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Year: 2011

Jim Roslof: 1946-2011

Jim Roslof: 1946-2011

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Jim Roslof, the best boss in Middle Earth
Jim Roslof, the best boss in Middle Earth

The news of Jim Roslof’s battle with cancer took a negative turn this week. I was informed by Jeff Easley that time was limited, and I was crushed to hear that Jim passed away in his bed at home on Saturday morning, March 19, 2011.

As many of you who read my art blog know, Jim is one of the finest individuals I’ve ever had the honor of working with. Jim was bright, humorous, and a joy to correspond with. His beautiful contribution to the Art Evolution Project was done with a love of the industry that shown in his brush strokes, and sadly that image was the last he ever produced.

For all of you who’ve known Jim or appreciated his work, especially the art direction that brought us his TSR hires like Larry Elmore, Jeff Easley, Keith Parkinson, and Jim Holloway, I hope you’ll find the time to send a card. Trust me when I say this, that when they made Jim, they broke the mold, but the world was much better for having him in it.

To me, Jim represented the very best of what gaming and the art that defined it should be. He never took himself too seriously, never fell in line with a corporate view, and had an eye for talent that very few in the industry ever will. I salute you, Jim, and thank you for being a friend when I needed it most, your insider information about the dawn of RPGs always bringing a smile to my face.

Cards can be sent to: Jim & Laura Roslof W5409 Kenosha Dr, Elkhorn, WI 53147

Monstrous Post on Monsters III: Monstronomicon

Monstrous Post on Monsters III: Monstronomicon

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The Harpy Celaeno from Peter S. Beagle's THE LAST UNICORN
The Harpy Celaeno from Peter S. Beagle's THE LAST UNICORN

I ranted and raved in the previous installment of this monstrous undertaking about how all the mere morsels who responded to my first post in the the series did little to address my actual question — which was, who are the great monster of modern heroic fantasy? What crevasses do they haunt, what lonely paths do they prowl?

As you can see, many monstrosities were discussed, but little from the preferred topic of this here Black Gate blog.

However, as those comments were coming in, I also received an email from one Massimiliano Izzo of Genova, Italy, who dealt out all sorts of fantastical fantasy monsters the way Grendel dealt out death to drunken Danes — in large amounts, with enthusiasm.

max1Here is how this morsel describes himself: “You can just say that I became addicted to fantasy when I was 13 and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ blew me away…since then I’ve read a little bit of everything from William Morris and Dunsany to recent authors like Erikson and Robin Hobb, but I still do prefer the old school (before-Brooks). I’m also interested in mythologies from all over the world (by the way, Filipino folklore rocks! They have some terrific monsters.)

“Currently I’m a little bit bored with multi-volume series and I prefer standalone books. My favoutite authors, besides Tolkien are Patricia McKillip (hands down!!), Jack Vance and GRRMartin. I could add R.E. Howard, J.K. Rowling and another thousand of pretty predictable names but I’m stopping here… Ah, and I love old school hard rock/heavy metal/AOR.”

All monster lovers should adore metal, of course.

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Late with my playoff picks

Late with my playoff picks

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Okay, I’m a little late with my brackets, but here they are anyway.

swordandsorcerybrackets2

Tanya Roberts as Kiri
Tanya Roberts as Kiri

Obviously, there are some odd choices and upsets here. First of all, how did Kiri from Beastmaster make it into the women’s tourney?

Pure 80s hotness. One does have to put bums in seats.

(Click on the tumbnail pics for larger images.)

You may ask what James T. Kirk and the Gorn Captain doing in a Sword and Sorcery tournament? Well, Kirk wanted in, so he rewrote the computer program allocating arena space and logistics. He doesn’t like to lose.

Still, Titus Pullo should knock him unconscious in the second round, but I expect Kirk will lose his shirt.

Titus Pullo (HBO's Rome)
Titus Pullo (HBO's Rome)

You might accuse me of basing my picks on pure emotion.

If it were that, I’d have Etain and Titus Pullo going all the way, both because 2010’s Centurion deserved better notice than it received, and I’d love to see howling Pictish fury set against the trained brutality of everyone’s favorite drunken, whoremongering Roman legionary.

Those who cry “80s nostalgia” might have a better case, but Dragonslayer‘s Galen does fall to Titus Pullo in the first round…

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WAITING FOR BILBO: THE HOBBIT Begins Filming This Week

WAITING FOR BILBO: THE HOBBIT Begins Filming This Week

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It’s been a long time coming and the rumors have been flying for years now. Negotiations have been made, directors have been won and lost and won again, and now it seems the Dwarves are about about to arrive in Hobbiton. The movie adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy classic THE HOBBIT finally begins filming this week, specifically on March 21, in Wellington, New Zealand.

Reports coming in from Middle Earth are extremely encouraging…

hobbit12

 

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Steampunk II

Steampunk II

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spYou can read my review of Steampunk II: Steampunk Reloaded by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer over at the SF Site.  Here’s the general gist:

The various VanderMeer collections stand out because of their sense of humor about genre classification lacking in most academic treatments and that they supplement terrific fiction with offbeat critical discussions, typography and other diversions of interest. A prime example here is “A Secret History of Steampunk,” a collage incorporating graphics, multiple authors, and just plain weirdness to satirize the academic research and discussion of obscure literary fragments…many of these tales are positively brilliant. Margo Lanagan’s “Machine Made” is a disturbing fable of a sexually repressed newlywed taking revenge on a doltish husband whom she discovers seeks pleasures of the flesh through a mechanical servant. Caitlín R. Kiernan’s “The Steam Dancer (1896)” relates the desires of a woman rescued from death with bionic appendages who only feels truly whole as a saloon dancer before an audience of opium addicts attentive to her body, but oblivious to her artistry. As long as we’re on the subject of mechanically enabled creatures, “The Cast Iron Kid” by Andrew Knighton presents a Western gunfight in which the title character is undone not by a six-shooter, but by principles of subatomic physics. “As Recorded on Brass Cylinders: Adagio for Two Dancers” by James L. Grant and Lisa Matchev probably could have been recast as a “mainstream” SF story in which a pair of androids share the troubling human emotions of love and loyalty;  however, put in a steampunk context, it seems to me that much more poignant..

Vintage Treasures: Science Fiction in the Golden Age

Vintage Treasures: Science Fiction in the Golden Age

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sf-golden-ageJames Van Hise, renowned comic and pulp expert and editor of The Rocket’s Blast ComicCollector magazine, has compiled a terrific collection of non-fiction articles from the dawn of the science fiction pulp era.

Science Fiction in the Golden Age arrived in the mail a week ago, and I’ve been mesmerized by it ever since. It gathers articles, letters, interviews, advertisements and artwork that appeared in pulps, fanzines and other sources between 1908 and 1955, including a H. G. Wells piece in a 1908 issue of Cosmopolitan speculating about life on Mars – with four illustrations, all reproduced here in color – a 1938 report on John W. Campbell’s plans as the new editor of Astounding Science Fiction, a review of E.E. “Doc” Smith’s Galactic Patrol from 1950,  a report from “Inside the Graf Zeppelin” from Science & Invention (1929), and a lot more.

Authors include Hugo Gernsback, Leigh Brackett, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Thomas Sheridan, and Ray Bradbury, and the vintage art from pulps and fan magazines includes classic work by Frank R. Paul and others, as well as unused art intended for the first edition of The Skylark of Space. I particularly enjoyed the house ads for magazines and novels, including Amazing Stories and Otis Adelbert Kline’s The Planet of Peril.

This is clearly a labor of love from someone who spent years reading and gathering literary gems and curiosities from some extremely rare sources, including Air Wonder Stories, Fantastic Adventures, Scientifiction, Fantasy Review, Boys Magazine, Writers Digest, Fantasy Advertiser, and many other pulps and fanzines. The only criticism I have is that the page numbers in the TOC are rather useless, given that most of the magazine isn’t paginated.

Science Fiction in the Golden Age is the first in a planned series, although since this one came out in May 2005 and no new volumes have followed, I’m not sure about the state of those plans. Volume One is 160 pages, 8 1/2 x 11 (side-stapled) with full color front and back covers by Frank R. Paul. I bought mine from the author on eBay for $20; additional copies are still available.

Blogging Sax Rohmer’s The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu, Part Eight – “The Fiery Hand”

Blogging Sax Rohmer’s The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu, Part Eight – “The Fiery Hand”

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fiery-hand“The Fiery Hand” was the eighth installment of Sax Rohmer’s Fu-Manchu and Company.   The story was first published in Collier’s on September 25, 1915 and was later expanded to comprise Chapters 24-26 of the second Fu-Manchu novel, The Devil Doctor first published in the UK in 1916 by Cassell and in the US by McBride & Nast under the variant title, The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu.

8073861This serves as Rohmer’s variation on the haunted house story and mines the same territory as countless Sherlock Holmes pastiches where the reader is assured that the detective will arrive at a rational explanation because the other characters are convinced that the mysterious goings-on must be of supernatural origin from the start. That said, the story is an excellent one and finds Rohmer in fine form.

Inspector Weymouth calls on Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie to enlist Smith’s aid in investigating the Gables, a property in Hampstead that appears to have been haunted for the past two years. The previous owners, a Quaker family who lived at the house for over forty years sold it after manifestations of a fiery hand holding a flaming dagger appeared. They said nothing of the incident at the time for fear of not being able to sell the property.

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Locus 602 Arrives

Locus 602 Arrives

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locus-602The latest issue of Locus, the Magazine of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Field, has arrived at the Black Gate rooftop headquarters.

This issue contains interviews with Gene Wolfe and Alaya Dawn Johnson, a spotlight on Sean Wallace, a column by Cory Doctorow on “Explaining Creativity to a Martian,” short fiction reviews by Gardner Dozois and Rich Horton, the usual treasure trove of detailed book reviews by Gary K. Wolfe, Faren Miller, Paul Witcover, and many others, and a quarterly listing of US & UK Forthcoming Books through December 2011 — the most detailed and accurate catalog of forthcoming books in the industry.

As always, Locus also contains the latest news from the field. This issue includes coverage of the Nebula and Bram Stoker Award nominations, Borders’ bankruptcy, an obit of Brian Jacques, snippets and gossip on people & publishing, and much more.

The complete Table of Contents is here.

Simply put, if you want to keep up with what’s really happening in science fiction and fantasy, you need to be reading Locus.

We last covered Locus with the August 2010 issue.

This issue is 72 pages and priced at $6.95; a one-year (12-issue) subscription is $60. Their website is here, and online subscription form is here.

The Desert of Souls, a Review

The Desert of Souls, a Review

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the-desert-of-souls

“We should talk more, you and I,” he said, “about storytelling.”

–Howard Andrew Jones, The Desert of Souls

The Desert of Souls is the debut novel of Black Gate magazine managing editor Howard Andrew Jones. About ¼ of the way into it, I thought aloud: You’ve got to be kidding me. A debut novel? Jones’ Arabian Nights-style adventure has the polish of a cut diamond, and the finish of a veteran author.

The Desert of Souls is a proper fantasy, albeit placed in a historical setting, so there’s magic, undead monsters, god-like snakes, and more. I haven’t encountered a djinn on the printed page since my old AD&D days, and was pleasantly flooded with memories of Oasis of the White Palm as I read. The Desert of Souls features two heroes, Dabir and Asim, who spend large part of the book in near-death situations in pursuit of the wizard Fifouz, who plots to visit an ancient curse on a modern city.

Jones has an excellent sense of pace and an affinity for a tale properly told. Not rushed, but told as a story should be told, as though novelist and the reader were drawn up around a campfire with the whole night ahead for stories. A lot happens in The Desert of Souls but it’s not told breathlessly; the pace is languid at times, quick at others in Asim’s first person narrative. It’s also unabashedly optimistic, a welcome relief in these often dark times of current fantasy offerings.

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Goth Chick News: 16th Annual Halloween & Attractions Best in Show

Goth Chick News: 16th Annual Halloween & Attractions Best in Show

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24150_390196963255_167128213255_3900787_3094256_nLast weekend, St. Louis, MO played host to the 16th Annual Halloween & Attractions Show which was side by side with the Halloween Costume & Party Show. These events have not occurred simultaneous in several years and to have this much Halloween in one place was, well…

Let’s just say I needed to have a nice long lie down afterwards.

The HAS and the HCPS play host to vendors of every imaginable item for professional haunted attraction creators. Aisles of latex body parts, animatronic werewolves, smoke machines, scary sound effects, fake castle walls, grossly realistic masks and special effects makeup kept me engrossed for the full nine hours that the show ran on Saturday. In addition, I met several amazing artists, and a couple of horror movie directors that I’m sure you’ll recognize. But I’ll leave those as a surprise for later.

Over the coming weeks I will have the pleasure of bringing you several full-length interviews with the most intriguing people I met. But as I’ve done each year, we’ll start with a “Best in Show” list and let me say, it’s hard to stand out amidst this bloody mess. All of these items are available for purchase by the general public on the web sites indicated and represent the most innovative products for 2011.

I love this job.

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