First Class Noir: Death Comes Too Late by Charles Ardai

First Class Noir: Death Comes Too Late by Charles Ardai

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Death Comes Too Late (Hard Case Crime,
March 12, 2024). Cover art by Paul Mann

Charles Ardai is the creator and the editor of the famous, successful Hard Case Crime series (featuring novels by the likes of Rex Stout, Lawrence Block, Stephen King, Earle Stanley Gardner, Cornell Woolrich, and Ray Bradbury, just to mention a few) now reaching its 20th Anniversary.

But Ardai is no minor author himself, as proved by the present volume, which collects twenty short stories (including some prize winning tales) previously appeared in various venues.

On the whole the book represents a very interesting and entertaining showcase of Ardai’s work. Among the various stories some are particularly worth mentioning.

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Andre Norton: Gateway to Magic, Part II

Andre Norton: Gateway to Magic, Part II

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Andre Norton’s two-book series Judgment on Janus and Victory on Janus
(Fawcett Crest, December 1979 and January 1980). Covers by Ken Barr

Part I of Andre Norton: Gateway to Magic is here.

Two other fun books by Norton that I read between ages 12 and 16 were Judgment on Janus and Victory on Janus. In Judgement, a down and out young man named Naill Renfro ends up on the planet Janus, which is ruled by a group of religious fanatics from Earth. There are artifacts on Janus from a native civilization, which is thought extinct, and Renfro finds one but is contaminated by it and begins to mutate. Turns out, he’s mutating into a native of the planet, a changeling, if you will. He flees into the vast forest of Janus.

When I first read this book, I was caught up in the rousing adventure, which had elements of the Sword & Planet genre. Only with a later read did I realize all the things going on underneath the surface, the condemnation of religious fanaticism and racism, and the criticism of a corporate world of excess. I came around to that way of thinking myself many many years later. She was ahead of her time here.

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New Treasures: Under Fortunate Stars by Ren Hutchings

New Treasures: Under Fortunate Stars by Ren Hutchings

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Under Fortunate Stars (Solaris, May 9, 2023). Cover design by Dominc Forbes

According to the Solaris website, Under Fortunate Stars was published in the US nearly a year ago. But I just found it at my local Barnes & Noble, so it’s new to me. Let’s fire up the New Treasures floodlights and have a look at this thing.

First off, it’s a first novel, and that’s a plus in my book. New writers are the lifeblood of science fiction. And also, if I find the good ones before my friends, I get good street cred. And street cred is tough to come by in your late 50s, believe me.

It’s also space opera. We like space opera. Especially when it’s been well reviewed, like this one has. Gizmodo says “Under Fortunate Stars is a time-twisting homage to classic space opera and science fiction, taking well-beloved tropes and twisting them on their head. It’s a paradoxical puzzle-box of a novel,” and SF Book Review calls it, “One of the most entertaining time travel space adventures that you will ever read today, tomorrow — or even yesterday.”

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Some Personalia About Sherlock Holmes (Doyle on Holmes)

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Some Personalia About Sherlock Holmes (Doyle on Holmes)

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So in our first series post, we had a LONG post on ACD’s 1923 essay – The Truth Behind Sherlock Holmes – for Collier’s The National Weekly. This week, it’s an earlier one he which wrote for The Strand.

“The Adventure of the Dying Detective” ran in The Strand in December of 1913 (appearing the prior month over in America, in Collier’s). There wouldn’t be another Holmes story until September of 1917, with His Last Bow appearing in both The Strand, and Collier’s, that month.

Holmes having finally come back to his magazine with “The Dying Detective,” Strand editor Greenhough Smith was anxious to keep the detective’s name in the magazine. He persuaded Doyle to write an essay, Some Personalia About Sherlock Holmes, which ran in the December, 1917 issue. “The Adventure of the Mazarin Stone” wouldn’t follow until October of 1921.

I have this essay in Peter Haining’s The Final Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, from Barnes and Noble. Last week’s The Truth Behind Sherlock Holmes is also in that nifty book.

 

LETTERS

Doyle begins by talking about how many letters he has received regarding Holmes. He mentions many are in Russian. He does recount an amusing story of a woman in Warsaw (Poland) who states that she had been bedridden for two years and his novels “were her only, etc etc.”

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Adventure in the Magellanic Cloud: The Mote in Time’s Eye by Gérard Klein

Adventure in the Magellanic Cloud: The Mote in Time’s Eye by Gérard Klein

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The Mote in Time’s Eye (DAW, January 1975). Cover by Josh Kirby

This is the latest in a series of posts I’m doing covering relatively obscure SF novels of the ‘70s and ‘80s. This novel was first published in French in 1965, but as it didn’t appear in English until 1975, I figure it fits this series.

One of the things on the good side of the Donald A. Wollheim ledger is his willingness to publish SF in translation. This was one of four novels by Gérard Klein that DAW books published. (Perhaps half a dozen translated short stories appeared in various places.)

Gérard Klein was born in 1937. He began publishing SF at the age of 18, and he seems to have mostly stopped in the mid-70s. He has also been a significant anthologist, and a critic, receiving the Pilgrim Award in 2005 for his scholarly work. His day job was as an economist. He is still alive, now 86 years old.

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Vintage Treasures: To the Resurrection Station by Eleanor Arnason

Vintage Treasures: To the Resurrection Station by Eleanor Arnason

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To the Resurrection Station (Avon, October 1986). Cover by Tom Kidd

Eleanor Arnason is a familiar name to anyone who’s been reading short science fiction for the past four decades. Her first story appeared in New Worlds 6 in 1973, and since then she’s published dozens of acclaimed tales in most of the major markets, especially Asimov’s Science Fiction, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Tales of the Unanticipated, and many fine anthologies. Her short fiction has been nominated for the Nebula Award five times, including “The Potter of Bones” (Best Novella, 2003) and “Stellar Harvest” (Best Novelette, 2000), both published in Asimov’s SF.

Her novel output has been a little thinner, though still highly acclaimed. Her fourth novel, A Woman of the Iron People, won both the inaugural James Tiptree Jr. Award in 1991, and the 1992 Mythopoeic Award. But today I want to talk about her first science fiction novel, the quirky and original far-future tale To the Resurrection Station.

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A to Z Reviews: “Deal with the Devil,” by Carol Gyzander

A to Z Reviews: “Deal with the Devil,” by Carol Gyzander

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A to Z Reviews

Although the most famous iteration of the Beatles featured George Harrison, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and Ringo Starr, the band had a variety of lineups prior to settling on the Fab Four. Many know of its famed lineup during their Hamburg Days: Harrison, Lennon, McCartney, Pete Best, and Stu Sutcliffe. In “Deal with the Devil,” Carol Gyzander elects to write about a lesser known lineup, which allows the story to be dated to a one week period between Christmas 1960 and the end of that year, when the Beatles played in Liverpool with Chas Newby replacing Stu Sutcliffe, who had elected to remain behind in Hamburg.

While they wait to begin a set to begin, Lennon hands around some pills and suddenly the nascent Beatles find themselves staring at two boys on a television screen. More surprisingly, they are able to have a conversation with the two boys who claim to live in the Beatles’ distant future and were trying to establish contact with the rock heroes, Black Sabbath, through some sort of séance.

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Goth Chick News: Death Cars, and Blumhouse, and Stephen King Novels – These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

Goth Chick News: Death Cars, and Blumhouse, and Stephen King Novels – These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

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If you just sang the title, we can definitely be friends.

There has been Hollywood buzz for more than five years about whether or not a movie version of Stephen King’s 1983 novel Christine would be getting remade. Finally, in June 2021, our favorite horror production company, Blumhouse (The Invisible Man, Black Phone, Insidious), announced they were in, and a script was in development. At that time, King had been on a tear with the success of IT and IT: Chapter 2, not to mention a reboot of Pet Sematary, and by December of that year King was reading over a draft script for a new Christine. However, by February 2022 King was going on the record as saying he had cooled on the idea of a Christine remake.

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Datlow’s Latest Treat: The Best Horror of the Year, Volume Fifteen, edited by Ellen Datlow

Datlow’s Latest Treat: The Best Horror of the Year, Volume Fifteen, edited by Ellen Datlow

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The Best Horror of the Year, Volume Fifteen (Night Shade, January 16, 2024)

Once again legendary editor Ellen Datlow has released her annual anthology featuring the Best horror stories that appeared in print the previous year.

And once again the volume includes, in the front, a detailed, invaluable overview of the year in horror (this time 2022). Being a short story lover I am particularly interested in anthologies and collections and, as it happens, once again I discovered how many interesting books I missed…

I always enjoy Datlow’s selections but, naturally enough, some I found particularly accomplished. Here they are.

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The Content Warning Debate

The Content Warning Debate

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This is a trigger fish, apparently: Image by Brigitte Werner from Pixabay

Good afterevenmorn!

In an effort to try and get myself “out there,” so to speak, and figure out what marketing tricks I can use that don’t feel horrendously icky to me in order to try and inch towards making a living from my writing, I spend a lot of time on TikTok. I sometimes attempt to get my books out there, but those videos never get any views. When I’m just fooling around with the various filters they have, I often get far more views; in the hundreds or thousands. I don’t understand it. I don’t understand the algorithm, or how to take advantage of it. I am terrible at marketing. Still, I try. And I’ll keep trying. Maybe I’ll have it work out randomly. Mostly, I just waste hours of my life scrolling through my feed, which currently consists of international news, Hozier (I watched two videos and TikTok has decided I’m obsessed), and a lot of book content. As is usually the case in BookTok, there is a debate raging right now regarding content/trigger warning appearing at the front of the book.

It’s quite an interesting debate.

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