Search Results for: New Edge Sword

The Nightmare Men: “The Enemy of Evil”

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Manly Wade Wellman is responsible for the creation of a number of supernatural sleuths, occult detectives and werewolf punchers, including Judge Pursuivant. But, arguably one of the more well-known of Wellman’s coterie of heroes is John Thunstone. Big and blocky, with a well-groomed moustache and eyes like flint, Thunstone is an implacable and self-described ‘enemy of evil’. He hunts it with the verve of a Van Helsing and strikes with the speed and viciousness that puts Anton Zarnak to shame….

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Have Fun Storming the Chaostle

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Chaostle (Amazon) Chivalry Games ($69.99, May 2011) Reviewed by Andrew Zimmerman Jones Many fantasy board games have you performing some sort of dungeon crawl, but the approach in Chaostle is a bit different. Instead of crawling through the bowels of a castle’s lower levels, you are instead moving through various levels, leaping from floor to floor in an effort to make it through the castle as quickly as possible. There are a variety of different paths to take and these…

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Art of the Genre: The Art of Kickstarter

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Kickstarter… the name in itself is evocative. I’m sure many of you have heard of this new website that supports creative people by giving them a place to ask for pledges in return for project assistance. It’s really an incredible took, and I blogged recently about a Kickstarter project done by former TSR artist Jeff Dee. His initial work with the fan-based pledge site got me thinking about what I wanted to accomplish in 2012. I mean I had art…

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A Look at The Tears of Ishtar

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The Tears of Ishtar Michael Ehart Ancient Tomes Press (284 pp, $16.95, March 2010) Reviewed by Bill Ward Fans of Michael Ehart’s 2007 release The Servant of the Manthycore (Double-Edged Publishing) will find a lot of familiar ground in The Tears of Ishtar – in fact the later book contains all of the stories collected in the former, some of which have been enlarged or altered, alongside new material. While I will admit to feeling a slight twinge of disappointment…

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The Nightmare Men: “The Supernatural Sleuth”

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Lin Carter’s Anton Zarnak is a man of mystery. With a jagged streak of silver running through his black hair from his temple to the base of his skull and his exotic features and peculiar mannerisms, Zarnak is almost as outré as the enemies he fights. With a startling knowledge and a somewhat sinister history, Zarnak battled evil in three stories penned by Carter — “Curse of the Black Pharaoh”, “Dead of Night”, and “Perchance to Dream” — as well…

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Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Mars, Part 1: A Princess of Mars

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The year 2012 C.E. is the centenary of the Reader Revolution. Two novels published in pulp magazines that year, A Princess of Mars and Tarzan of the Apes, re-shaped popular fiction, helped change the United States into a nation of readers, and created the professional fiction writer. One man wrote both books: Edgar Rice Burroughs. In celebration of this anniversary, and in anticipation of the upcoming Andrew Stanton film John Carter based on A Princess of Mars, I will tackle…

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Special Fiction Feature: “The Moonstones of Sor Lunarum” by Joe Bonadonna

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Back on August 9, 2011, I wrote an article entitled “Dorgo the Dowser and Me,” which John O’Neill graciously posted on the Black Gate website here. It was all about my first published novel of swords and sorcery, Mad Shadows: The Weird Tales of Dorgo the Dowser, the influences that inspired the book, plus some teaser “trailers” about each story. Mad Shadows is really a picaresque novel — a collection of six stories linked together by a main character, and…

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Updated Blood and Thunder Portends Good Start to 2012 for Robert E. Howard Fans

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2011 hasn’t been the kindest year for fans of Robert E. Howard. January saw the end of the fine Del Rey series of Howard originals with the publication of the 11th and final volume Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures  (sigh). In August we got a crummy new film purporting to be REH’s Conan that resembles no story the Texan ever wrote, and is currently sporting a woeful 22% “rotten” rating over at Rotten Tomatoes (still think you can tell…

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The Enjoyment of Fantasy: Open Letters to Adam Gopnik, Mur Lafferty, and John C. Wright

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I’ve been a bit under the weather the past couple of weeks, which has been annoying for a number of reasons. For one thing, I was unable to get my thoughts in enough order to respond adequately to three pieces of writing I came across several days ago. Each piece on its own seemed to pose interesting questions, and collectively they raised what seemed to me to be related issues about how one reads, and why; and how and why…

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Fantasy Out Loud

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Nearly every night, I read aloud to my boys.   For Evan, my seven-year-old, I have lately been reading The Hobbit.  Two nights ago, no sooner had I begun than Evan interrupted, saying, “It’s funny how they spell ‘Smaug.’” “Oh?” I asked.  “How would you spell it?” “S-M-O-G.” “Good,” I said.  “That is how you would normally spell it.”  But privately, I thought how wonderful it was that Tolkien chose this other, more evocative spelling.  It also occurred to me that…

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