Black Gate – Page 817 – Adventures in Fantasy Literature

The Tears of Ishtar by Michael Ehart

Tuesday, May 5, 2015 Fletcher Vredenburgh Comments 6 comments

When my renewed interest in swords and sorcery was sparked a few years ago, one of the first and best books of new writing I found was The Return of the Sword, edited by Jason M. Waltz (reviewed at BG by Ryan Harvey). It’s filled with a passel of great stories and turned me on to several writers I follow closely to this day. Among them are Bill Ward, James Enge, and Bruce Durham. It’s the book that convinced me that there was a renaissance in heroic fiction and that it was worth blogging about.

One of the most intriguing stories, with imagery that’s stayed with me over the years, is “To Destroy All Flesh” by Michael Ehart. I wasn’t surprised to learn it was part of an ongoing series of linked stories. “Flesh” references characters and quests that clearly predate the action at hand.

Ehart’s protagonist, Ninshi, a woman from Ugarit in Bronze Age Syria, is enslaved by a flesh-eating demon, the Manthycore. She must provide corpses of warriors for the beast to devour. Her terrible master gave her immortality, great strength, and enhanced healing in order to carry out this task.

By the time I could see again, it had already begun to feed. As always, it started with the soft parts. The belly and the face were its favorites and because it fed so seldom, it showed little restraint. This time it chose to wear the head of a lion, which seemed to be well suited for the task.

It felt the force of my gaze, but did not react right away, engrossed in some particularly savory morsel from the belly of one of the corpses. I took care not to take note of which one. It is a matter of pride that I not look away, but I long ago learned to look without seeing.

She is sustained over the centuries of her servitude by the dream of freeing herself and forcing the Manthycore to restore her lover to life. That quest sets the stage for the tales collected in The Tears of Ishtar.

…

Read More Read More

New Treasures: The Vorrh by B. Catling

Tuesday, May 5, 2015 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

I first heard of B. Catling’s second novel The Vorrh when Matthew David Surridge reviewed it for us two years ago, saying:

It’s a powerful book, precise and unexpected in its use of language and its plot construction, a dizzying and straight-faced blend of history and the unreal… It’s mostly set in the years after World War One, but although there are scenes with peculiar Victorian technology and bakelite automata, it mostly avoids any feel of either steampunk or such recently-coined retrofantasies as dieselpunk or decopunk… while one can say that the Vorrh of Catling’s novel — a massive forest in which time is confused and myths wander — recalls Robert Holdstock’s Mythago Wood, the feel is something quite different.

The book has just been reprinted in trade paperback by Vintage, with an impressive range of cover blurbs, including a stellar endorsement by Alan Moore on the front cover:

Easily the current century’s first landmark work of fantasy.

Sadly, Moore’s introduction to the hardcover edition is missing here, but you can’t have everything. (The hardcover, out of print for scarcely a year, already commands ridiculous prices on the collector’s market, so I’m just glad to finally have a copy.)

…

Read More Read More

Ode to a J.R.R. Tolkien Coffee Mug

Monday, May 4, 2015 Nick Ozment Comments 8 comments

I’ve been drinking coffee from this mug since way back in the twentieth century. It was a gift, of that I’m pretty sure, but I’ve had it so long I can no longer tell you who I got it from or when.

It survived my first marriage, a move from Arizona to Minnesota and several subsequent moves all over the Land of 10,000 Lakes, and being left through one brutal winter in a cow pasture (I lost it on a walk late in the fall; the following spring it was still there where I’d left it, sitting on the hood of a rusted old jalopy!).

It is a little worse for wear — a chip on the rim and another one on the base. The litho, though — incredibly — is pristine and unfaded, even though it’s been through hundreds of cycles in the dishwasher.

The caricature of Tolkien as a hobbit, which is repeated on either side of the mug, was done by Steven Cragg. The text, which is attributed to “Largely Literary Designs, Inc.,” reads as follows:

Ever since we were no bigger than a billiard ball we’ve wanted something important we could call our own — a yacht, for example, or a cottage in the Bahamas, or a marriage counselor who could go an entire hour without saying the word “feelings,” or, well, a mythology of Middle-Earth, to be perfectly honest with you, a unique vision of history and pre-history, good and evil, gods, devils, the whole shebang, the sort of thing J.R.R. Tolkien devised more than a half a century ago, which means we’re lucky as Frodo, of course, because thanks to modern printing technology and a newfangled bartering system called “money,” we now need go no further than our corner bookstore, pick up a copy of The Hobbit and suddenly we’re there, chucked head over heels into Tolkien’s magical kingdom, thankful that when our own world becomes too much for us, we can always turn to his.

…

Read More Read More

2015 Locus Award Finalists Announced

Monday, May 4, 2015 John ONeill Comments 0 Comment

The Locus Science Fiction Foundation has announced the nominations for the 2015 Locus Awards.

The winners are selected by the readers of Locus magazine. The awards began in 1971, originally as a way to highlight quality work in advance of the Hugo Awards. The winners will be announced during the Locus Awards Weekend in Seattle WA, on June 26-28, 2015. In addition to creators, the Locus Foundation also honors winning publishers with certificates, which I think is kind of neat.

The finalists are:

FANTASY NOVEL

The Goblin Emperor, Katherine Addison (Tor)
Steles of the Sky, Elizabeth Bear (Tor)
City of Stairs, Robert Jackson Bennett (Broadway)
The Magician’s Land, Lev Grossman (Viking)
The Mirror Empire, Kameron Hurley (Angry Robot US)

…

Read More Read More

Vintage Treasures: The Last T’En Trilogy by Cory Daniells

Monday, May 4, 2015 John ONeill Comments 2 comments

Two months ago, in my March New Releases article, I said a few words about a handsome omnibus volume from best selling author Rowena Cory Daniells, The Fall of Fair Isle, published in paperback by Solaris on March 10. A complete trilogy on one volume, it collects Broken Vows, Dark Dreams, and Desperate Alliances, all originally published over a decade ago and recently republished with new cover art. Together, they form a sequel to her epic fantasy saga The Outcast Chronicles.

After that, I kinda forgot about it. Until last week, when I was sorting through some old review copies that I received in the late 90s, while I was editor of SF Site. I found the original paperback editions from Bantam Books (above, top row) and, to be blunt, it took a few days before it dawned on me that they were the same series. Where the Bantam editions were packaged as high fantasy/medieval romances, the new Solaris versions are marketed as dark fantasy — with starkly different cover design, and under a different name. It’s one of the more interesting examples of a publishing make-over I’ve seen in a while.

…

Read More Read More

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Adventures With Jeremy Brett

Monday, May 4, 2015 Bob Byrne Comments 13 comments

For several decades, Basil Rathbone, star of fourteen Holmes films in the thirties and forties, was generally the most recognizable and popular screen Holmes. And of course today, Benedict Cumberbatch and Robert Downey Jr are internationally recognized for their turns as the master detective.

But in between Rathbone and Cumberbatch, one actor (with apologies to Peter Cushing) stood above all other portrayers of Sherlock Holmes. And that was Jeremy Brett.

This is number one of a three part series looking at the first part (The Adventures) of the Granada television series, which ran in full from 1984 to 1994. To many fans, Brett is simply THE Holmes. So…

In 1980, Michael Cox was a producer at Granada, one of the Independent Television (ITV) contractors in England. At the same time in America, Charlton Heston was starring as Sherlock Holmes in the stage play, The Crucifer of Blood. His Watson was a handsome Englishman named Jeremy Brett.

The following year, Cox proposed an authentic Sherlock Holmes series; one that was as true to the original tales as could commercially be done in the television format. His idea was received positively, but Cox was told that an essential element of the deal would be a pre-sale agreement with American television. This would secure “up-front” money, which would be invested into the series. WGBH in Boston, host of the popular PBS series, Mystery!, was an ideal candidate for the partnership.

…

Read More Read More

Through the Woods and Other Stories by Emily Carroll

Sunday, May 3, 2015 Matthew David Surridge Comments 0 Comment

Through the Woods And now for some utterly uncontroversial awards news: on April 22, the nominees for the 2015 Eisner Awards were announced. You can find the complete list here, representing some very impressive work. I’ve written in the past about Astro City, Sandman: Overture, and Saga; I want to take a moment now to write a bit about one of the other nominees. Emily Carroll’s up for two Eisners, ‘Best Graphic Album — Reprint’ for her anthology Through The Woods, and ‘Best Short Story’ for her online piece “When the Darkness Presses.” They’re both excellent.

I first stumbled across Carroll’s comics shortly before the Eisner nominations were made public. I found a copy of Through The Woods at my local library, after which I read through the short stories on Carroll’s web site. I thought both the print and online works were brilliant comics. Mostly horror or dark fantasy with a strong mythic edge, they experiment with form in order to get at the heart of their narratives. Panel designs and lettering and storytelling are all unobtrusively intelligent and quietly inventive, finding new ways to bring out the emotional textures of the tales.

Carroll changes her style and approach with each story, but maintains a distinctive voice. She moves easily from web to print, working with the possibilities of page design in both mediums in a way that feels not just accomplished but effortless. Reading through her work you’re struck by the range of approaches but also by the sense of an overall unity — the unity that emerges from a major artist exploring the themes that hold meaning for her.

…

Read More Read More

Galaxy, April 1961: A Retro-Review

Sunday, May 3, 2015 Rich Horton Comments 0 Comment

Here’s an issue from Galaxy late in H. L. Gold’s editorial tenure, which probably means that Frederik Pohl was doing most of the editorial work. (Pohl officially took over with the December 1961 issue, but I have read that he was editor in all but name from the late ’50s.)

It’s got a pretty impressive Table of Contents, though it’s a bit disappointing in that the best known writers (Sturgeon and Leiber) are not at their best, and a couple of the other well-known writers (Saberhagen and Lafferty) are early in their careers and not fully developed yet.

It’s also pretty thick, 196 pages including the covers. The feature set is smallish: an editorial by Gold (or at least signed by him) called “Puzzles for Plotters,” which poses a couple of puzzles that (he avers) humans can solve but computers can’t; the brief Forecast squib on what’s coming next issue; Floyd C. Gale’s Five Star Shelf of book reviews, very much capsule reviews – I do note that he liked Peter Beagle’s A Fine and Private Place very much – and Willy Ley’s science column, For Your Information, which covers several subjects: the Gegenschein, the annexation of Patagonia, seven league boots, and letters from readers.

The cover is by Mel Hunter, and it reminded me of Rick Sternbach’s work. It doesn’t illustrate any story, it’s just called “A Derelict in the Void,” and shows a ship investigating a wrecked spaceship. Interiors are by Virgil Finlay, Dick Francis, Jack Gaughan, Harman, and Walker.

…

Read More Read More

Self-published Book Review: The Shard by Ted Cross

Sunday, May 3, 2015 Donald Crankshaw Comments 0 Comment

If you have a book you’d like me to review, please see the submission guidelines here.

Ted Cross’s The Shard takes place in a world of elves, dwarves, and humans. Millenia ago, dwarves and elves warred against one another with devastating losses on both sides. Only when it was almost too late did they realize that they had been tricked by the corrupted wizard Bilach, leaving themselves vulnerable to his conquering armies. They combined forces and defeated Bilach. Afterward, the remaining wizards created a tower called the Spire of Light, with a great crystal atop enchanted to encourage peace. Centuries later, the dragon came and destroyed the tower and the crystal. Now a new threat has appeared, and the only way to defeat it is to find the sole remaining shard of the crystal, hidden in the lair of the dragon who destroyed it.

Wisely, the author doesn’t lay out the ancient history quite so directly as I’ve done here. Told this way, it seems too simple, too familiar. Instead, the history is told in bits and pieces, not through the eyes of the elves or the dwarves, but through the perspective of the humans, who came late to the region and saw the coming of the dragon, but know little of the history behind what it destroyed. In a sense, the story is told backward, each new story a revelation farther into the past, shedding light on a new person’s or people’s origin and role.

At the center of the large cast of characters is Midas. A lord of a minor holding, he is still mourning the loss of his son Miros when he discovers that someone is attempting to spark a war between the humans and the elves. He knows right away that such an act is foolhardy, and he makes contacts with the elves in order to try to ease tensions. The elf lady Alvanaria is eager to help keep the peace, but ultimately it’s the appearance of a new threat that prevents humans and elves from going to war. An army of wyrmen is rapidly approaching, and it will take humans, elves, and dwarves to stop them. But first, Midas, his sons, Alvanaria, the wizard Xax, and their companions will need to retrieve the shard of the Spire of Light from the dragon’s lair.

…

Read More Read More

Spot the Avengers: Age of Ultron Spoiler on the Cover of the 1967 Paperback The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker

Sunday, May 3, 2015 John ONeill Comments 5 comments

The Avengers Battle the Earth Wrecker-small

The Avengers Battle the Earth Wrecker-back-small

I took my kids to see Avengers: Battle of Ultron on Friday, and we heartily enjoyed it. It’s a remarkable funny and ridiculously fast-paced two hours and 20 minutes of superpowered mayhem, and it’s obvious that writer/director Joss Whedon and his cohorts have a genuine love for the source material, as it’s packed with asides and sly references for those who remember the Marvel comic by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

Yesterday I was doing what I do every Saturday — sorting piles of old paperbacks — when I stumbled on the 1967 Bantam paperback The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker by Otto Binder. It came from a collection of 52 vintage paperbacks I bought on eBay for fifteen bucks last year (which also included The Unknown, Nine Horrors and a Dream by Joseph Payne Brennan, and Robert Bloch’s Nightmares.) Earth-Wrecker is one of only two Bantam Marvel tie-ins I’m aware of; the other is Captain America: The Great Gold Steal, by Ted White (1968).

The fascinating thing about The Avengers Battle the Earth-Wrecker, though, is that, despite being released nearly 50 years ago, it has a mild spoiler for the Avengers: Age of Ultron right on the cover. If you want to avoid spoilers, just scroll on to the next article. Otherwise, read on.

…

Read More Read More