Superior Sword-and-Planet: The Bane of Kanthos by Alex Dain

Superior Sword-and-Planet: The Bane of Kanthos by Alex Dain

Comments 8 comments


The Bane of Kanthos (Ace Books, October 1969). Cover by Gray Morrow

I read The Bane of Kanthos by Alex Dain in the original 1969 edition, which was part of an Ace Double with Kalin by E. C. Tubb. The cover uses the phrase sword-and-sorcery, but The Bane of Kanthos is a sword & planet novel. An earthman is transported to an alternate world via passage through a black gate. He discovers that the world is at risk from a great, reawakened evil, and that he is the only one who can save it.

There are staunch allies, nasty villains, and a beautiful warrior-princess. All these tropes are familiar, but I enjoy them. What raised this book above the standard level for me was the fine writing. I thought the author’s word usage and prose choices were excellent.

…

Read More Read More

The Would-Be Story-Teller

The Would-Be Story-Teller

Comments 4 comments
Image by Erik Karits from Pixabay

Hello, Readers!

Once upon a time, there was a person, and that person had inside of them a hundred-thousand worlds, filled with people and events; tales of incredible joy and woe. This person, who contained universes beyond count, had a desperate desire to share them with the world. But they hesitated. What if they weren’t any good? What if they shared these stories that they loved so dear, only to have the world sneer at them, turn their noses, proclaim them to be the worst stories ever told? So, in an effort to prevent that, they travelled the world, making a study of stories and how they’re told so that they might be able to learn the craft, learn how to emulate these stories that people told and loved, and make their own just as good. The stories didn’t have to be the best, but they had to be good.

The apprentice story-teller did not find the answers they sought. Only confusion. Each story-teller they encountered cited different things that made a story good.

…

Read More Read More

What I’m Reading: November 2023

What I’m Reading: November 2023

Comments 5 comments

I’ve been juggling reading with catching up on a bunch of TV/streaming stuff. But I’ve worked in a couple of good reads.

I thought about a post on series’ I’m behind on in my reading. I probably will do one – sadly, it would be VERY long. But I did just finish two novels in one such, and I started a third.

HOLMES ON THE RANGE

I wrote this essay back in 2019 on Steve Hockensmith’s Sherlock Holmes-influenced cowboy brothers. Dear Mr. Holmes is a collection of the seven short stories that kicked off the series. And just last month, the seventh novel – Hunters of the Dead– came out.

I had read the first three novels and the short stories. But book four – The Crack in the Lens – came out in 2009. I was WAAAAY behind. So last week I read Crack… – and then immediately tore through The World’s Greatest Sleuth!. Now I’m on book six, The Double-A Western Detective Agency.

Check out my prior essay for a more in-depth look at the series. But the premise is that brothers Gustav (Old Red) and Otto (Big Red) Amlingmeyer, are trail-riding cowpunchers in the Old West. This is during the time of Sherlock Holmes’ Adventures and Memoirs. Gustav can’t read. So, while they’re sitting around the campfire at night, Otto reads aloud the Holmes stories from a dog-eared magazine.

Gustav is totally enthralled with Holmes’ methods and sets out to do some deducifyin’ on the trail. And these two fall into malice and mayhem like a spinster in one of Agatha Christie’s villages. Gustav is the brains, and Otto is the brawn.

…

Read More Read More

Dread Monsters and Sinister Menaces: The Worlds of James H. Schmitz

Dread Monsters and Sinister Menaces: The Worlds of James H. Schmitz

Comments 5 comments
Telzey Amberdon-small Agent of Vega & Other Stories-small Eternal Frontier-small


Three Bean omnibus reprint volumes featuring James H. Schmitz:
Telzey Amberdon, Agent of Vega and Other Stories, and Eternal Frontier
(March 2000, November 2001, September 2002). Covers by Bob Eggleton

Two years ago I created a Facebook post about a Black Gate Vintage Treasures article on James H. Schmitz’s 1979 novel Legacy. One of the interesting things about Facebook is that you’ll occasionally get comments years later, and that’s what happened this time. On November 3rd of this year Allan T. Grohe Jr. responded to that ancient post with two intriguing questions for me.

John: do you know of any 1/ interviews with Schmitz? — other than the one in Moebius Trip #15 from 1972, which I’m aware of but seems pretty difficult to find, or 2/ literary studies of Schmitz’s works?

I first read Schmitz about 15 years ago, via Eric Flint’s Baen collections, and he ranks up there with Herbert as a worlds-builder, in my estimation! 🙂

Unfortunately I don’t know of any interviews with, or studies of, James Schmitz. But that comment did lead to a broader and very rewarding conversation with Allan, in which I learned about his own writing on Schmitz.

…

Read More Read More

Vintage Treasures: Out on Blue Six by Ian McDonald

Vintage Treasures: Out on Blue Six by Ian McDonald

Comments 0 Comment


Out on Blue Six (Bantam Spectra, May 1989). Cover by Will Cormier

Ian McDonald has written some of the most acclaimed science fiction of the last four decades. His first novel Desolation Road (1988), about an oasis town on a far-future Mars, won the Locus Award, and his King of Morning, Queen of Day (1991) won the Philip K. Dick Award. His novels River of Gods, Brasyl, and The Dervish House were all nominated for the Hugo Award, and he’s been nominated for the BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) Award numerous times, including for his novels Terminal Cafe, Chaga, and Luna: New Moon.

Out on Blue Six is something of an oddity in his catalog. His second novel, it tells the tale of a group of “pain criminals” in a far-future state where all forms of pain and unhappiness are illegal. Ian McDonald has gone on record saying “I hate [it]… I wish I hadn’t written the damn thing.” Kat Hooper at Fantasy Literature, in her review Out on Blue Six: Really bizarre, calls it “strange all the way through… and over-stimulating, like an acid trip.”

None of that has dissuaded the book’s many fans, of course, who adore this book.

…

Read More Read More

The RPG Rundown is your Home for Lively Discussions of Your Favorite Games

The RPG Rundown is your Home for Lively Discussions of Your Favorite Games

Comments 2 comments

YouTube is the place for serious gaming discussion these days. It’s not all fake Marvel trailers and dance clips. With the right connections and a little investigative spirit, you can find a thriving community where old-school gaming is very much alive.

Well, it worked for me, anyway. Mostly because one of those quality connections was Dave Munger, Black Gate‘s original site engineer and the man who wrote the first two posts on this very blog, way back in November 2008. Dave tipped me off to the RPG Rundown, a YouTube channel that covers tabletop role playing games. The lively and entertaining discussions there include new game reviews, industry news, player tips and info, and broader conversations on the very nature of role playing.

…

Read More Read More

Track Down Michael Kelly’s Year’s Best Weird Fiction While You Can

Track Down Michael Kelly’s Year’s Best Weird Fiction While You Can

Comments 3 comments

Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Volumes One – Five, edited by
Michael Kelly and Divers Hands (Undertow Publications, 2014-2018 )

Two weeks ago I caught this brief note on Michael Kelly’s Facebook page.

It was 5 years ago that I published the fifth, and final, volume of the Year’s Best Weird Fiction. My proudest publishing endeavour. These are all out of print, now.

Could that be true? Were all five of these fabulous volumes no longer available?

Alas, it appears to be. None are available from the publisher, or at Amazon, or any of the other online sellers I hastily checked. If it’s true these books are no longer in the channel, and you don’t already have them, then I urge you to track them down in the secondary market while you can.

…

Read More Read More

Michael Bishop, November 12, 1945 – November 13, 2023

Michael Bishop, November 12, 1945 – November 13, 2023

Comments 6 comments

Michael Bishop

The first issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction I bought was August 1974, and it had some fine work, perhaps most notably John Varley’s first published story, “Picnic on Nearside.” But… the second issue had, as the cover story, “Cathadonian Odyssey,” by Michael Bishop. At that time, I had no idea who Michael Bishop was. But that story fair blew me away. I was awed. Overwhelmed. I thought it a sure Hugo winner and it was on my first ever Hugo nomination ballot (and it was a finalist, losing to a good but not great Larry Niven story, “The Hole Man.”)

Shortly later I read his story “Death and Designation Among the Asadi” in Donald Wollheim’s Best of the Year collection, and was again wowed. And I continued reading his work with great enjoyment — short fiction such as “The Samurai and the Willows,” “Saving Face,” “The Quickening,” “Dogs’ Lives,” “Apartheid, Superstrings, and Mordecai Thubana,” “Cri de Coeur,” and “Twenty Lights to the Land of Snow” being particular favorites.

…

Read More Read More

How to Write With a Cat

How to Write With a Cat

Comments 8 comments
Everyone, this little psycho is Galahad. I love him dearly.

Why hello, Readers.

I am currently editing a manuscript, rather than writing one, but as I sit here writing this post, my cat is pacing back and forth on the ground before the chair, looking up, judging angles and estimating. I know what’s about the happen. He knows, too.

Things are going to get very difficult in just a moment.

…

Read More Read More

What I’m Watching – November 2023

What I’m Watching – November 2023

Comments 12 comments

So, it’s time for another What I’mWatching. Today we’ve got some TV, some movies, and some streaming shows – including what used to be called a teleplay. Awaaaaay we go:

BROOKLYN NINE NINE

This show ran for eight seasons (2013 – 2021), covering 153 episodes. I didn’t watch it when it aired, but I’m on the final season, now. This is a VERY fun comedy cop show. Stephanie Beatriz just co-starred in Twisted Metal. I like her mix of toughness and humor in both shows.

This reminds me of Animal Control (which I like), though it’s not as dumb. From the few episodes I saw of Park and Rec, I think this appeals to the same crowd. Good cast, funny stories, without dumbing things down too much. This has been my go-to evening watch, and I’ll be disappointed when it’s over. But a fun show.

THE CAINE MUTINY COURT MARTIAL

I wrote this post on Humphrey Bogart’s The Caine Mutiny, which is based on Herman Wouk’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Marlon Brando (On the Waterfront) beat out Bogie for the Oscar that year. Quite simply, Bogart’s Captain Queeg is brilliant: Arguably his best performance.

…

Read More Read More