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Forgotten Authors: George Allan England

Forgotten Authors: George Allan England

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George Allan England

George Allan England was born in Fort McPherson, Nebraska on February 9, 1877. He attended Harvard University, where he earned Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees. In 1903, he published Underneath the Bough: A Book of Verses. His first published science fiction story was “The Time Reflector,” which appeared in the September 1905 issue of The Monthly Story Magazine, edited by Trumbull White.

He published numerous short stories throughout the 1910s, which his novels Darkness and Dawn, Beyond the Great Oblivion, and The Afterglow being serialized in The Cavalier, between 1912 and 1913 and published by Small, Maynard & Company in 1914. These novels, set in 2915, a thousand years after “The Great Death” killed most of the human race during the 1920s. England’s protagonist, Allan Stern and his secretary survived the Great Death in a form of suspended animation, waking up to the new world. …

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This is Silly. Book Goals Are Not Personal

This is Silly. Book Goals Are Not Personal

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A tea cup sits atop a stack of artfully placed old books.
Image by Ylanite Koppens from Pixabay

Good afterevenmorn, Readers!

How was your winter holidays? I hope you found it gentle and restful and full of the things that make you happy. I spent some time with family, which is always lovely, and more time by myself recovering (the joys of being a massive introvert). It seems that the end of the year was more fraught for others than myself, though.

I’m speaking of the BookTok community. There have been a few ruffled feathers with folks getting angry at other folks for the massive number of books they may (or may not, as one of the accusations proclaim) have read.

If that sounds silly to you, you are not alone. I’ve been watching from the sidelines giggling or rolling my eyes, depending. Let’s get into this nonsense… because sometimes watching train wrecks in slow motion is mildly amusing. And so I am here after another adventure into social media to report on what’s going on over there.

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The Best of Bob: 2025

The Best of Bob: 2025

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Happy 2026! Let’s kick butt for another year. Or at least, limp to the finish in 52 weeks. I really enjoy ‘meeting’ with my friends – and some strangers – here at Black Gate every Monday morning. Keep checking in, and let’s keep the discourse going on things we love. Or at least that catches our eye. Black Gate really is a family. My time writing here has almost been longer than my marriage was!

I continued to evade the Firewall at Black Gate (no, I do not earn a cent a word every time I mention ‘Black Gate.’ like some kind of blogging Pulpster), so I showed up every Monday morning. I had a much harder time conning other folks into writing my column for me – they’re catching on. Drat! So, I had to do my own work this past year.

Here are what I thought were ten of my better efforts in 2025. Hopefully you saw them back when I first posted them. But if not, maybe you’ll check out a few now. Ranking them seemed a bit egotistical, so they’re in chronological order. Let’s go!

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Catching My Breath & Some Things to Recommend

Catching My Breath & Some Things to Recommend

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Blessed are the legend-makers with their  rhyme of things not found within  recorded  time.

from ‘Mythopoeia‘ (1931) by JRR Tolkien

The impetus to write my Tolkien series came from rewatching Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and realizing just how much I dislike them. That realization drove me back to the actual books. Diving once more into Middle-earth inspired me to begin a deeper exploration of Prof. Tolkien’s works, creation, and their influences.

My original motivation, largely of drafting a retort to the films, was quickly supplanted as soon as I picked up The Fellowship of the Ring and once again read that opening line:

When Mr. Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton.

I found myself immediately being pulled into the great vortex of Tolkien’s art and ideas. As my previous entries into this series describe, my attention was sometimes drawn to different elements that it had been on previous reading and my appreciation for certain things had grown over the years. What I’m not sure I brought up much was how much enjoyment I get from actually reading Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

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Steamed: What I’ve Been Playing in 2025

Steamed: What I’ve Been Playing in 2025

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Throughout 2025, I shared with you what I was Reading, Watching, and Listening To (audiobook-wise), I also covered a little bit of videogaming in a couple columns. But I figured I’d talk about some of the games I played this year, in one post. Utilizing my approach from my Conan Pastiches article during Cimmerian September, we’ll keep it to two paragraphs each.

I do most of my gaming through Steam, with Fortnite and a couple titles on Epic. I haven’t played anything on Good Old Games in a few years now, and I don’t use Amazon gaming pretty much at all.

OUT OF THE PARK BASEBALL 26

The 2019 edition of this baseball sim is my third-most played Steam game (771 hours). And I had payed a prior version for years, as well. I upgraded to the 2026 iteration this Summer, and it’s already in my Top 20. This is a simulation, not an arcade game. You can take any team from history and manage it from year-to-year. And you can quit/get fired and take over another team. You can manage games pitch by pitch, or by batter. Or have the computer simulate the game, or even month.

I enjoy setting up World Series match ups of two historical teams. I just replayed the 2017 World Series as the Dodgers, beating the Astros, who couldn’t cheat in this baseball game. Before that, it was the 1947 Dodgers vs. the 1946 Indians. I really enjoy this option. I think any baseball wonk (which I absolutely am) would enjoy this game.

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Iron Lung vs The Establishment

Iron Lung vs The Establishment

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Good afterevenmorn, Readers!

I feel like I manifested this… But I’m getting ahead of myself. Does anyone remember me lamenting about how difficult it was for original or new folks to break out in the entertainment industry? I’ve been griping since Adam was knee-high to a grasshopper (how’s that for a malaphor?) that original stories aren’t getting made anymore, with production companies all settling for established IPs with a huge fanbase they can take advantage of. Smaller stories, no matter how good they might be, are left in the dust because creative risks are just not done any longer.

It’s been a point of ire of mine for a while now. And then, as if answering the call, in comes a YouTuber with a fully independently produced and distributed film based in the world of a fully independently created video game. Alright, technically it is an adaptation, but the fact that the game is independent, small, and not widely known in the way, say, the Assassin’s Creed Franchise is, means that this one counts. It counts, alright?

Also, I believe this is not the story in the game, but in the world of the game, but I’ll explain later.

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That Annual Audible Sale 2025 (What I’ve Been Listening To)

That Annual Audible Sale 2025 (What I’ve Been Listening To)

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I have been using my library app a lot for audiobooks the past few months. I just borrowed (not all at once. I’m not a twit) the entire Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy radio shows, as part of my Douglas Adams rabbit-hole trip (which started when I listened to this book).

At the same time, I was listening to the early Cole and Hitch Westerns, from Robert B. Parker. You might have read about the great job Titus Welliver (Bosch) does reading those, here.

While using the library app more, I still have my Audible sub. And they do a BIG sale every year. Every title is on sale to some extent. Compared to last year, it seems like either the base prices were higher, or the percent reductions were less. However, I set my limit at $4 per title, and spent quite a few hours looking up authors and delving into subjects. I didn’t buy as many titles as I did last year. And I was hoping some things sitting in my Wish List since last year’s sale (like The Keep on the Borderlands) would be in my price range. Not even close. But I still picked up nearly two-dozen books – many for around $2.

CASTLE PERILOUS – John DeChancie

DeChancie wrote eight books in this series between 1988 and 1994. They aren’t quite as humorous as those classic-style paperback covers might lead you to believe:  like Craig Shaw Gardner’s stuff, or even Piers Anthony’s Xanth books. Maybe ‘fantastical’ is more appropriate. A little whimsical. 144,000 doors in the mysterious Castle lead to other worlds/aspects – one of which is Earth. It’s ruled by the sorcerer Incarnadine, and people who find their way to the Castle often become Guests, and stay. The series involves key characters in wild adventures – often with villains trying to take over the Castle.

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A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Will Murray on Dash(iell) and (Lester) Dent

A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Will Murray on Dash(iell) and (Lester) Dent

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Frequent guest columnist, New Pulp maven Will Murray, is back with more speculation: this time linking about the two biggest names in Pulp. Was Dashiell Hammett a Lester Dent fan? Well, let’s find out! 

The so-called Pulp Jungle, as Frank Gruber once called it, was a densely populated wonderland, at least insofar the greatest concentration of pulp magazine writers lived in or in close proximity to New York City, where most of the publishers were established.

Late in life, Theodore Tinsley, a regular contributor to Black Mask, The Shadow, as well as numerous other top pulp titles, recalled:

“Pulpland seems a strange, purple-clouded island, in a warm sea somewhere far off, where some of the damnedest elves and goblins I ever met used to say and do strange things, especially when drunk.”

Thanks in part to the American Fiction Guild, a writer’s association which flourished during the 1930s, a great many of these writers and their editors convened for Friday luncheon gatherings at Rosoff’s restaurant on 43rd Street. They socialized, vacationed together, dated, and even married. It was virtually a subculture delineated and confined by a common vocational focus.

Others, scattered throughout the country, kept in touch by letter. But not everyone knew everyone else, except possibly by reputation.

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In Defence of the “Romantasy Girlies”

In Defence of the “Romantasy Girlies”

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A typewriter with paper with the phrase “words have power” typed on it.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Good afterevenmorn, Readers!

So, once again I have entered the world of TikTok. This one is very old now, in the lightning fast news cycle that is that particular platform, so I’m rather behind the ball on commenting on it. For a few reasons for this. One, I’m old (ish. In internet terms, I mean). I simply cannot move at the speed TikTok seems to demand. Two, the one really got under my skin, despite not being one of the group targeted. So I wanted to take the time to calm down before approaching it. And third, I feel like I’ve covered this topic more than once, and I’m very annoyed that I feel compelled to tackle it once again. But here we are.

It is, of course, the weird, irritating, and erroneous snobbery between genres.

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Bob’s Books – Shelfie #13 (More Douglas Adams!)

Bob’s Books – Shelfie #13 (More Douglas Adams!)

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I don’t do much science fiction. I have Asimov’s Foundation books, and the first several Dune books (though The White Plague is my favorite Frank Herbert). And there are a few other assorted books from folks like Robert Heinlen, Philip K. Dick, and Arthur C. Clarke.

But man, I LOVE Douglas Adams, and The Hithchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I revisit Hitchhiker’s periodically, and the most recent dive down the rabbit hole led to me adding three more books to my bookshelf.

I’ve got a collection with Adams’ five Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy novels, as well as the lone Hitchhiker’s short story. With Adams, it all starts here, of course. I mean, how else are you gonna learn how to see the universe on less than 30 Altairian dollars a day?

There’s also Eoin Colfer’s good-enough official continuation novel, And Another Thing…

I’ve re-read the Hitchhiker’s series several times. I also listen to the audiobooks. They used to be available read by Adams himself, though those seem to be pretty much phased out. The current ‘in’ series has Stephen Fry doing book one, and Martin Freeman the other four.

Hitchhiker’s is ALWAYS fun. This series has never grown stale, or aged poorly, for me. I’ve been revisiting it for decades.

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