Search Results for: New Edge Sword

Adventures In Shape-Shifting: Robert Stallman’s The Orphan

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I write this on an emotional high, a plateau from which I never wish to descend, for I’ve just managed the impossible: I’ve gone back in time. The vehicle employed? A book, prose, a worn paperback. It’s Robert Stallman’s The Orphan. I first encountered this title somewhere in the Dark Ages, probably around 1980. I re-read it perhaps two years later, along with its two sequels, The Captive and The Beast. Even though large swaths of plot have faded from…

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Dave Gross on Pitching and Pinching

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You know, of course, we love us some Pathfinder (the role playing game, not the Viking-American Indian movie) here at Black Gate. And I don’t just say that because Managing Editor Howard Andrew Jones has written two novels (with a third coming in October) for their excellent fiction line, Pathfinder Tales. There have been 30 novels in the series so far. The first (Prince of Wolves), the most recent (The Lord of Runes) and three in between (Master of Devils,…

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Future Treasures: Frostgrave: Tales of the Frozen City edited by Joseph McCullough

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Joseph McCullough is the author of one of the most popular articles in Black Gate history, “The Demarcation of Sword and Sorcery,” which today is considered one of the defining texts on the genre. He’s published fiction in BG and elsewhere, and is currently Project Manager for Osprey Adventures. His latest project is the wargame Frostgrave: Fantasy Wargames in the Frozen City, coming in July from Osprey. In support of the new game, Osprey is also publishing Frostgrave: Tales of…

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May Short Story Roundup

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I’m sorry that I let April pass without a short story roundup. The outpouring of new heroic fiction continues unabated on the pages of numerous magazines the genre is lucky to have. I’m back on track and here to tell you about last month’s must-reads. I have never left any doubt in my reviews about which is my favorite fantasy magazine, so let me start by singing the praises of Adrian Simmons and his cohorts at Heroic Fantasy Quarterly. Each issue…

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Fiction: Shieldwall: Barbarians (Chapter 1)

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I’ve been guest blogging over at Charles Stross‘s blog, a writer with so many rockets to his name  I joke about buying him a Tracy Island set. I did a three part piece In defence of Traditional (Eurocentric Quasi-Medieval) Fantasy which sparked some… lively discussion in the comments. I also talked about my writing process, and of course my YA Dark Age adventure,  Shieldwall: Barbarians! (UK, Amazon-free Epub), which I originally wrote for my son. Frankly, I’m a bit brain dead, so you’ll pardon…

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Adventures In Gaming: The Temple Of the Sea Gods

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I first created this adventure back in 1986, as a discrete part of a longer cycle in which the characters involved were questing for several potent artifacts intended to aid them in defeating their world’s largest dragon. One of those items was hidden here, in this temple. For purposes of exhuming this module, I’ve made a number of things generic (both for the sake of easy translation to your gaming world, and to avoid any possible AD&D copyright issues). Even…

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Conan of Venarium

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I’ve got a couple Holmes-related posts in the works, but am not done researching any of them (no, I don’t just make up my posts as I go: I actually put some thought into them; even if  it may not always appear so). Fortunately, I’ve got no shortage of other areas of interest that I can use to fill the gap (I still haven’t figured out how to get a baseball-related post here. Although, if I still had my copy…

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Adventures In Straw Polls: Fear, Lovecraft, and Me

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Once upon a time, H.P. Lovecraft, he of the vaunted Cthulhu party set, set down his principles for crafting scary stories. He opined that terror is the oldest and most basic emotion available to humankind, and then went further, stating that those things unknown to we mortals are that which are most fearsome. His exact phrase, from the essay “Supernatural Horror In Literature,” (last revised 1935) reads: “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and…

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Black Gate Nominated for a Hugo Award in a Terrible Ballot

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The nominees for the 2015 Hugo Awards have been announced by Sasquan, the 73rd World Science Fiction Convention, and let’s be blunt: it’s a terrible ballot. Here’s a brief recap: over the last few years a number of writers (primarily conservative Americans) have become increasingly convinced that the growing number of women and non-white authors winning Hugo Awards is somehow evidence that the awards have been ‘hijacked’ by a minority group of voters and social justice warriors (SJWs). Their concerns…

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Adventures In Italy: Calvino’s Italian Folktales

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I grew up on Hans Christian Anderson, the Brothers Grimm, and the myriad anthologies of Andrew Lang: The Blue Book Of Fairy Tales, The Brown Book Of Fairy Tales, The Red Book Of Fairy Tales, etc. Most of these were read aloud by my father, so I received them as part of humanity’s long oral tradition, a fact for which I am now very grateful. Aesop, too, arrived in my life as something overheard rather than read. All of the…

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