Raiders of the Lost Ark (Paramount Pictures, June 12, 1981)
As you will see, my choices are on the whole rather fluffy, but these are the films that I return to time and time again for comfort, or as a way to reset my brain. I’d be very interested to find out if any of my favorites align with any of your own – please let me know in the comments below!
Without further ado, in no particular order, and no ratings (because they are all 10s), let’s get cracking!
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Who’s in it?
Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, John Rhys-Davies, Paul Freeman
What’s it about?
A professor of archaeology has a side hustle stealing cultural artifacts under the pretense that they belong in a museum, but redeems himself by punching a lot of Nazis.
Doris Piserchia was born Doris Summers on October 11, 1928 in Fairmont, West Virginia. She earned a Bachelor of Arts from Fairmont State College in 1950. Although her family expected her to go into teaching, Piserchia had no interested in teaching an instead, after graduation, she served in the United States Navy until 1954, achieving the rank of Lieutenant. While in the Navy, she married Joseph Piserchia, who was serving in the Army. They would have five children. In the early 1960s, Piserchia attended the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, studying educational psychology.
Piserchia’s publishing career didn’t begin until she sold “Rocket to Gehenna” to Joseph Ross at Fantastic, where it appeared in the September 1966 issue. In some ways, “Rocket to Gehenna” was a false start for Piserchia. It is not like any of her other works and she wouldn’t publish again for six years, until “Sheltering Dream” appeared in Worlds of If, which published two more of her stories that year.
The following year, 1973, saw Piserchia break into anthologies with “Half the Kingdom” appearing in Damon Knight’s Orbit 12. She would appear in five successive volumes of Orbit. Her short fiction career, however, was brief, with her final short story, “Deathrights Deferred” appearing in Science Fiction Discoveries, edited by Carol and Frederik Pohl, in 1976, although he story “The Residents of Kingston,” sold to Harlan Ellison, would eventually appear in the J. Michael Straczynski edited Last Dangerous Visions in 2024.
The Weigher (Baen Books, November 1992). Cover by C. W. Kelly
First contact stories are one of science fiction’s major subgenres, an important branch of stories about aliens, going back at least to H. G. Wells’s The First Men in the Moon. The usual point of view is a human one; after all, humans are familiar and nonhumans are not, and that way the reader can share the protagonist’s discovery of a new species and culture. But every so often, a writer tells the story from the nonhuman point of view. The Weigher, published first in Analog in 1984 and then expanded into a novel in 1992, is one of these ventures.
What adds interest to this is that the culture of the aliens is worked out in some detail, and is different from our own culture in major ways, and probably from a lot of human cultures. Some of these differences reflect different biology and psychology; others probably don’t, such as the version of money in use.
I am gut punched to hear that author James Sallis (December 1944 – January 27, 2026) has died. James was the closest thing to a writing mentor I had. He was a friend, and certainly one of the most talented writers I’ve ever known.
He lived in New Orleans when I moved there and I met him at a book signing. Though he was already pretty famous in literary circles, he was incredibly down to earth, and he invited me to his house for several literary parties he and his wife, Karyn, threw. Though at that time I’d only published a few short stories, he spoke to me as a peer.
I took myself on a date Thursday night. It was very romantic. I first went to a bookshop to pick up a new book for myself (this was because I had forgotten to take my book with me, and could not spend the evening passing time without a book. It is law that if you forget the book you intended to bring, you must procure a new one. I don’t make the rules (I do, in fact, make the rules)). I do so love a bookshop that is full of books. So many have “branched out” relegating the books to a tiny corner and filling the space with other stuff. I’m diverting, but this is a worthy digression.
Anyway, after treating myself to a new book, I ventured over to a restaurant and treated myself to dinner and a couple of drinks. Given how cold it was in Ottawa Thursday night (-22C or so before the windchill… I might be wrong, but I think that is somewhere around -8F), I was surprised by how busy it had gotten; a fact I only realised when it was time to pay up and head over to the cinema. It is a very good book, so far.
So off to the cinema I went, with a full stomach, to watch the new indie horror film Iron Lung, scripted, produced, directed by and staring YouTube personality Markiplier. I did not know what to expect. I have spent the better part of the lead up to the release of the film avoiding everything to do with it in order to go in as fresh and unspoiled as possible. I was expecting it to be very much an amateur film; rough around the edges, perhaps a little silly where it ought not b… you know… normal mistakes from amateur filmmakers with their first feature. I did not get what I expected.
I’m working on a Douglas Adams post as part of an upcoming recurring feature on his non-fiction quotes.
But I got sidetracked reading Calvin and Hobbes this past weekend. Much of America is in a war against brutal weather. We got over 16 inches of snow in Central Ohio, and sub-zero wind chill has been a regular thing. Throughout the country, people are seeing snow for the first time in decades; and in huge amounts.
There are some terrific Winter strips for Calvin and Hobbes; that was definitely a more magical time when we were kids. As opposed to multiple sessions digging out the car; to go to work, now. Sigh…
Life through Calvin’s eyes is a treat to read after all these years. And even as adults, we can still find ourselves locked in family battles over the thermostat setting. Fox Trot, another favorite cartoon of mine, deals with that more than once. As a family with three kids, you can imagine it.
Here, Dad ends the debate with a valid parental option, as he often does. And Calvin gives up. I really enjoy these interchanges, which often involve grumpy old man ‘builds character’ lessons.
Robert Holdstock’s Berserker Series, published under the name Chris Carlsen. Sphere Books, 1977-1979. Covers by Melvyn Grant
A series that I wanted but had a difficult time getting was the Berserkerseries by Chris Carlsen. There are three books, all from Sphere Books, published in 1977, 1977, & 1979 respectively. I finally got the last one and just finished reading it. The series is:
1. Shadow of the Wolf (August 1977)
2. The Bull Chief (October 1977)
3. The Horned Warrior (1979)
ISFDB lists Melvyn Grant as the cover artist on #1 and 3, and I’m pretty sure book 2 is by him as well. These books are pot boiling, action pulp style Sword & Sorcery novels, and it was quite a surprise when I found out Chris Carlsen was really Robert Holdstock (1948 – 2009).
Following the excellent Starship Troopers feedback last week, here’s a selection that might be a little less controversial.
Kidding.
The Party (1968)
Who’s in it?
Peter Sellers, Claudine Longet, Steve Franken, Denny Miller
What’s it about?
Hrundi V. Bakshi (Sellers) is an up and coming Indian actor who dreams of the big time. Unfortunately, being prone to mishaps leads to him blowing up a very expensive film set, and he is fired on the spot. Due to a clerical error though, he ends up on the guest list to a party being thrown by the film’s producer, and he attends in the hope that he can apologize in person. Through no fault of his own, Bakshi stumbles through one surreal incident after another, ultimately leading to the partial destruction of a Hollywood mansion, and a blossoming romance with a young French starlet.
Robert Moore Williams was born in Farmington, Missouri on June 19, 1907 and attended the Missouri School of Journalism, from which he graduated in 1931 with a Bachelor of Arts in journalism. He married Margaret Jelley in 1938 and they had one daughter. The couple divorced in 1952.
Williams published his first short story, “Zero as a Limit” in the July 1937 issue of Astounding Science Fiction, at the time still edited by F. Orlin Tremaine. Later in 1937, he published a story in Thrilling Wonder Stories, edited by Mort Weissinger, and his third story, “Flight of the Dawn Star” appeared in the March 1938 issue of Astounding, now edited by John W. Campbell, Jr. By the end of 1938, he added Amazing Stories, edited by Raymond A. Palmer to the list of magazines and editors he sold to.
In addition to science fiction, Williams published in a variety of other genres, occasionally using pseudonyms, including John S. Browning, H.H. Harmon, and Russell Storm. He also used the house name E.K. Jarvis on some stories written for the Ziff-Davis magazines, such as “Hickson’s Strange Adventure.” Although Williams was the most prolific (and possibly only) author to use the Jarvis name in the 40s, Robert Bloch used it most often in the 50s, with seven stories appearing under that byline. Other authors to use it included Paul W. Fairman, Harlan Ellison, Robert Silverberg, and Henry Slesar.
A Sword of Bronze and Ashes, September 12, 2023, FLAME TREE PRESS (Cover illustration by Broci)
Welcome to more Dark Muse News. This post reviews Anna Smith Spark’s A Sword of Bronze and Ashes. It was released in September 2023 (Flame Tree Press, cover illustration by Broci) and is the first book of the series The Making of This World: Ruined. The sequel, A Sword of Gold and Ruin, was recently published in October, 2025.
Anna Smith Spark is known as the Queen of Grimdark, a moniker she acquired with her Empires of Dust series. You can expect the same poetic brutality here. Her style and approach are very unique but are reminiscent of Tanith Lee. Literary wording may keep you distanced as a reader, but the raw emotion expressed throughout is so real that it makes the fantasy feel real, too. We interviewed Anna Smith Spark in 2019 – Disgust and Desire as part of our Beauty in Weird Fiction series, where she revealed all sorts of muses and inspirations. That year, we hosted a Q&A Session at Gen Con; there, she, John O’Neill, and I showed off our footwear (link); Anna’s footwear won hands down! …
