In Pursuit Of the Dragons Of Britain

In Pursuit Of the Dragons Of Britain

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The "Munitions Dragon" at the Tower of London.
The “Munitions Dragon” at the Tower of London.

As some few of you may know, I recently abandoned my luxurious offices in Black Gate’s sprawling Indiana Compound and have set my course by a wandering star. My prime objective (if not my Prime Directive) is to find a real, live dragon.

So far, no go. On the plus side, I have found definite signs of dragons in all quarters of my British hunting grounds. In fact, if carvings and statuary are any guide, dragons remain downright popular and have been so for centuries. Surely their real life counterparts cannot be far afield? Lurking just over the next moor, I should think, spitting flame and devouring maidens.

The most remarkable thing about dragons is how they induce credulity. Dragon fans become, with time, less like a fine aged wine and instead rather like my old friend Fox Mulder: against all reason, we want to believe. Maybe firedrakes and so on don’t exist –– maybe I’m off on a wild goose chase, and I should scarper back to the Indiana Compound forthwith –– but having grown up on Smaug, Quok, and the Reluctant Dragon, I find that I run along on fumes of faith. Dragons are simply too magical to track them with anything less than full-bore belief.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: A Man Called Spade

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: A Man Called Spade

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Spade_FalconbookIn last week’s column, I mentioned The Maltese Falcon, starring Humphrey Bogart. (Did you follow instructions and watch it for the first time?) Over eighty years after its publication, Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon stands supreme today as the finest private eye novel ever written. Bogie’s 1941 film proved that the third time is a charm, prior attempts in 1931 and 1936 having failed.

Sam Spade, the quintessential tough guy shamus, appeared in a five-part serial of The Maltese Falcon in Black Mask in 1929. Hammett carefully reworked the pieces into novel form for publication by Alfred E. Knopf in 1930 and detective fiction would have a benchmark that has yet to be surpassed.

Hammett, who wrote over two dozen stories featuring a detective known as The Continental Op (well worth reading), never intended to write more about Samuel Spade, saying he was “done with him” after completing the book-length tale.

But the public wanted more and his agent cajoled him into cranking out three more short stories featuring Spade. The first two appeared in American Magazine and the third in Collier’s in 1932 and they were collected into book form later that year as The Adventures of Sam Spade and Other Stories. In 1999, Vintage Crime published Nightmare Town, a compilation of twenty Hammett stories, including all three Spade short stories.

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Washington Attorney General Files Suit Against Ed Nash for Kickstarter Fraud

Washington Attorney General Files Suit Against Ed Nash for Kickstarter Fraud

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Asylum Kickstarter cards-smallIn a surprising move, Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson filed a suit Thursday against Ed Nash and his game company Altius Management for Kickstarter Fraud.

I can’t recall a single instance of a Kickstarter creator being sued for non-delivery of a project, but some in the industry have been forecasting this for months — particularly in the face of recent high-profile Kickstarter failures such as John Campbell’s notorious Sad Pictures for Children and Erik Chevalier’s The Doom That Came To Atlantic City.

Here’s a summary of the suit from GeekWire:

Back in October 2012, Nash raised $25,146 from 810 backers — including at least 31 from Washington — for a playing card game called Asylum designed by a Serbian artist and managed by Nash. The campaign exceeded its funding goal of $15,000, meaning Nash was legally responsible for sending every backer the products they paid for. But as the estimated delivery date of December 2012 passed, customers never received their Asylum product. In the months following, angry backers voiced their frustration on the ongoing Kickstarter page comment thread.

“Almost a year and no updates,” one backer wrote. “Ed Nash is in hiding.”

Read the complete article here.

Announcing the Winner of the Laurence Manning Giveaway

Announcing the Winner of the Laurence Manning Giveaway

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Man Who Awoke 1st edIn my recent review of Laurence Manning’s The Man Who Awoke, I ran a giveaway for a copy of the book, in which the winner would be determined by who best answered the question “Why is pulp era science fiction and fantasy still relevant today?”

I had intended to respond to the entries to generate some discussion, as well as posting a reminder. Then Murphy stopped by for an extended visit, and none of those things happened before the deadline.

However, we had two good entries. The first was from Anthony Simeone. Here’s an excerpt from his answer:

In genre fiction above all other forms of literature, writers act as living lenses, through which we can see the world in a different way. That is one of the great blessings of the passage of time and death: we get to see the world afresh with each passing year, and through each new person that walks the Earth. Fiction, the written word, are telepathic messages sent forward in time for us to experience and enjoy. Ultimately, they are voices from the void of the past, without which the years behind us would be tragically silent.

The other entry was from Daniel J. Davis. Here’s some of what he had to say.

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Self Published Book Review: The Book of Thoth by Paul Leone

Self Published Book Review: The Book of Thoth by Paul Leone

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

Book_of_ThothConsidering my dislike of vampires, I seem to review a lot of books about them. Either vampires are hard to avoid or I just can’t help myself. Paul Leone’s The Book of Thoth is part of his Vatican Vampire Hunters series. As you might guess by the name of the series, Mr. Leone does not shy away from religious themes. Or vampires. In his series, vampires are literally demons escaped from Hell, occupying the bodies of the dead. This explains why they so hate and fear anything sacred, whether it be holy water, crucifixes, churches, or even the blood of the righteous.

Nicole van Wyck is an heiress who has no interest in going into the family business and who is rapidly losing interest in the clubs and parties all her friends are involved in. Her life is threatening to become the aimless drifting of so many of the rich and irresponsible. That is, until she friends meets her first vampire. Fortunately for her, the vampire is being tracked by a group of church-sponsored hunters, who chase it away with no one the wiser. Except for Nicole, who suspects that there’s more going on than the friends who are with her realize. When she does track down the hunters, they make her an offer to join them and Nicole concludes that if vampires are real, then fighting them is not optional.

Nicole is certainly not another vapid heiress. She works hard, whether tracking down a mystery or training to fight vampires. She also has a strong moral center, which comes through both in how readily she leaps into the fight and in how she is willing to argue against her own team when they cross the line. Nicole is certainly a capable heroine, but she and her fellow hunters are not facing run of the mill vampires, but a veritable count of Hell, Count d’Aubert, and his very dangerous minion, Alice. The demons in dead flesh are after the titular Book of Thoth, which holds the secrets of Satan himself. To do that, they must gather three keys to open up the book’s hiding place.

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True Places: Jan Morris’ Hav

True Places: Jan Morris’ Hav

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HavIn 1984, writer Jan Morris spent several months in Hav, an idiosyncratic city in the Eastern Mediterranean. She left it just ahead of a violent insurrection and collected her letters describing the city into a book, Last Letters From Hav. Twenty years later, she returned to Hav to document what had changed, in a piece called Hav of the Myrmidons. Both were collected together in one volume, called simply Hav.

Hav, of course, doesn’t really exist. It’s not on any map of this world; true places (to quote Melville) never are.

Morris created Hav, situating it in a specific place and imagining a history for it which she then proceeded to uncover as a tourist. Morris is an experienced travel writer and she brings Hav alive, its foods and dress and sights, its flora and fauna and geology. She has a fine eye for detail and a strong prose style, conveying much in a brief space. She’s also reflective, contemplating on the things she sees and her own perception of these things: one can certainly argue that that’s what the book’s about: What she knows of Hav, what she learns and how, and what will always remain mysterious.

The first book, Last Letters, takes the form of six letters written over as many months. We meet some of the people of Hav, learn about the odd mix of cultures that made the place what it is, and see many of its unusual sights and traditions. But we also see strange things happening, things that the natives gloss over, but which disconcert Morris. She penetrates deeply into the nature of the city, finally encountering a surprising secret society; and then she leaves, just moments before some kind of upheaval strikes the city. What’s happening? Who’s behind it? Much is left ambiguous, though there are hints.

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Against the Giants of Chaos: Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land

Against the Giants of Chaos: Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land

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Shadowdale the Scouring of the Land-smallLast month, I took a look at the the first Third Edition D&D Cormyr supplement, Cormyr: The Tearing of the Weave, released in March 2007. It was a 160-page mega-adventure detailing a vast and sinister conspiracy deep in the Realms, and the first installment of what would eventually be a three-part supermodule.

I wasn’t aware Cormyr was part of a series while I was bidding like a fiend in the front row of the Spring Games Plus Auction. It was just one of several Forgotten Realms products I won, and all I knew at the time was that it was in brand new condition and criminally cheap – probably because it was released for version 3.5 and now was nearly two versions out of date.

So after I read through Cormyr and discovered I had just one third of an epic story line, I went scrambling through the rest of my auction winnings to see if I’d also scored any other parts of the saga. Luckily, I quickly found Part II: Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land, which picks up the thread and hurtles our adventurers deep into the newly-conquered land of Shadowdale.

Shadowdale lies conquered! Who can free this oppressed land?

Zhentish soldiers, Maerimydran drow, and Sharran cultist have forged a dark alliance to subjugate the peaceful land of Shadowdale. Elminster’s tower lies in ruins, Lord Amcathra governs at the sufferance of the dale’s conquerors, and the very Weave of magic in this embattled land seems to fray with each passing day. The Zhentish yoke lies heavy over Shadowdale — but the Dalesfolk are ready to fight for their freedom, if only they can find true heroes to lead the way!

This Forgotten Realms campaign adventure is designed for characters of levels 9-13. It can be played as a stand-alone adventure or as the second adventure in a three-part series. Each encounter contains tactical information for the Dungeon Master and expanded map features for ease of play.

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Future Treasures: Rogues edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois

Future Treasures: Rogues edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois

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Rogues George R.R. Martin-smallGeorge R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois have edited a number of major anthologies together over the last few years, including the massive heroic fantasy volume Warriors (2010), the star-crossed love story collection Songs of Love and Death (2010), urban fantasy-focused Down These Strange Streets (2011), Jack Vance tribute Songs of the Dying Earth (2010), the 800-page Dangerous Women (2013), and (my personal favorite) Old Mars. But now they’ve assembled what may be the most intriguing of the lot, a collection of 21 original stories (including a brand new A Game of Thrones tale by George R.R. Martin) showcasing thieves, villains, and ambiguous heroes of all sorts.

If you’re a fan of fiction that is more than just black and white, this latest story collection from #1 New York Times bestselling author George R. R. Martin and award-winning editor Gardner Dozois is filled with subtle shades of gray. Twenty-one all-original stories, by an all-star list of contributors, will delight and astonish you in equal measure with their cunning twists and dazzling reversals. And George R. R. Martin himself offers a brand-new A Game of Thrones tale chronicling one of the biggest rogues in the entire history of Ice and Fire.

Follow along with the likes of Gillian Flynn, Joe Abercrombie, Neil Gaiman, Patrick Rothfuss, Scott Lynch, Cherie Priest, Garth Nix, and Connie Willis, as well as other masters of literary sleight-of-hand, in this rogues gallery of stories that will plunder your heart — and yet leave you all the richer for it.

Featuring all-new stories by Joe Abercrombie, Daniel Abraham, David W. Ball, Paul Cornell, Bradley Denton, Phyllis Eisenstein, Gillian Flynn, Neil Gaiman, Matthew Hughes, Joe R. Lansdale, Scott Lynch, Garth Nix, Cherie Priest, Patrick Rothfuss, Steven Saylor, Michael Swanwick, Lisa Tuttle, Carrie Vaughn, Walter Jon Williams, and Connie Willis.

Rogues includes an introduction by George R.R. Martin and will be published by Bantam Books on June 17, 2014. It is a massive 832 pages, priced at $30 in hardcover and $14.99 for the digital edition. I’m underwhelmed by the cover, but I suppose it fits the theme of the earlier Warriors and Dangerous Women volumes.

The Hugo Ballot: Another View

The Hugo Ballot: Another View

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Neptune's Brood-smallPeople will have heard that the Hugo nominations are out. I think the reactions to each ballot always break in two ways: the process and the content.

Lots of people have views on the process of constructing the ballot and the views are so diverse that I couldn’t do justice with a bunch of links here. If you’re interested in that crowd reaction, John O’Neill covered the tip of the iceberg in his post last week.

I suppose my only two cents is to point out that nobody likes 100% of any ballot and that, because they are based on a nomination process of voters who have different tastes and criteria, this is hardly surprising. On the content, I think there’s plenty on this ballot to make a strong showing at the Hugo Awards Ceremony over Labor Day Weekend.

The novels ballot looks interesting. I’ve been told wonderful things about Leckie’s debut novel Ancillary Justice and now I want to read it even more. I love Charles Stross (an honor I share with Nobel in Economics Laureate Klugman), but I have to admit that Neptune’s Brood is neither exciting nor captivating literature so far (although I’m only a third of the way through).

I was discussing Stross with a friend yesterday. He’s got a dizzyingly varied corpus (the Laundry Files novels, “Rogue Farm,” Saturn’s Children and “Lobsters” stake out just a few examples of some of his creative way stations), but my friend and I noted that we sometimes have a harder time with his character work and plotting, much as we might with Perdido Street Station by Mieville. I’ll finish Neptune’s Brood and see what I think.

There are some intriguing entries on the novella ballot, including some Stross, but also Cat Valente and a Brad Torgerson story from Analog. Analog doesn’t seem to get a lot of Hugo attention, and at first, I thought this might be the sign of editorial changes at the magazine.

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“An Element of Imagination”: Olga Slavnikova’s 2017

“An Element of Imagination”: Olga Slavnikova’s 2017

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2017Every so often, I come across a book so idiosyncratic I have to write about it just to work out what it is I’ve read. A book strange and powerful, but whose power is difficult to locate or specify. Sometimes it’s hard even to be sure whether the book can be called ‘good’ in any meaningful way. By writing about it, I can get some thoughts in order, and see where they lead. And as such, I want to take a look here at Olga Slavnikova’s 2017.

Slavnikova’s book won the 2006 Russian Booker Prize and was translated into English by Marian Schwartz in 2010. It’s nominally science fiction, being set in the titular year and featuring a few relatively minor advances in technology as part of its setting. It reads much more like fantasy, though. It’s set in a part of Russia not to be located on a map, but also not entirely fictional, and it’s haunted by a folktale of a mountain-spirit. And, at a certain point, history begins to repeat itself for reasons more thematic than rational: an irruption of the surreal and dreamlike into the slow-moving plot.

The book begins with its main character, Krylov, a gemcutter, seeing off a professional acquaintance, Professor Anfilogov, at a train station. There Krylov meets a woman he comes to call Tanya, and the two begin an affair in which they deliberately keep their real names and backgrounds secret from each other. As Anfilogov finds a deposit of precious gems far off in the mountains, history begins to repeat itself: re-enactments of the Russian Revolution take on a life of their own, causing confused violence and incidentally separating Krylov and Tanya. Krylov has to turn to his ex-wife, Tamara, who has become rich by selling a new approach to funerals. Violence rises as Krylov seeks Tanya and Anfilogov tries to get back home, with rumours of his discovery preceding him.

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