of opportunities for the aficionado of all things unnerving. It is therefore unnecessary for BG photog Chris Z and I to venture too far afield to dig up content, and this year’s calendar is even more bloated than usual.

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Future Treasures: An Unattractive Vampire by Jim McDoniel

Thursday, March 3, 2016 John ONeill Comments 0 Comment

Are you a reader who yearns for a return to the days where vampires were monsters, instead of hunky leading men? Then have I got a book for you.

Jim McDoniel’s debut novel An Unattractive Vampire, a darkly comic urban fantasy of ancient horrors in suburban cities, is tailor-made for those sick of vampires that sparkle. It’s one of the first releases from new publishing house Sword & Laser, and will be available later this month.

After three centuries trapped underground, thousand-year-old Yulric Bile ― also known as the Curséd One, the Devil’s Apprentice, He Who Worships the Slumbering Horrors ― awakens only to find that no one believes he is a vampire. Apparently he’s just too ugly ― modern vampires, he soon discovers, are pretty, weak, and, most disturbing of all, good. Determined to reestablish his bloodstained reign, Yulric sets out to correct this disgusting turn of events or, at the very least, murder the person responsible.

With the help of pert vampire-wannabe Amanda; Simon, the eight-year-old reincarnation of his greatest foe; and a cadre of ancient and ugly horrors, Yulric prepares to battle the glamorous undead. But who will win the right to determine, once and for all, what it truly means to be a vampire?

An Unattractive Vampire will be published by Sword & Laser on March 15, 2016. It is 307 pages, priced at $13.99 in trade paperback and $8.99 for the digital version. The cover is designed by David Drummond.

See all of our coverage of the best in upcoming fantasy here.

Telepathy Machines and Strange Alien Games: Rich Horton on King of the Fourth Planet/Cosmic Checkmate

Thursday, March 3, 2016 John ONeill Comments 4 comments

Last June, in the comments section of an article on a 1959 Ace Double by Andre Norton and Jerry Sohl, Joe H, asked:

I think this is the only “classic” Ace Double I own… King of the Fourth Planet/Cosmic Checkmate by Robert Moore Williams/Charles V. De Vet & Katherine MacLean. Any chance it might make your list someday?

It sometimes takes us a while, but we always do right by our readers!

I’ve never read this one. But Rich Horton has, of course, and he reviewed it around a decade ago. King of the Fourth Planet, a tale of Martians and telepathy machines, didn’t appeal to him, but he found Cosmic Checkmate (later expanded and republished under the title Second Game), a tale of space exploration and alien games, much more intriguing. Here’s his review.

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The March Magazine Rack

Thursday, March 3, 2016 John ONeill Comments 0 Comment

I was very pleased to see Goblin Fruit, the online magazine of poetry of the fantastical, return after a one-year hiatus (does one year even count as a hiatus? If that’s true, Black Gate took a hiatus after virtually every issue!) March looks like it has plenty other good surprises in store for short fiction fans — stay tuned. For our vintage magazine readers, Rich Horton took a look at the June and July 1960 issues of Amazing Science Fiction Stories, containing James Blish’s complete novel …And All the Stars a Stage. And Matthew Wuertz continued his issue-by-issue re-read of Galaxy with March 1953.

Check out all the details on the magazines above by clicking on the each of the images. Our February Fantasy Magazine Rack is here.

As we’ve mentioned before, all of these magazines are completely dependent on fans and readers to keep them alive. Many are marginal operations for whom a handful of subscriptions may mean the difference between life and death. Why not check one or two out, and try a sample issue? There are magazines here for every budget, from completely free to $35/issue. If you find something intriguing, I hope you’ll consider taking a chance on a subscription. I think you’ll find it’s money very well spent.

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Congratulations to Black Gate‘s Nominees for the REH Foundation Awards

Thursday, March 3, 2016 John ONeill Comments 5 comments

On Wednesday the Robert E. Howard Foundation announced the nominees for this year’s REH Foundation Awards, honoring the top contributions in Howard scholarship and in the promotion of Howard’s life and works. We were delighted and honored to see Black Gate bloggers nominated in several major categories, including Barbara Barrett, Bob Byrne, Howard Andrew Jones, and Bill Ward:

The Cimmerian — Outstanding Achievement, Essay (Online)

BARRETT, BARBARA – “Hester Jane Ervin Howard and Tuberculosis (3 parts)” REH: Two Gun Raconteur Blog (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)

The Stygian — Outstanding Achievement, Website

BLACK GATE (John O’Neill)

The Black River — Special Achievement

BYRNE, BOB – For organizing the “Discovering REH” blog post series at Black Gate

JONES, HOWARD ANDREW and BILL WARD – For their “Re-Reading Conan” series at howardandrewjones.com

Only REH Foundation members can vote for the nominees. If you’re interested in learning more about the foundation (and voting), you can sign up for a free memberships at the REHF website here.

Thanks to the REH Foundation for the many honors. And congratulations to all the nominees!

New Treasures: The ‘Mancer Series by Ferrett Steinmetz

Wednesday, March 2, 2016 John ONeill Comments 5 comments

I bought Ferrett Steinmetz’s The Flux during my last trip to Barnes & Noble, partly because it’s an Angry Robot novel, and Angry Robot is doing great stuff. But also because of its intriguing premise: a world where if you love something enough, your obsession will punch a hole in reality, creating unique magics and potentially giving you powerful abilities.

Turns out The Flux is the second novel in a loose trilogy which has been getting a lot of attention. The first one, Flex, was published last year, and the third, Fix, arrives this September. Joel Cunningham at Barnes & Noble.com has praise for the entire series.

We’d probably love Ferrett Steinmetz’ Flex trilogy for the premise alone — it’s a gritty, hilarious contemporary fantasy series about magic users in a world where your obsessions can can bore a hole through the fabric of spacetime and give you the ability to manipulate reality at will. But it’s all the extra bits (characters you will ache for, twisty plots, the baddest baddies, killer action sequences) that put it over the top, and onto our list of 2015’s best reads.

I suppose I should be annoyed that now I have to track down a copy of Flex, and wait for Fix to complete the story. But when a series sounds this promising, I’m more than happy to gobble up additional volumes.

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Classically Awful or Awfully Classic: A.E. Van Vogt’s The World of Null-A

Wednesday, March 2, 2016 Thomas Parker Comments 13 comments

Alfred Elton van Vogt (1912-2000) is one of the great names of 20th century science fiction, and not just because the moniker sounds so odd, like it belongs to a mad scientist in a lurid Gernsbackian tale, the kind where “cosmic rays” are used to mutate the sleepy denizens of the city zoo into panicky prehistoric behemoths, which then rampage through the streets, spreading riot and chaos, thus allowing a cabal of sinister foreigners to hijack the metropolis’s secret supply of plutonium in order to build a colossal… sorry. Got a bit carried away there; once you’re in full Pulp Mode it’s hard to disengage. Back to A.E. van Vogt.

Van Vogt was a giant of the golden age of the 40’s, first appearing in John Campbell’s Astounding Science Fiction with the short story “Black Destroyer” in 1939. In the years that followed, he dominated the pages of the magazine with countless short stories and novels that even today are regarded as classics, among which the best known are Slan, The Empire of the Atom, The Voyage of the Space Beagle, The War Against the Rull, The Book of Ptath, and The Weapon Shops of Isher. (He frequently incorporated his short stories into his full length books; van Vogt was a pioneer of the “fix-up” — a term he coined — in which a novel is cobbled together from earlier, shorter pieces.)

In an era in which many of the SF writers of the 40’s and 50’s (some of major importance) have vanished from the shelves, most of the van Vogt books I’ve mentioned are still in print, and he remains influential — and controversial. (He did a short stint as a cheerleader for L. Ron Hubbard’s dianetics, for instance.) His writing seems to be equal parts sublime and appalling, and any discussion of van Vogt must sooner or later get around to addressing one simple question: can a “classic” be a godawful, incoherent mess?

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