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Some Remarks on an Unremarkable Space Opera: Galactic Gambit by Roy C. Dudley

Some Remarks on an Unremarkable Space Opera: Galactic Gambit by Roy C. Dudley

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Galactic Gambit (Lenox Hill Press, September 1971). Cover by Herbstman

In my recent looks at less-remembered novels of the ’70s and ’80s I’ve covered some obscurish works by well-remembered writers (Phyllis Eisenstein, L. Sprague de Camp) and some obscurish works by less well known but hardly unknown writers (Gerard Klein, Mick Farren), and even some quite little known writers (Atanielle Annyn Noel).

But this time I’m trying for something truly obscure — a hardcover from 1971 that is the only novel by its writer, from a publishing company that offered microscopic advances ($300) and sold only to libraries. The only semblance of a review of this novel I could find is in the Science Fiction Encyclopedia (of course!) and it reads in full: “US printing technician and author of Galactic Gambit (1971), an unremarkable Space Opera.”

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A to Z Reviews: “A Sound, Like Angels Singing,” by Leonard Rysdyk

A to Z Reviews: “A Sound, Like Angels Singing,” by Leonard Rysdyk

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A to Z Reviews

Leonard Rysdyk published a handful of short stories in the early 1990s, and has continued to self publish novels. His second short story, “A Sound Like Angels Singing,” appeared in 1993 in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s anthology Snow White, Blood Red, the first volume of their six book fairy tale anthology series.

Rysdyk’s narrator is a rat who goes about its rodential business scrambling for food, having sex, fighting with other rats, and basically living a glorious rat lifestyle. They do have to avoid the dogs and cats that humans employ to attempt to kill them, but for rats, every day is pretty much like every other day. The status quo doesn’t make for a good story, and so on this particular day, something strange seems to be happening, although the narrator can’t quite place what it is.

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The End of Time and Me: Michael Moorcock’s Dancers at the End of Time

The End of Time and Me: Michael Moorcock’s Dancers at the End of Time

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The Dancers at the End of Time trilogy: An Alien Heat, The Hollow Lands,
and The End of All Songs (Avon Books, September and November 1977,
and June 1978). Cover art by Stanislaw Fernandes

When I discovered Moorcock in the early 1980s, I read his trilogy Dancers at the End of Time and the associated novel A Messiah at the End of Time. I remember enjoying the trilogy, though I have only vague memories of the stand-alone novel. Back in 2017, I re-read Moorcock’s Elric series and wrote about it for Black Gate. In 2020, I did the same for his Corum novels and in 2022, I revisited Erekose. Rather than look at Hawkmoon, which I last re-read in 2010, I decided to dive into The End of Time sequence.

In addition to The Dancers at the End of Time trilogy and the novel The Transformation of Miss Mavis Ming (also published as Messiah at the End of Time and Constant Fire), Moorcock has written several short stories that belong to the sequence: “Pale Roses,” “White Stars,” “Ancient Shadows,” “Elric at the End of Time,” and “Sumptuous Dress: A Question of Size at the End of Time.” Although most were published before I read the trilogy, I believe I missed all of them with the exception of “Elric at the End of Time.”

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A to Z Reviews: “Auriga’s Streetcar,” by Jean Rabe

A to Z Reviews: “Auriga’s Streetcar,” by Jean Rabe

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A to Z Reviews

Growing up in northern Illinois with an interest in astronomy, I was very familiar with the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin. The 40-inch refractor telescope, built in 1893, was the largest of its type until the 43 inch Swedish Solar Telescope was completed in 2001, although only 39 inches of that telescope are usable.

In 2004, Jean Rabe published the short story “Auriga’s Streetcar” in Martin H. Greenberg and John Helfers’ anthology Space Stations. Rabe’s heroine, Hoshi, has taken a private spacecraft to the abandoned Yerkes-Two space station on the eve of its deorbiting to see what she can salvage, with her focus on the40-inch lenses that had once be used at the Williams Bay Observatory, but which had since but relocated to the space station.

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The Tuvela Theory: The Demon Breed by James H. Schmitz

The Tuvela Theory: The Demon Breed by James H. Schmitz

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The Demon Breed (Ace Books, September 1979). Cover by Bob Adragna

Earlier this year, I visited my city library during a book sale. One of the things I spotted on their shelves was a novel by James H. Schmitz that I wasn’t familiar with. I’ve liked Schmitz since I discovered his story “Novice” in the collection Analog 2 — so I bought this one.

The Demon Breed came out in 1968, fairly late in Schmitz’s career, which lasted from 1943 to 1974. Like a large part of his work, it first appeared in Analog, where it was serialized as The Tuvela. Most of what he wrote was short fiction, including his best known story, “The Witches of Karres,” expanded into a novel with the same title in 1966; The Demon Breed is one of only four novels, and by today’s standards, a fairly short one.

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Howard Andrew Jones’ Lord of a Shattered Land and the Serious Business of Swords, Sorcery, and Comedy

Howard Andrew Jones’ Lord of a Shattered Land and the Serious Business of Swords, Sorcery, and Comedy

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Lord of a Shattered Land (Baen Books, August 1, 2023). Cover by Dave Seeley

At about the halfway mark in Howard Andrew Jones’s Lord of a Shattered Land, the excellent opening volume of The Chronicles of Hanuvar, the author shifts gears. “Against the run of play,” he opts for comedy.

Lord of a Shattered Land is set up in episodic form, such that each of the chapters can be read independently. The first eight unfold through tightly plotted escapades that firmly position Hanuvar, the refugee general, as a heroic figure. His journeys bring him face-to-face with enemy soldiers and more than a few gruesome creatures.

As ever, the line between horror and S&S remains thin –– but that’s a discussion for another post. For today, I’m sticking with Chapter Nine, “The Autumn Horse,” in which Jones signals that he’s ready for a change of pace. To accomplish this, he has a single tool, the same one employed by every humble scrivener, and that, of course, is prose.

So how, exactly, does Jones haul Hanuvar, however briefly, into the realm of the comedic?

Let’s find out. Nuts and bolts, look out below!

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A to Z Reviews: “The South China Sea,” by zm quỳnh

A to Z Reviews: “The South China Sea,” by zm quỳnh

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A to Z Reviews

In my collection, the letter Q is represented by 12 authors and 28 stories, ranging from Qitongren’s “The Spring of Dongke Temple,” which I discussed last week and ending with zm quỳnh’s “The South China Sea,” which appeared in the anthology Genius Loci, edited by Jaym Gates in 2016. I should note that my story “Well of Tranquility” also appears in Genius Loci.  The only letter represented by fewer authors is X (two authors and four stories).

The title provides the setting for quỳnh’s story, which looks at the plight of refugees fleeing from war in Việt Nam. The narrator’s family owns a boat and uses it to attempt to ferry the refugees from their homeland to a safer place. Unfortunately, the sea is as dangerous and implacable enemy as the militaries fighting over their home countries. The threats of storms and pirates are pervasive and as the story opens, it is clear that over several attempts to ferry people to safety, the family has failed, resulting in the deaths of many refugees and family members, and the ultimate return to Việt Nam.

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A to Z Reviews: “The Spring of Dongke Temple,” by Qitongren

A to Z Reviews: “The Spring of Dongke Temple,” by Qitongren

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A to Z ReviewsQitongren offers a mix of fantasy and fairy tale with “The Spring of Dongke Temple.” Originally published in Chinese in 2007, it was translated by Liu Jue in 2019 for publication in the anthology of Chinese science fiction Ticket to Tomorrow and Other Stories. In 2020, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer selected the story for The Big Book of Modern Fantasy.

“The Spring of Dongke Temple” opens with a cautionary tale of a woodsman who stumbled upon the isolated Buddhist temple in the mountains and after a brief stay there returned to his family refusing to say anything about the temple except to note the proliferation of swallows in the ruins. The brief description gives the temple a feeling that it might not be out of place in the tales of H.P. Lovecraft.

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A Red Desert World, Full of Mystery: Old Mars, edited by George R.R. Martin & Gardner Dozois

A Red Desert World, Full of Mystery: Old Mars, edited by George R.R. Martin & Gardner Dozois

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Old Mars (Bantam Books, October 8, 2013). Cover by Stephen Youll

This isn’t a Sword & Planet collection per se but is likely to prove interesting to readers of S&P.

It’s a big book, 548 pages of reading in 15 longish stories and an introduction by Martin. All the tales evoke the kind of Mars that readers of Burroughs, Bradbury, and Brackett will recognize — a red desert world full of mystery.

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Not Fade Away: The Cemetery of Untold Stories by Julia Alvarez

Not Fade Away: The Cemetery of Untold Stories by Julia Alvarez

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The Cemetery of Untold Stories (Algonquin Books, April 2, 2024). Cover artist unknown

We live our life telling a story

Of what we’ve said and done

But lately you caused me to worry

That you’re spinning fiction

— Amanda Fish, “The Hard Way,” Kingdom

What perhaps separates humans from our fellow creatures is the capacity, indeed the compulsion, of storytelling. Hardly an original observation on my part (cf., The Stortelling Animal by Jonathan Gottschall), though for all we know the white whale biting off the mad captain’s leg is vocalized in Cetacea pods.

Stories, and discussions of stories, are why you are all reading here. Of course it’s not limited to the literate classes, as the rich oral tradition of ancient cultures demonstrates, not to mention the popularity among screen-addicts of  so-called “reality shows” of otherwise untalented people whose only achievement is being on a reality show. Though even that low level of celebrityhood is further diluted in an era where just about everyone has their own Instagram following.

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