Search Results for: "discovering robert e. howard"

With a (Black) Gat: Some Harboiled Anthologies

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(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun) There are a lot of anthologies out there that collect old pulp stories and I’m using several for the With a (Black) Gat series. While my hard-boiled collection doesn’t remotely rival my Sherlock Holmes library (or even my Nixon/Watergate, Civil War and Constitutional Convention of 1787 libraries), I’ve managed to amass quite a bit of good reading. Of course, I have novels and individual short story collections…

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With a (Black) Gat: Raoul Whitfield

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(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun) Welcome back to our second post in With a (Black) Gat! I don’t think that you can argue with the assertion that the Joe ‘Cap’ Shaw era was the highwater mark of Black Mask Magazine (and detective pulps in whole). Some good writers, like Steve Fisher, Cornell Woolrich and John D. MacDonald, made their marks on the Mask with Shaw’s editorial successors, but let’s be real. Dashiell…

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The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in April

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Joe Bonadonna had the top post at Black Gate in April, with his review of Andrew P. Weston’s Hell Hounds, the follow-up to his 2015 novel Hell Bound, and the second novel featuring the Daemon Grimm and his adventures in the Heroes in Hell universe created by Janet Morris. Not to be intimidated, both Bob Byrne and Fletcher Vredenburgh placed two articles in the Top Ten last month. Bob’s feature on Arthurian Elements in the Conan Canon came in at…

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With a (Black) Gat: George Harmon Coxe

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(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun) Working from Otto Penzler’s massive The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps, we’re going to be exploring some pulp era writers and stories from the twenties through the forties. There will also be many references to its companion book, The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories. I really received my education in the hardboiled genre from the Black Lizard/Vintage line. I discovered Chester Himes, Steve…

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The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in March

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The most popular topic at Black Gate last month was the Gary Con gaming convention in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, Gary Gygax’s home town. Part 1 of my convention report, in which I detailed the angry fallout among Pathfinder licensees to Paizo’s announcement of an impending Second Edition — including the “Pathfinder by the POUND!!” liquidation at the Frog God booth — was our most popular post for the month, by a pretty wide margin. Part 2 of my report, a 17-photo pictorial…

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Tolkien’s Magic Sword: Anglachel

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I wrote a post here at Black Gate about Nauglamir, the necklace of the dwarves. Personally, I would love to see that tale as a separate novella (note to self: I’ve written Doyle and Stout – do not take on Tolkien…). Today’s essay is about another item: a magic sword named Anglachel. It is really a minor element of the book, but the story of it weaves in and out of many other parts. That’s one of the true wonders…

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The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in February

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January sure was popular with readers. The most popular article at Black Gate last month was… our summary of the most popular articles at Black Gate the previous month. If that patterns hold, this will be the most popular article on the blog in March. To guarantee that, I’ve put a big picture of Godzilla at the top. You’re welcome. Getting back to more regular fare, the second most popular post on the blog last month was Elizabeth Crowens’ epic interview…

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Black Gate on the list for the 2018 REH Foundation Awards

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If you were to take a poll at Black Gate World Headquarters, asking for the staff’s favorite author, I’d put my money on Robert E. Howard coming in at the top spot. ‘Conan’ appeared in a Black Gate headline over a decade ago (thank you, Charles Rutledge!). Ryan Harvey, John Fultz, Bill Ward, William Patrick Maynard, Brian Murphy, Howard Andrew Jones, Barbra Barrett and more have written about Howard and his works under the Black Gate banner. And the respect…

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Modular: Conan’s Adventuring in an Age Undreamed of

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And so begins a Play by Post in the world of Conan! OPENING SCENE Vultures spiral above the battlefield. Blood soaks into the rocky ground from hundreds of dying men and their horses, a grim reminder from the desperate hours prior. For those who fought and died, the battle was as purposeless as any. Prince Satabus of Khoraja was tricked into bringing an army to aid King Ulam-Khala of Akbitana in a war against his cousin, King Nezurab of Shumir,…

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Modular: Pathfinder 2nd Edition Announced – Never Say Never

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Yesterday, Paizo announced an upcoming playtest for a 2nd Edition of Pathfinder. Wow. For years, Paizo officials have said that there would never be a second edition. I suspect that all evidence of those statements have been scoured from the Internet. A quick search didn’t find any. There might have been qualifiers along the way, such as ‘unless the demand is too great’ or some such. But I remember the message as ‘We won’t do a 2nd Edition.” With the inference,…

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