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Month: October 2017

Undead Emperors and Cybernetic Rebels: The Succession Novels by Scott Westerfeld

Undead Emperors and Cybernetic Rebels: The Succession Novels by Scott Westerfeld

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The Risen Empire-small The Killing of Worlds-small

Last month I bought a remaindered copy of The Risen Empire, the opening novel in Scott Westerfeld’s acclaimed Succession series. Of course that meant I had to track down the second and final volume, The Killing of Worlds. In the process I had a quick look through our archives to see ifBG reviewers had had anything to say about them over the years.

As usual, our staff didn’t let me down. Martin Page held up the first volume as an exemplary achievement in his post “How and Why You Should Withhold Information from the Reader,” saying:

For example, Scott Westerfeld’s marvelous The Risen Empire quickly turns out to be about a secret. We see one team try to expose the secret and another — who know what it is — ruthlessly try to preserve it.

Here’s the back covers of both volumes.

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The Subtle Art of Game Speculation

The Subtle Art of Game Speculation

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Starcraft the Board Game-small

I collect a lot of games. They’re not all winners. For example, I stupidly purchased not one but two copies of the massive StarCraft: The Board Game from the clearance section of a toy store in 2007. I thought my kids — who were gonzo for the Blizzard computer game at the time — would show a least a little interest, but they never did. Just because a game is heavily discounted doesn’t mean it’s a good buy. I kicked myself for making a dumb impulse purchase, and stashed the games in my basement.

Flash forward a decade to today, as I’m sitting in the front row of the Games Plus Fall auction in Mount Prospect, Illinois. It runs over four days, but the Saturday auction is reserved for science fiction games and RPGs. There are thousands sold to collectors and enthusiasts from all over the Midwest. And what to my astonished eyes was one of the most hotly sought-after items? StarCraft: The Board Game, which is apparently both rare and highly desirable, at least in good shape. The first copy to be offered up, a perfect copy still in the shrinkwrap, caused a frenzy of bidding, and sold for $112. Not bad for a game I paid $30 for in a discount bin ten years ago.

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October Is Hammer Country: The Kiss of the Vampire (1963)

October Is Hammer Country: The Kiss of the Vampire (1963)

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kiss_of_vampire_posterOctober is here and that means I need no excuse simply to line up a quartet of horror movies from Britain’s Hammer Film Productions for the next four Saturdays in a row and throw words at them. For me, Hammer films are the perfect horrors for the Halloween season: atmospheric, Gothic, supernatural featuring famous monsters, violent without making you feel abysmal afterward, and packed with plenty of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. Hammer movies feel like great Halloween party guests who wear the most elegant costumes and whom you want to hang out with after the other guests have gone home.

My criteria for picking the four movies for a Hammer October was to choose films from outside of the studio’s two major franchises — Dracula and Frankenstein — and which are currently available on Blu-ray in North America. Which means Plague of the Zombies and The Devil Rides Out are disqualified, unfortunately. (Kino Lorber, please get on this.) But it was easy to find movies that fit my ghoulish bill, and I’m starting off with the first vampire film Hammer produced that didn’t involve Dracula.

The Kiss of the Vampire was originally intended as a follow-up to The Brides of Dracula (1960), the first sequel to Hammer’s smash 1958 hit Dracula/Horror of Dracula. Hammer was trying to create a Dracula series without the count and Christopher Lee, focusing instead on Dracula’s legacy of aristocratic blood-sucking descendants and Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing pursuing them. The Kiss of the Vampire was going to continue this, introducing a full coven of vampires holding black magic ceremonies in a Gothic castle. This expanded on hints from The Brides of Dracula: the opening narration speaking of how Dracula’s “disciples live on to spread the cult and corrupt the world,” and the story of the wealthy visitors to Castle Meinster who seduced the young baron into their undead circle.

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New Treasures: The Core by Peter Brett

New Treasures: The Core by Peter Brett

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The Core Peter Brett-smallThe second book in Peter Brett’s Demon Cycle series, The Desert Spear, became an international bestseller, and the next two volumes catapulted him to the top tier in the industry. That’s a meteoric rise for someone with a single series to their name.

Anticipation for the final book, The Core, has been running high for two years, and it finally arrived  in hardcover from Del Rey this week. Here’s the description.

For time out of mind, bloodthirsty demons have stalked the night, culling the human race to scattered remnants dependent on half-forgotten magics to protect them. Then two heroes arose — men as close as brothers, yet divided by bitter betrayal. Arlen Bales became known as the Warded Man, tattooed head to toe with powerful magic symbols that enable him to fight demons in hand-to-hand combat — and emerge victorious. Jardir, armed with magically warded weapons, called himself the Deliverer, a figure prophesied to unite humanity and lead them to triumph in Sharak Ka — the final war against demonkind.

But in their efforts to bring the war to the demons, Arlen and Jardir have set something in motion that may prove the end of everything they hold dear — a swarm. Now the war is at hand, and humanity cannot hope to win it unless Arlen and Jardir, with the help of Arlen’s wife, Renna, can bend a captured demon prince to their will and force the devious creature to lead them to the Core, where the Mother of Demons breeds an inexhaustible army.

Trusting their closest confidantes, Leesha, Inevera, Ragen, and Elissa, to rally the fractious people of the Free Cities and lead them against the swarm, Arlen, Renna, and Jardir set out on a desperate quest into the darkest depths of evil — from which none of them expects to return alive.

At 800 pages, The Core brings the page count for the entire 5-volume series to an impressive 3,250 pages. This is an epic you can sink your teeth into, and no mistake. It began with The Warded Man, still available in paperback. Those of you looking for a new fantasy series, and who hate to start reading before it’s complete — your ship has finally come in.

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In 500 Words or Less … Utter Fabrications: Historical Accounts Of Unusual Buildings And Structures, ed. by Dawn Vogel and Jeremy Zimmerman

In 500 Words or Less … Utter Fabrications: Historical Accounts Of Unusual Buildings And Structures, ed. by Dawn Vogel and Jeremy Zimmerman

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Utter Fabrication-smallUtter Fabrications: Historical Accounts of Unusual Buildings and Structures
Edited by Dawn Vogel and Jeremy Zimmerman
Mad Scientist Journal Presents, DefCon One Publishing (354 pages, $14.99 paperback, $4.99 eBook, Sept 2017)

“No one understands strange places like the people who have been there,” opens the description for Utter Fabrications: Historical Accounts of Unusual Buildings and Structures, calling out the fact that everyone knows a place that gives them a funny feeling. For me, it was a stretch of residential street partway between the grocery store where I worked as a teenager and the home where my mom and stepdad lived. Walking that way wouldn’t always make my skin crawl… but enough that I started to avoid it.

The idea behind this anthology, I think, is to evoke that familiar feeling of the uncanny. And some of the stories in Utter Fabrications manage to do that. “Every House, A Home” by Evan Dicken focuses on a freelancer who tries to suss out the negative energy around buildings – not because of bad feng shui or poltergeists, but because the building is actually unhappy. In “Kingsport Asylum” by Diana Hauer, a woman returns to the asylum where she spent her youth and faces the very tangible memories of the crimes committed there.

Each story takes the idea of a place being inhabited by energies beyond our understanding and plays with it, and one of the strengths of this anthology is the different ways this idea is shaped, whether it’s through a roving bike rack, a house that dreams of exotic locales or a city district that sometimes takes people but also sometimes protects them. There are also a number of diverse characters on display; my favorite was the non-binary groundskeeper in “Asylum,” with a close second being Nat in “Every House,” who struggles with reading human emotions but can become totally in tune with a building.

If I’m being entirely honest, though, none of the stories really drew me in or gave me that “aha” moment I look for in short fiction. In some cases the stories are predictable, and in many cases things work out well in almost prosaic or Lifetime movie sort of way, which has never been my cup of tea. The roving bike rack that becomes attached to Alanna McFall’s protagonist in “Can’t Be Locked Down” is the one story that struck me with its quirky originality, but none of the others really did the same.

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Goth Chick News: That Time We Drove 350 Miles for Haunted Houses and Gothic Music

Goth Chick News: That Time We Drove 350 Miles for Haunted Houses and Gothic Music

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Cedar Point and Midnight Syndicate

Cedar Point Amusement Park… the final word in destinations for rollercoaster enthusiasts.

The three hundred and sixty-four-acre attraction, located on a Lake Erie peninsula in Sandusky, Ohio opened in 1870 and is the second-oldest operating amusement park in the United States. Known as “America’s Roller Coast,” Cedar Point features a world-record 71 rides, including 16 roller coasters.

But is this the reason Black Gate photog Chris Z kept texting me the words “road trip” at least twice a day for a month since March?

Nope.

It goes back to our last road trip to St. Louis to attend the Haunted Attraction Association show where I spend time every year fan-girling out over my goth-boy-band crushes, the musical group Midnight Syndicate.

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Future Treasures: The Book of Swords, edited by Gardner Dozois

Future Treasures: The Book of Swords, edited by Gardner Dozois

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The Book of Swords-smallA while back Gardner Dozois asked if I wanted a review copy of his upcoming “Sword & Sorcery” anthology, The Book of Swords.

Now, Gardner does not do small anthologies — neither in the physical sense, nor in the sense of their impact on the field. If the premier anthologist in the SF community was putting his time and energy into a collection of original sword & sorcery tales, then clearly the genre still has some life in it.

It wasn’t that long ago that I thought the era of big-budget (or even modest-budget) S&S anthologies was long over. What’s changed? The global phenomena that is GRRM’s Game of Thrones, that’s what’s changed. I don’t consider GoT to be sword & sorcery… but there’s no denying that publishers (and film producers) are a lot more interested in adventure fantasy all of a sudden. If the results are anything like The Book of Swords, I’m all for it.

The Book of Swords arrives next week in hardcover from Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire publisher Bantam Books, with sixteen brand new stories by Lavie Tidhar, Robin Hobb, Ken Liu, Matthew Hughes, Walter Jon Williams, C. J. Cherryh, Garth Nix, Ellen Kushner, Scott Lynch — and, yes, a brand new Song of Ice and Fire story from George R. R. Martin.

Fantasy fiction has produced some of the most unforgettable heroes ever conjured onto the page: Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, Michael Moorcock’s Elric of Melniboné, Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Classic characters like these made sword and sorcery a storytelling sensation, a cornerstone of fantasy fiction — and an inspiration for a new generation of writers, spinning their own outsize tales of magic and swashbuckling adventure.

Now, in The Book of Swords, acclaimed editor and bestselling author Gardner Dozois presents an all-new anthology of original epic tales by a stellar cast of award-winning modern masters — many of them set in their authors’ best-loved worlds. Join today’s finest tellers of fantastic tales, including George R. R. Martin, K. J. Parker, Robin Hobb, Scott Lynch, Ken Liu, C. J. Cherryh, Daniel Abraham, Lavie Tidhar, Ellen Kushner, and more on action-packed journeys into the outer realms of dark enchantment and intrepid derring-do, featuring a stunning assortment of fearless swordsmen and warrior women who face down danger and death at every turn with courage, cunning, and cold steel.

Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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Modular: Starfinder Alien Archive — Clark Ashton Smith meets Douglas Adams (with visuals by Ray Harryhausen)

Modular: Starfinder Alien Archive — Clark Ashton Smith meets Douglas Adams (with visuals by Ray Harryhausen)

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256 Starfinder Alien Archive
Starfinder Alien Archive — due  October 18th
256 Kurtzhau the GM
“Kurtzhau,” 13, our local Starfinder GM

Though writers are notoriously not always the best parents, I’m a Good Dad right now. I got us a preview copy of the forthcoming Starfinder Alien Archive — it’s due out October 18th.

Kurtzhau, my 13 year old son who’s currently GMing the game for his mates, rates it as “Awesome.”

I concur.

80+ new aliens (depends on how you count), 20 playable races (some delightfully nuts ), lots of alien tech, each entry a rich adventure seed in its own right and rules for building your own NPC aliens.

Lovely illustrations. Good writing. And it’s got a sort of creative gravitas. Nothing here is throwaway.

Take the Void Hag.

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Strolling through Medieval Segovia, Spain

Strolling through Medieval Segovia, Spain

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The Alcázar, built in the 12th century upon the foundations
of a Roman fort, is one of Spain’s most impressive castles,
and that’s saying a lot. Check out my previous post
about the Alcázar of Segovia and its interesting
collection of medieval artillery.

While I’ve blogged a lot here about the sites of Madrid, it’s been a while since I’ve mentioned some of the excellent day trip possibilities from the Spanish capital. My favorite is the small city of Segovia just on the other side of the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains. With a beautiful cathedral and castle, one of the best preserved Roman aqueducts in Europe, plus winding medieval streets and delicious cuisine, it’s a popular choice for a day trip or overnight stay. You can reach Segovia by bus in just over an hour.

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A Mutiny in Space, and an Emperor of the Stars: High Adventure #153: Classic Stories from Wonder Stories

A Mutiny in Space, and an Emperor of the Stars: High Adventure #153: Classic Stories from Wonder Stories

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Hig Adventure 153-small Hig Adventure 153-back-small

I began collecting pulp magazines in my early teens. Back then I wasn’t too concerned about condition or rarity… I just wanted to read them. Books like Jacques Sadoul’s 2000 A.D. Illustrations From the Golden Age of Science Fiction Pulps and Asimov’s Before the Golden Age ignited an intense curiosity about these early science fiction tales of alien invasions, space explorers, killer robots, and scientists with labs that would make Reed Richards green wth envy.

Pulps were hard to find in those pre-eBay days, and mostly I had to make do with tattered anthologies. I would have appreciated a magazine like High Adventure very much at the time, let me tell you. The magazine reprints about a half-dozen short stories and novelettes from the pulps in each themed issue; the reprints are facsimiles shot right from the original pages, with art, ads, and all. The theme for issue #143 is Classic Stories from Wonder Tales, and it contains hard-to-find fiction by Manly Wade Wellman, Clark Ashton Smith, Nathan Schachner and Arthur L. Zagat, Gawain Edwards, and R.F. Starzl.

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