“I started reading more about the history and culture of Africa. And I began to realise that in the SF and fantasy genre, blacks were, with only few exceptions, either left out or depicted in racist and stereotypic ways. I had a choice: I could either stop reading SF and fantasy, or try to do something about my dissatisfaction with it by writing my own stories and trying to get them published. I chose the latter course.” –Charles R. Saunders…
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Back when Black Gate‘s editor John O’Neill lived in Ottawa in the early 80s, he was a member of a small SF fan club. His first meeting featured a reading from the editor of an excellent local fanzine, Stardock, who had just completed his first novel. The author was Charles Saunders, the novel was Imaro, and the reading he never forgot. DAW released the first three Imaro novels between 1981 and 1985, then dropped the series for reasons arising from textbook bad…
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A Review by Ryan Harvey Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. Imaro 2: The Quest for Cush by Charles Saunders Night Shade Books (214 pages, May 2007, $14.95) Let’s put the lie to a hackneyed advertising slogan: you do get a second chance to make a first impression. Imaro offers the proof. Charles Saunders’s sword-and-sorcery hero didn’t make a good first impression in paperback publishing during his inaugural go-round in the early 1980s. DAW Books released Imaro…
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A Look at Current Fantasy Books Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. The Children of Húrin by J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien Houghton Mifflin [313 pages, April 2007, $26.00] Reviewed by Ryan Harvey A common misconception about the writings of J.R.R. Tolkien often used by critics within the genre is that his work offers “reassurances,” a bucolic and cozy English country professor’s view of the world using those adorable Hobbits. Where this view comes from, I…
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“I am going to tell a story,” the griot says. “Ya-ngani!” the crowd responds, meaning “Right!” “It may be a lie.” “Ya-ngani.” “But not everything in it is false.” “Ya-ngani.” The griot begins his tale. from “Amma” by Charles R. Saunders For those unfortunates unacquainted with Charles R. Saunders and the tales he’s woven, you can read plenty about them here at…
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After DAW killed the fourth Imaro novel, for nearly twenty years Charles R. Saunders’s published swords & sorcery output was limited to only a few short stories. Since 2006, starting with the reprinting of Imaro, new books from him have been appearing at a furious rate. In addition to new novels starring his established S&S characters, Imaro and Dossouye, he introduced a new pulp hero, Damballa. Abengoni: First Calling (A:FC) is the first book in Charles R. Saunders’s foray into epic…
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As I’ve written before, we are living in a S&S renaissance. A genre that was stuck in a loop of rote characters — fighting the same wizards, stealing the same temple treasures and damsels’ virtues — and virtually extinct from bookstore shelves, has come roaring back to life in the past decade. It may not command the same attention it did forty years ago, but it is rousing and alive. Something that’s proving to be incredibly reinvigorating to the genre…
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Charles R. Saunders, author of the legendary Imaro books, has weighed in on Howard Andrew Jones’s first novel: What, then, is so special about The Desert of Souls? Well, just about everything. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of the Middle East during the initial bloom of Islam’s ascendance, Howard brings to life the storied past of places such as Baghdad, Basra, Mosul… To this tapestry of history, Howard adds several threads of sorcery… The protagonists and the patron become involved…
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Charles Saunders has posted a terrific short story over at the blog section of his website — the sort of story that would not have been out of place in a classic issue of Weird Tales. ‘Luendi’ is in four, rather short, parts, and gives us the fate of one Piet van Brug, a man that embodies all the vilest characteristics of imperialism. Colonial Africa in 1890 is the setting, or more precisely an unexplored section of the interior beyond…
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The man is back! Charles R. Saunders rocked Sword-and-Sorcery in the ’70s and ’80s with his African fantasy hero Imaro, a compelling character who tore through the pages of numerous magazines and whose exploits were ultimately collected in three volumes from DAW. Over the last few years two of those were generously updated and republished by Nightshade Books, causing fans of Saunders’ unforgettable heroes to rejoice at the return of one of the masters of the field. Now, via Brother…
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