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The Borrowers and The Borrowers Afield, by Mary Norton
(Odyssey/Harcourt, January 1998). Covers by Marla Frazee

I’ve done four posts in a row on Edgar Rice Burroughs, with more to come. But right now it’s time for a change of pace.

It’s going to be a big change for this particular post. It’s about The Borrowers. In my late teens, after I learned Andre Norton was a woman, someone told me she’d written books under her own name of Mary Norton, and that one was called The Borrowers. Turns out this wasn’t true; her original name was Alice Mary Norton, although she changed it legally to Andre Alice Norton in 1934. This was in the late 1970s, pre-internet, and I believed Andre Norton wrote The Borrowers for several years. It added to her charm for a while because I’d read The Borrowers when I was 11 or 12 and adored it.

The Borrowers may seem pretty far afield from Sword & Planet fiction, but the story of little people living in human houses and borrowing things from them, which would explain why things got “lost,” inspired my imagination and I invented many stories of myself shrunk down to that size and adventuring. After I wrote Swords of Talera, my first S&P novel, I toyed with the idea of writing an S&P story with borrower size characters but never did. Many many years later I discovered a graphic novel from DC called Sword of the Atom, which somewhat scratched that itch for me. (More on that later.)

[Click the images for non-Borrower-sized versions.]

The Borrowers Afloat, The Borrowers Aloft, and The Borrowers Avenged
(Odyssey/Harcourt, January 1998). Covers by Marla Frazee

I got The Borrowers from our local library and only found out as an adult in my thirties that there were three later books in the series. These are: The Borrowers Afield, Afloat, and Aloft. I still remember being irritated at our library for not having those too. I would have devoured them.

This happened to me with other series I would have read more of at the time, including The Three Investigators (I thought there were just 2), The Hardy Boys (I only saw 3), and Doc Savage (I thought there was only a couple).

I picked up my own copy of The Borrowers many years ago, and later got The Borrowers Afloat, but after thinking about this post I went and ordered Afield and Aloft, and then discovered that Mary Norton wrote a fifth sequel 20 years after Aloft called The Borrowers Avenged. I ordered that one too. I just finished reading Afield and Aloft and they had all the charm and fun of the original.

I’m reading Avenged now. The first two I have are ex-library copies but I bought the other three are new. The older ex-library editions have wonderful covers and interior illustrations by Beth and Joe Krush. I particularly love The Borrowers Afield cover, by Marla Frazee. Totally ignites my imagination.

Charles Gramlich administers The Swords & Planet League group on Facebook, where this post first appeared. His last article for Black Gate was The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part IV: The Hollow Earth and Pellucidar.

Robert E. Howard in a photo sent to H.P. Lovecraft in 1931,
and Bran Mak Morn: The Last King (Del Rey, May 31, 2005)

January 22, 2025 was the 119th birthday of Robert E. Howard, my favorite author. The works of this great author resonate with countless fans to this day.

“Worms of the Earth” is my favorite story by Robert E. Howard. It features Bran Mak Morn, the last king of the Picts.

Howard was fascinated with Picts, his conception of whom was largely mythological, with splashes of real world history. The Picts in his stories span Kull, Conan, Bran, James Allison, and more.

Art and layout from “The Worms in Earth,” published in
Bran Mak Morn: The Last King. Art by Gary Gianni

Of this story, REH said, “Only in my last Bran story, The Worms of the Earth… did I look through Pictish eyes, and speak with a Pictish tongue!”

The attached pictures feature art by Gary Gianni, from the Del Rey paperback, Bran Mak Morn, The Last King. His illustrations of the witch-woman, Atla, are particularly good.

From “The Worms in Earth,” in Bran Mak Morn: The Last King

She was truly remarkable in the story, especially when she named her price for help to Bran:

What of my blasted and bitter life, I, whom mortal men loathe and fear? I have not known the love of men, the clasp of a strong arm, the sting of human kisses, I, Atla, the were-woman of the moors! What have I known but the lone winds of the fens, the dreary fire of cold sunsets, the whispering of the marsh grasses? – the faces that blink up at me in the waters of the meres, the foot-pad of night-things in the gloom, the glimmer of red eyes, the grisly murmur of nameless beings in the night!

I am half-human, at least! Have I not known sorrow and yearning and crying wistfulness, and the drear ache of loneliness? Give to me, king – give me your fierce kisses and your hurtful barbarian’s embrace. Then in the long drear years to come I shall not utterly eat out my heart in vain envy of the white-bosomed women of men; for I shall have a memory few of them can boast – the kisses of a king! One night of love, oh king, and I will guide you to the gates of Hell!

The Ultimate Triumph: The Heroic Fiction of Robert E. Howard
(Wandering Star, January 1, 1999). Art by Frank Frazetta.

The Ultimate Triumph ~ The Heroic Fiction of Robert E. Howard, illustrated by Frank Frazetta, is a prized treasure of mine, a gift that I received from my dear friend, Jim Goodwin.

“Beyond the Black River,” in The Ultimate Triumph: The Heroic Fiction of Robert E. Howard. Art by Frazetta

It features my favorite Conan story, “Beyond the Black River,” a recently discovered version of “The House of Arabu,” and several other rarities, poems, and one of my favorite letters that REH wrote to HPL regarding his stance on Civilization vs. Barbarism.

From The Ultimate Triumph: The Heroic Fiction of Robert E. Howard. Art by Frazetta

Sprinkled throughout this slipcased volume are incredible illustrations and paintings by the great Frank Frazetta. In fact, a foreword by Mr. Frazetta is also included, as well as an introduction by preeminent Howard scholar, Rusty Burke.

The title of this book is no misnomer, my friends — it truly is the ultimate triumph.

From The Ultimate Triumph: The Heroic Fiction of Robert E. Howard. Art by Frazetta

Robert E. Howard’s boxing stories may be his least read, because he’s so well known for Conan, Kull, Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, El Borak, and several “Weird West” tales (a sub-genre that he is sometimes credited as the originator of).

But the boxing stories are excellent, too! They also include more humor than many of his other works (excepting the stories from A Gent from Bear Creek). Several of the “Sailor” Dennis Dorgan tales were not published during Robert’s lifetime, and those that were published were done so under his pseudonym, Patrick Ervin.

The Incredible Adventures of Dennis Dorgan (Fax Collector’s Editions, January 1, 1974))

In December 2022 I received the download files for “The Black Stone,” by Robert E. Howard. This dramatic presentation, recorded by the inimitable H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society, may be (and please correct me if I’m wrong) the first time they have recorded an REH story. I couldn’t wait to listen to it! This is one of my favorite short stories.

Robert E. Howard’s The Black Stone (H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society, December 2022)

Robert E. Howard was an incredible innovator of sword-and-sorcery, weird fiction, horror, boxing, action/adventure, western, weird west stories, and more, as well as an equally impressive collection poems and verse. And he did almost all of it in a ten-year period from about age 20 to his passing at age 30, pounding away on an Underwood typewriter in a cramped, screened-in porch. I marvel at what he accomplished, and I wonder at what might have been.

If you are interested in the man and his life, I highly recommend Blood and Thunder, by Mark Finn.

Robert E. Howard postcard

I never imagined that a postcard would be sent to me from Robert E. Howard’s home town of Cross Plains, TX. And during the 100-year anniversary of Weird Tales magazine, no less! I am ever grateful to my dog brother, Mark Finn, for making this possible.

I first met Mark after I’d read his stellar biography Blood & Thunder. I wanted to express my gratitude and appreciation for his incredible work, and I soon learned (surprise, surprise; or, “surprize,” as REH spelled it) that he was a fellow tabletop RPG enthusiast and comic book fan. So, thank you, Mark! By this postcard you rule!

Jeffrey P. Talanian’s last article for Black Gate was a review of The Eye of Sounnu by Schuyler Hernstrom. He is the creator and publisher of the Hyperborea sword-and-sorcery and weird science-fantasy RPG from North Wind Adventures. He was the co-author, with E. Gary Gygax, of the Castle Zagyg releases, including several Yggsburgh city supplements, Castle Zagyg: The East Mark Gazetteer, and Castle Zagyg: The Upper Works. Read Gabe Gybing’s interview with Jeffrey here, and follow his latest projects on Facebook and at www.hyperborea.tv.

I have occasionally strayed off topic here at Black Gate, KISS, the Beach Boys, Humphrey Bogart…stuff like that. I played tee-ball as a tyke and have loved baseball my whole life. With a new season dawning (one in which my beloved Dodgers are the reigning World Series champs for the fourth time since I was born), I wanted to talk baseball. And I think that sharing about Don Newcombe is the way to do it.

In 1949’s (sappy) It Happens Every Spring, Ray Milland’s chemistry professor suffers through his life half of the year, to get to baseball season.

Lord Tenneyson said ‘In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.’ For a long time, it was baseball, not love, that young men thought of in American Spring.

When Spring Training would roll around in Florida (and then later, also in Arizona), I used to say “If they’re playing baseball somewhere, there’s till some hope for the world.” I’m not sure I believe that in these messed-up days. But the Dodgers (the epitome of a small-market, hard-working franchise, competing against big city, big money teams – HA HA HA) are working out and playing games in Arizona. It’s baseball season, which helps me ignore that my Ohio wind chill is 15 degrees right now.

The Dodgers and Yankees met in the World Series in 1947, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1955 and 1956. It was a glorious era for NYC baseball (and the Giants were a powerhouse as well), though Brooklyn managed to win only the 1955 matchup.

The greatest advantage that the Yankees had was their starting pitching. Whether it was Eddie Lopat, Allie Reynolds, Whitey Ford, Bob Kuzava or Don Larsen, the Bronx Bombers always seemed to come up with somebody in big moments (if not for Cookie Lavagetto, Bill Bevens would be included on that list).

Rick Monday, Newcombe, Sandy Koufax, and Steve Garvey

During this era, Don Newcombe rose above other Dodger would-be aces such as Carl Erskine, Ralph Branca and Johnny Podres (though the latter certainly carried the flag in the 1955 Series). Big Newk missed the 1952 and 1953 seasons, as he was serving his country, fighting in Korea. And his 1954 season was a poor one: it took him a year to get back to form after being released from service.

But from 1949-1951 and 1955-1956, Newcombe went a combined 103-40, with 92 complete games. Those are some impressive numbers for the 1949 Rookie of the Year.

However, he got a reputation as a choker in big games. He went all ten innings against the Phillies on the final day of the 1950 season, with the Dodgers needing a win to force a playoff. But he gave up a three run homer to Dick Sisler in the top of the tenth in the season-ending 4-1 loss (which would have been a win if third base coach Milt Stock had simply held Cal Abrams at third in the bottom of the ninth).

He carried a 4-1 lead into the ninth inning of that famous game three playoff against the Giants in 1951. But he couldn’t hold on and he had been relieved by Ralph Branca when Bobby Thomson hit the home run heard round the world.

And in three World Series’, he just couldn’t get the job done for the Dodgers. He started 5 games, going 0-4 with an ERA of 8.59 and lasting about 4 innings a start. Dominating regular season, poor post-season: Shades of a great lefty named Clayton Kershaw, several decades and thousands of miles West, later (Kershaw is my second-favorite Dodger, after Jackie Robinson).

In 1956, he won the (very first) Cy Young Award and the NL MVP, going 27-7. But in the World Series he couldn’t make it out of the second inning of game two or the fourth in game seven. His drinking more directly impacting his performance, as well as his shoulder wearing out from the overuse, his career was effectively done, and he went a combined 37-42 in the four years after that Cy Young season.

He spent 1961 in the minors and he finished in Japan in 1962, as a first baseman. Newcombe was a career.268 batter, with 7 homers in 1955. He could have been a major league hitter.

A Trailblazer

Newcombe was one of the first black players signed by the Dodgers. He and Roy Campanella played with Nashua of the New England League (B) in 1946. Newcombe returned there in 1947 (striking out 186), while Campanella played at AAA Montreal, and Jackie Robinson changed the world in Brooklyn.

Newcombe was dominant in his two years at Nashua, going 33-10 with an ERA well under 3. He probably would have played in AA ball in 1947 but the Dodgers’ two AA teams were in the South and not yet ready to be integrated. Apparently AAA wasn’t the best option, as it had been for Robinson and Campanella.

In 1948 he went 17-6 at AAA Montreal (while Campy began his Hall of Fame career in Brooklyn). He threw his only no hitter, won three games in the first round of the International League Playoffs (losing another game 0-1), and then won a game in the Governor’s Cup series. He then went 1-1 as the Royals defeated the Dodgers’ other AAA team (St. Paul) for the Junior World Series. Newcombe dominated AAA.

He got called up to the Dodgers early in 1949. He was only the second black pitcher in the major leagues and the first good one (Dan Bankhead pitched in four games for the Dodgers in 1947).

Jackie Robinson deserves every praise and accolade. But Don Newcombe was the first man to prove an African-American could pitch in the major leagues. He hit 3 batters as a rookie, and 6 his third year. But there were no racial issues about a black pitcher hitting a white batter. It didn’t hurt that he was 6’-4”, 220. But his success, and his acceptance on the field, made him a pioneer, though he never received the credit he deserved for that.

Close to Cooperstown

His raw numbers are lacking in HoF dazzle: 153-96, with a 3.57 ERA.

He does have one Rookie of the Year, one MVP, and one Cy Young award, along with one World Series ring, and he was a four-time All Star. That’s what is. But we can also look at a few ‘What ifs.’

There are four distinct elements of his career that might have changed his possible Hall of Fame path:

1) Newcombe’s first two seasons were spent with the Newark Eagles in the Negro Leagues. It’s fair to say that he might have developed more quickly with two years in the Dodgers’ system. But he was only 18 that first year. Maybe the hard experience of playing in the Negro Leagues had some benefits for him.

2) He lost a season, maybe two, to baseball’s color barrier. It’s a foregone conclusion that he would have done better than Dan Bankhead did. He was 17-8 with 19 complete games and a league-leading 5 shutouts as a 23 year-old rookie. That’s a pretty good start.

3) And he lost nearly two peak seasons to the Korean War. Plus his first year back was basically a lost one as well. He easily could have had three more 20 win/single-digit loss seasons.

Give him 60 more wins for the Korean War years, and there would be a dozen pitchers with fewer wins who are in the Hall of Fame, including two Dodgers (Don Drysdale, Dazzy Vance).

4) Finally, had Newcombe pitched better in the World Series (especially in 1956), he might well have continued on as one of the NL’s top pitchers, instead of spiraling deep into alcoholism.

With two more outs, it’s Newcombe, not Bobby Thomson, who is the hero of the 1951 NL playoff series (playoffs only occurred if two teams were tied at the end of the season. MLB did not adopt divisions and regular playoffs until 1969).

And with post-season success, the media might have lightened up (racism was certainly involved, but everyone loves a winner – somewhat). And he might have been more at ease if he wasn’t so clenched up inside from the criticism (Conversely, Newcombe was not appropriately praised for when he excelled, which he often did.).

That fourth factor (the postseason) was certainly within his control. But if the first three things had gone a bit differently, Don Newcombe might well be in the Hall of Fame today.

He and Justin Verlander are the only players to win the Rookie of the Year, Cy Young and MVP awards. That speaks volumes.

He Was Criticized Unjustly in the Press

If you’ve read books about Jackie Robinson, you know the abuse that racist sportswriters (and fans, and players, and…) heaped upon him. Other early trailblazers like Newcombe were also the subject of vitriol. On September 14, 1951, Tommy Holmes of the Brooklyn Eagle – under the headline Is Newcombe Ailment a Case of Imaginatis? – wrote a scathing, rumor and innuendo-filled attack on Newcombe, which never would have been written about a white pitcher. Excerpts can be found in Jon Weisman’s book on Dodgers pitching, Brother in Arms. It’s a pathetic piece of non-objective ‘journalism’.

For example, Holmes asserts that ‘experts’ expected Newcombe to win 30 games that season, and instead of doing so, he was complaining about a sore arm. Dizzy Dean won 30 games in 1934. Exactly one pitcher has done so (that’s a good trivia question – go look it up) in the 90 seasons since. Holmes wrote an ‘uppity negro’ piece on Newcombe, and it was wrong in EVERY way.

As Chuck Dressen desperately tried to stop the Dodgers’ epic collapse (they led by 13 games in August), he kept throwing a tired (Newk led the team in innings pitched and had 18 complete games) and sore-armed Newcombe out there.

Newcombe started on September 17th, lasting only 6 and two-thirds. On the 22nd, he only made it 5 innings. On the 26h, he threw a complete game in a 15-5 win (you think Dressen couldn’t have given him a few innings off in a ten run win?). Only three days later on the 29th, it was a complete game shutout. And the very next day in the must-win season-finale, Dressen had him pitch 5 and two-thirds innings of relief. Big Newk gave up one hit and no runs as the Dodgers won 9-8, forcing the three-game playoff that made Bobby Thomson a baseball legend.

On only two days rest, after that heavy workload, Newcombe pitched 8 and one-third innings in that third-game loss. He had performed an even more impressive feat of carrying the team to the final day of the season the year before.

Holmes and other writers (and NYC baseball writers were celebrities in their day) wrote about Newcombe from their racist beliefs, not as objective observers. He was a workhorse who carried Dodgers teams to the brink of championships.

Alcoholism and Rebirth

Newcombe succumbed to life-long alcoholism. While he made the choice to drink, the unrelenting (and unreasonable) pressure he was subjected to, along with racist abuse, surely contributed to its severity. He declared bankruptcy in 1965 (he sold his World Series ring, which future Dodgers owner Peter O’Malley later bought and returned to him), and later divorced.

But he stopped drinking, straightened out his life, and was the Dodgers’ Director of Community Relations for over forty-five years, passing away in 2019. He became a leader in several organizations inside and outside of baseball, related to beating alcoholism.

Newcombe reflected on his career being cut short:

“I was only 34, but the alcohol had taken its toll. I think it shortened my major-league career by about six or seven years. I regret that I didn’t take better care of myself in the latter part of my career because I would like to have made the Hall of Fame, where I think I belong.”

Don Newcombe was haunted by his own demons, but found his own personal redemption. And with better handling on the Dodgers’ part; a few more seasons in the majors; and some more self-control, he could well be in Cooperstown today.

Newcombe recounted a conversation he had with Martin Luther King Jr.:

“Do you want to know what Jackie’s impact was? Well, let Martin Luther King tell you. In 1968, Martin had dinner in my house with my family. This was 28 days before he was assassinated. He said to me, ‘Don, I don’t know what I would have done without you guys setting up the minds for people for change. You, Jackie (Robinson) and Roy (Campanella) will never know how easy you made it for me to do my job.’ Can you imagine that? How easy we made it for Martin Luther King?”

He was an under-appreciated trailblazer, who rewrote his own personal story and played a major part in Dodgers’ history, on and off the field. And he wasn’t as far from a Hall of Fame career as one might think. It’s a shame no one worked with him to write a biography. It would have been a terrific book. He passed in 2019.

Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every summer since.

His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).

He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’

He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.

He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.

 

 

 

Gollum sat up again and looked at him under his eyelids. ‘He’s over there,’ he cackled. ‘Always there. Orcs will take you all the way. Easy to find Orcs east of the River. Don’t ask Sméagol. Poor, poor Sméagol, he went away long ago. They took his Precious, and he’s lost now.’

‘Perhaps we’ll find him again, if you come with us,’ said Frodo.

‘No, no, never! He’s lost his Precious,’ said Gollum.

Sméagol from The Taming of Sméagol of  The Two Towers

When I was younger, The Two Towers (1954) seemed to suffer from middle-book syndrome: the bits after the start of series that had to be trudged through in order to reach the exciting end. Not all of it — it does feature a big battle complete with magic and explosives — but Frodo, Sam, and Smeagol’s trek to Mordor sometimes felt as arduous for me to read as it was for them to cross the swamp and slag heaps. Now, I believe The Two Towers, and the second half, The Ring Goes East, is the heart of the whole series. Nowhere does Prof. Tolkien speak more clearly on the weight of war, the burden and necessity of standing against evil, and the eroding effects of that duty.

The Two Towers has some of the most powerful writing in all the trilogy. There are several passages that have never failed to move me. That one of the most powerful of these lines was taken away from Sam  carelessly given to Bad Faramir (more on that atrocity later), is one of the greatest crimes among the many I hold against Peter Jackson.

It’s the book of the trilogy that contains the most obvious references to Tolkien’s own service at the Somme in 1916. In the comments on my first article in this series, Half a Century of Reading Tolkien: Part One, K. Jespersen wrote that the books tasted of ashes, a flavor he linked directly to the First World War. I don’t tastes ashes in the books myself, but there are chapters redolent  of them.

Battle of the Hornburg by Alan Lee

Again, for the uninitiated, a brief summary is in order. Following the disastrous events at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring, the Nine Walkers are split into three groups. Merry and Pippin, captured by a band of orcs, are dragged westward toward Isengard and Saruman. Frodo, with Sam insisting on accompanying, after Boromir’s attempt to seize the Ring, heads eastward toward Mordor and Mount Doom. Aragorn decides that Frodo and Sam might succeed on their own, but unless he, Legolas, and Gimli follow the other two hobbits, they will suffer torment and death.

The book’s first half, The Treason of Isengard, switches back and forth between Merry and Pippin’s travails, and Aragorn and his companions’ assorted adventures across Rohan. The two parties are reunited a week later after the return of Gandalf, the introduction of the Ents, great tree-like beings, and the Battle of the Hornburg (aka, the Battle of Helm’s Deep). The last is huge and murky in Peter Jackson’s film version, but on the page is tighter and far more tactically coherent.

The Ring Goes East, as I said, is the real heart of the trilogy. Frodo takes leave of his companions because he knows he must take the Ring to Mount Doom and that no one else can resist its malignant gravity. It also introduces Gollum/Sméagol. Gollum had been tracking the Nine Walkers from at least Moria, but he remained off stage. Now, he is captured and bound to Frodo after being made to swear on the Ring. Gollum, who calls the Ring his Precious, bore it for centuries. It twisted and hollowed him out, eating away at his mind and his soul. Now, he would do anything for its owner and, simultaneously, anything to repossess it.

Together, the trio cross the Dead Marshes, site of a great battle. Fought thousands of years before, images of the fallen, man, elf, and orc alike, linger on just below the surface of the marsh’s waters. Ghost lights flit over them, luring the unwary to their doom. Tolkien supposed that the battlefields of the Somme lived on in the Dead Marshes. He described how shell holes would be filled with water and the dead of both sides floated in them.

Clearing the swamps and finding Mordor’s main gate too formidable an obstacle, they head south to a secret way through the mountains Gollum claims can take them safely into Mordor. They meet their first men of Gondor, see an oliphaunt, witness the sallying forth of one of Sauron’s armies out of  citadel so evil the ground around it is cursed, before starting on Gollum’s secret way. Things do not go well for any of them from there.

Riders of Rohan by Angus McBride

The Two Towers expands the reader’s vision of Middle-earth way beyond anything Tolkien displayed previously. The only human civilizations shown were the towns of Bree and Esgaroth. Now, we get to cross the expanse of the land of Rohan and meet its people, the Rohirrim. They been described as “Anglo-Saxon’s on horses,” which is reinforced with their Saxon-derived names such as Théoden, Éomer, and Éowyn.

Their horses were of great stature, strong and clean-limbed; their grey coats glistened, their long tails flowed in the wind, their manes were braided on their proud necks. The Men that rode them matched them well: tall and long-limbed; their hair, flaxen-pale, flowed under their light helms, and streamed in long braids behind them; their faces were stern and keen. In their hands were tall spears of ash, painted shields were slung at their backs, long swords were at their belts, their burnished shirts of mail hung down upon their knees.

It falls to the resurrected Gandalf to restore the king’s spirit so he can rouse his people and his forces against those of Saruman. Saruman once led the White Council against the resurgence of Sauron, but he came to betray them. Now he plans to conquer Rohan, Gondor’s only ally, and seize the Ring for himself.

And rouse the king, Gandalf does, which means we get one of Tolkien’s great epic moments. He doesn’t always show you the action in the books. We get the death of Boromir, Gandalf’s battle against the balrog, and the destruction of Isengard all second hand. Not this time. Instead, we get s brutal night battle against terrible odds and in harrowing detail, alleviated only a little by Gimli and Legolas’s banter over who’s killed more enemies.

It was now past midnight. The sky was utterly dark, and the stillness of the heavy air foreboded storm. Suddenly the clouds were seared by a blinding flash. Branched lightning smote down upon the eastward hills. For a staring moment the watchers on the walls saw all the space between them and the Dike lit with white light: it was boiling and crawling with black shapes, some squat and broad, some tall and grim, with high helms and sable shields. Hundreds and hundreds more were pouring over the Dike and through the breach. The dark tide flowed up to the walls from cliff to cliff. Thunder rolled in the valley. Rain came lashing down.

The Battle of Helm’s Deep by Darrell K Sweet

Arrows thick as the rain came whistling over the battlements, and fell clinking and glancing on the stones. Some found a mark. The assault on Helm’s Deep had begun, but no sound or challenge was heard within; no answering arrows came.

The assailing hosts halted, foiled by the silent menace of rock and wall. Ever and again the lightning tore aside the darkness. Then the Orcs screamed, waving spear and sword, and shooting a cloud of arrows at any that stood revealed upon the battlements; and the men of the Mark amazed looked out, as it seemed to them, upon a great field of dark corn, tossed by a tempest of war, and every ear glinted with barbed light.

Brazen trumpets sounded. The enemy surged forward, some against the Deeping Wall, others towards the causeway and the ramp that led up to the Hornburg-gates. There the hugest Orcs were mustered, and the wild men of the Dunland fells. A moment they hesitated and then on they came. The lightning flashed, and blazoned upon every helm and shield the ghastly hand of Isengard was seen. They reached the summit of the rock; they drove towards the gates.

Then at last an answer came: a storm of arrows met them, and a hail of stones. They wavered, broke, and fled back; and then charged again, broke and charged again; and each time, like the incoming sea, they halted at a higher point. Again trumpets rang, and a press of roaring men leaped forth. They held their great shields above them like a roof, while in their midst they bore two trunks of mighty trees. Behind them orc-archers crowded, sending a hail of darts against the bowmen on the walls. They gained the gates. The trees, swung by strong arms, smote the timbers with a rending boom. If any man fell, crushed by a stone hurtling from above, two others sprang to take his place. Again and again the great rams swung and crashed.

The Treason of Isengard was probably my favorite part of The Lord of the Rings when I was young. It’s got action and adventure and lots and lots of cool things. I remember me and my dad debating exactly what Orthanc and Meduseld looked like. Gandalf reappears and we learn about the palantír. The reunion of Merry and Pippin with Gandalf and company in Isengard is one of the funniest moments in the books. It all terrific, but it’s in The Ring Goes East, though, where the deepest themes of The Lord of Rings are developed.

Frodo and Sam march off toward Mordor knowing they probably won’t return, but they know it must be done. Defending what is right comes with a cost that leaves no one unchanged. It is too easy to fall in love with bloody deeds for themselves and forsake the things that might be lost.

In the middle of an attack by a band of Gondorian rangers on a force of enemy soldier, Sam meets the enemy up close for the first time.

The Fallen Southron by Anke Eißmann

Sam, eager to see more, went now and joined the guards. He scrambled a little way up into one of the larger of the bay-trees. For a moment he caught a glimpse of swarthy men in red running down the slope some way off with green-clad warriors leaping after them, hewing them down as they fled. Arrows were thick in the air. Then suddenly straight over the rim of their sheltering bank, a man fell, crashing through the slender trees, nearly on top of them. He came to rest in the fern a few feet away, face downward, green arrow-feathers sticking from his neck below a golden collar. His scarlet robes were tattered, his corslet of overlapping brazen plates was rent and hewn, his black plaits of hair braided with gold were drenched with blood. His brown hand still clutched the hilt of a broken sword.

It was Sam’s first view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad that he could not see the dead face. He wondered what the man’s name was and where he came from; and if he was really evil of heart, or what lies or threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace –

To take these words and give them to anyone other than an innocent gardener from the Shire is practically sacrilegious. I imagine this is how Tolkien must have felt on seeing his first dead Germans in the mud of the front. These words are at the core of the humanist heart of the books. War is a engine that sucks men in and grinds out corpses. It might be necessary, but it is horrible and not something to be cherished as many in Gondor have come to. Instead, the value of what is being defended must never be forgotten.

‘For myself,’ said Faramir, ‘I would see the White Tree in flower again in the courts of the kings, and the Silver Crown return, and Minas Tirith in peace: Minas Anor again as of old, full of light, high and fair, beautiful as a queen among other queens: not a mistress of many slaves, nay, not even a kind mistress of willing slaves. War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend: the city of the Men of Númenor; and I would have her loved for her memory, her ancientry, her beauty, and her present wisdom. Not feared, save as men may fear the dignity of a man, old and wise.

In The Hobbit, Gollum was simply a twisted little monster below Goblin Town who riddled with Bilbo. Here, he’s become Sméagol again, a pathetic creature torn apart by possessing the Ring for so many years and the hold it still holds over him. Not much of Sméagol remains after five hundred years of possessing the Ring, and as he describes it, that part of himself went away a long time ago. When Sméagol is first captured, Frodo recalls the words of Gandalf about how Bilbo’s was stayed by pity and mercy from slaying Gollum and finds the same pity in his own heart. Come the third book, The Return of the King, even after Sméagol has betrayed them and tried to kill them, Sam can’t bring himself to kill him. He’s enough of a tragic creature that Tolkien is able to convince Frodo, and more importantly, the reader, that he might still be something worth saving.

Frodo and Sam are the most developed characters in the trilogy. Tolkien doesn’t go in for all that much interiority with any of the other characters in his books. From their conversations and from their thoughts, Frodo and Sam take on much more life than anyone else. Together, they get to express one of the most profound things in The Lord of the Rings.

Gollum by Alan Lee

 

‘And we shouldn’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of a sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually – their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on – and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same – like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren’t always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we’ve fallen into?’

‘I wonder,’ said Frodo. ‘But I don’t know. And that’s the way of a real tale. Take any one that you’re fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don’t know. And you don’t want them to.’

‘No, sir, of course not. Beren now, he never thought he was going to get that Silmaril from the Iron Crown in Thangorodrim, and yet he did, and that was a worse place and a blacker danger than ours. But that’s a long tale, of course, and goes on past the happiness and into grief and beyond it – and the Silmaril went on and came to Eärendil. And why, sir, I never thought of that before! We’ve got – you’ve got some of the light of it in that star-glass that the Lady gave you! Why, to think of it, we’re in the same tale still! It’s going on. Don’t the great tales never end?’

‘No, they never end as tales,’ said Frodo. ‘But the people in them come, and go when their part’s ended. Our part will end later – or sooner.’

At the Cross Roads by Ted Nasmith

I love Sam’s realization that he personally is an appendix to a tale going back thousands of years. He’s reached this wonderful understanding that he’s in the middle of a story and then it suddenly occurs to him that he’s not even in his own story, but just one more leg on someone else’s. Of course all this gets mangled and bastardized in the movie.

Which brings me to Peter Jackson’s movie, which feels very much like someone other than Tolkien’s story. I’ll only bring up a few of the things that leave me enraged watching his The Two Towers. The easiest one is which two towers the title refers to. The book’s title refers to Orthanc and Minas Morgul. Instead, Jackson has Saruman deliver a line about a new power made of the union of two towers, by which he means Orthanc and Barad Dur. I don’t know if I can say it’s an important thing, but I can say it’s an annoying thing.

Aside from Aragorn falling off a cliff, more bad jokes — dwarf tossing (again!), bad soup, and others — and buffoonishness from Merry and Pippin, there’s the case of Bad Faramir. In the book, Faramir is a throwback to the noblest Men of the West. Unlike his brother Boromir, he fights for the good things, not for the accolades or the desire to perform heroic deeds. He is not tempted by the Ring and helps the hobbits on their way.

Jackson’s Faramir, like Aragorn before him, can’t simply be a hero. He must be flawed and learn something or other before he can achieve his heroic status. That neither he, nor Boromir, are fair skinned with dark hair only makes matters worse.

I’m not that thrilled with how the Battle of Helm’s Deep is handled in the film. In the book, Théoden brings his forces to the fortress for clearly laid out strategic reasons. Here, it’s made out to be some sort of foolish, poorly thought out action. Aragorn argues with him about sending out messengers for aid, something no one in the book would imagine saying for a moment.

The battle never seems as desperate or grim as Tolkien makes it out to be (Haldir, the elf with the five o’clock shadow, getting killed doesn’t count because he’s barely a character). I struggle to image Orlando Bloom’s Legolas acting like this:

He climbed up and found Legolas beside Aragorn and Éomer. The elf was whetting his long knife. There was for a while a lull in the assault, since the attempt to break in through the culvert had been foiled.

‘Twenty-one!’ said Gimli.

‘Good!’ said Legolas. ‘But my count is now two dozen. It has been knife-work up here.’

I can’t bring myself to say anything else about the movie. Yes, we do get to see the Ents destroy Isengard, but even that’s not as cool looking as it’s described in the book. I’m so sick and tired of whining Frodo and the scene with the Ring Wraith and then him threatening Sam makes me nuts. I just tried to watch the animated War of the Rohirrim and I think something broke in my head.

I guess the only thing to do now that I’ve finished The Lord of the Rings is to go to The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, or….Bored of the Rings. Whichever I choose, it’s guaranteed to wash away some of the pain of Jackson’s movie.

Half a Century of Reading Tolkien: Part One

Half a Century of Reading Tolkien: Part Two – The Fellowship of the Ring by JRR Tolkien

 

Fletcher Vredenburgh writes a column each first Sunday of the month at Black Gate, mostly about older books he hasn’t read before. He also posts at his own site, Stuff I Like when his muse hits him.

A Werewolf in England (Dark Temple Motion Pictures, 2020)

A 20 film marathon of werewolf movies I’ve never seen before.

As usual, the films must be free to stream.

I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

A Werewolf in England (2020) Prime

Man or beast? A bunch of hairy honkers.

Howlin’ good time? Hot on the heels of Werewolves Within comes another horror comedy, although this one doesn’t come close to succeeding. It starts well enough, with a title card font reminiscent of the best Bray Studios films, and some gravelly voiced dialects, but it soon regresses into a two-note gag reel of chamber pots and the contents of chamber pots.

Now, I like a good fart or poo joke as much as the next man, but the over-reliance on potty humor soon outstayed its welcome, despite a double dip into demonic diarrhea. There were moments that put me in mind of Motel Hell, but in the end the production was hampered by over saturation (seriously, filter that shit in post), poor sound design and strangely choreographed werewolves.

The beasts, more cuddly than terrifying, could have been really effective with lower lighting and more sparing framing. Oh well — it looked like everyone had fun, and it does feature the line, “I feel a tinglin’ in me nether giblets.”

6/10

Howling VII: New Moon Rising (New Line Home Video, October 17, 1995)
and Meridian (Full Moon Features, April 13, 1990)

Howling VII: New Moon Rising (1995) Prime

Man or beast? Rubbish practical/CG hybrid for all of 30 seconds at the end.

Howlin’ good time? Good people, if you’ve been reading these reviews, you’ll know I’ve watched some terrible films. You’ll also know that the worst thing a movie can do, in my opinion, is be boring. Forget the fact that this is horribly made, awfully acted, and weaves in footage from the last two films in an attempt to make sense of the story. The first hour of this mess is just unfunny bar regulars line dancing to country music while some bullshit ADR is shoveled on top of the steaming pile of plot. I honestly lost the will to live during this one. Settled for chewing my eyes out.

0/10

Meridian (1990) Tubi

Man or beast? Nice, practical, beast… wolf… thing.

Howlin’ good time? It’s a Full Moon feature, directed by Charles Band himself and although I think he’s a better producer, this is a nice looking film, suitably gothic for the subject matter. Meridian stars Sherilyn Fenn (and yes, I was a fully carded member of the Cult of Fenn in 1990) in a twist on the Beauty and the Beast story. In fact, it would have been a traditional, romantic ghost/beast story, if not for the unsavoury date rape that kicks off the whole affair.

The beast itself is a curious design, beautifully created by Greg (Lost Boys, Dracula) Cannom, who was definitely enjoying his ‘high brow’ phase. The prosthetics are great, and the body suit is well done; the huge hairy mass on its back is just one of a pair of extraordinary werewolf humps in the film. An interesting watch for purveyors of circus acts, nefarious twins and early 90s bosoms.

7/10

Mom (Epic Productions, June 13, 1991) and Werewolf of Washington (Diplomat Pictures, 1973)

Mom (1991) Tubi

Man or beast? Goofy were-thing.

Howlin’ good time? A 1990s horror film that is so 1990s it hurts. It starts well enough, with the wonderful Brion James as a shady, yellow-eyed drifter being aggressively creepy, and there’s a potentially excellent story to be had when our hero has to deal with his dear old mom turning into a werebeast and eating winos, but it’s not quite as exciting as I had hoped for. The creature itself is only seen in head and shoulder flashes and, although the mid-transformation make up is cool, the final creature looks goofy as all hell — we are talking Rawhead Rex goofy.

Fair to middling.

6/10

Werewolf of Washington (1973) Tubi

Man or beast? Hairy faced fella.

Howlin’ good time? It’s a scandal that I haven’t seen this before, but I’ve corrected that oversight. Not what I was expecting, this is a political satire wrapped up in a traditional lycanthrope yarn and it’s played for laughs. Skewering Nixon and Watergate, in this flick Dean Stockwell superbly grimaces and gurns as he changes each full moon and makes a meal of the president’s rivals. It’s basically All the President’s Wolfmen. Some genuinely funny moments (a witty script) and remarkable lapses into cinema verité elevate this hokey, bloodless romp into a film that I suspect I shouldn’t have enjoyed as much as I did.

7/10

Dire Wolf (Baby Steps Entertainment, 2009) Dire Wolf (2009) Tubi

Man or beast? Wolf/human hybrid.

Howlin’ good time? Bit of a cheat for no. 13, as it’s not strictly a werewolf, but a lab experiment gone wrong. Nothing remarkable about it; it’s typical SyFy fare, a couple of has-beens surrounded by lacklustre actors in a daft plot, with a surprising amount of practical gore. It’s instantly forgettable. However, it did prompt an extraordinary dive into the career of Fred Olen Ray, whom I only really knew for Alienator and Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers. I’m linking the Wikipedia page for his filmography here, as it’s quite the rabbit hole.

Anyhoo – 5/10

Previous Murkey Movie surveys from Neil Baker include:

There, Wolves: Part I
What a Croc
Prehistrionics
Jumping the Shark
Alien Overlords
Biggus Footus
I Like Big Bugs and I Cannot Lie
The Weird, Weird West
Warrior Women Watch-a-thon

Neil Baker’s last article for us was There, Wolves: Part I. Neil spends his days watching dodgy movies, most of them terrible, in the hope that you might be inspired to watch them too. He is often asked why he doesn’t watch ‘proper’ films, and he honestly doesn’t have a good answer. He is an author, illustrator, outdoor educator and owner of April Moon Books (AprilMoonBooks.com).

Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods!: Interviews with Science Fiction Legends (Tachyon Publications, September 2, 2025). Cover by Yoshi Vu

At Black Gate, we’re all about science fiction legends. Specifically, science fiction legends who appeared in paperback in spinner racks in the 70s and 80s. Or pulp magazines. Or wrote adventures at the dawn of the role playing industry. You know what, forget all that. We’re not picky.

What makes a true science fiction legend? This is the sort of thing that’s hotly debated on social media, and at science fiction conventions, and in lengthy blog posts titled “Towards a New Science Fiction Canon, Because Yours is Old and Stupid.” But recently, public opinion has shifted. To be a science fiction legend, the most important criteria is that your name looks good in green font on a 50s CRT monitor, preferably in a cool underground bunker. Exactly like the cover of Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods!: Interviews with Science Fiction Legends, the upcoming book from Richard Wolinsky and Tachyon Publications.

I’ve spent long hours staring at this cover (by the marvelously talented Yoshi Vu), and the more I do, the more I’m convinced I’m right. Just look at those names. Look at how cool they are! Roger Zelazny, Theodore Sturgeon, Robert Sheckley, Jack Williamson, Fritz Leiber, Damon Knight, Poul Anderson, Isaac Asimov, Anne McCaffrey, William F. Nolan, Terry Carr, Frederik Pohl. Right now you’re shaking your head, but you know I’m right.

Those glowing green names don’t just constitute a comprehensive list of true science legends. Coincidentally, they also happen to be included in this fabulous book of interviews. Don’t take my word for it; here’s the press release to show how right I am.

In this collection of candid interviews, more than fifty legendary authors swap fascinating — and sometimes controversial — anecdotes about the Golden Age of science Fiction (1920–1960). With such guests as Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch, Harlan Ellison, Philip K. Dick, Isaac Asimov, Margaret Atwood, Fritz Leiber, Frank Herbert, and many more, here are the wild personalities, sparks of contention, and vivid imaginations that made science fiction thrive.

Today, depictions of aliens, rocket ships, and awe-inspiring, futuristic space operas are everywhere. Why is there so much science fiction, and where did it come from? Radio producer and author Richard Wolinsky (Probabilites) has found answers in the Golden Age of science fiction.

Wolinsky has interviewed a veritable who’s who of famous (and infamous) science fiction publishers, pulp magazines, editors, cover artists, and fans. The interviews themselves, which aired on the public radio show, Probabilities, span more than twenty years, from just before the release of Star Wars through the dawn of Y2K. The result, Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods!, is ultimately a love letter to fandom.

See? I told you.

I’m not familiar with Richard Wolinsky, but it’s clear that I should be. He cohosted Probabilities, a half-hour public radio program devoted to science fiction, mystery, and mainstream fiction, which aired in San Francisco for nearly twenty years, from 1977 – 1995. After he took the program solo in 2002 he renamed it Bookwaves, and that incarnation is still running.

Space Ships! Ray Guns! Martian Octopods!: Interviews with Science Fiction Legends belongs on every serious science fiction bookshelf. It definitely belongs on mine, anyway.

It will be released from Tachyon Publications on September 2, 2025. It is 256 pages, priced at $18.95 in paperback and $11.00 in digital formats. Get more details and order copies directly from the publisher here.

John Carpenter’s Tales of Science Fiction: Vault (June 2018), Vortex
(October 2018), and issue #1 of Pause (February 26, 2025

Storm King Comics was founded in 2012 by legendary filmmaker John Carpenter and his wife of thirty-five years, producer Sandy King. Together, they are known for delivering stories of horror, science fiction, and the supernatural, with series like John Carpenter’s Tales of Science Fiction and John Carpenter’s Tales for a HalloweeNight. Combining Carpenter’s cinematic style with the visual storytelling of comics, Storm King Comics offers fans immersive experiences that have cemented its reputation in the comic book industry.

I was first introduced to Storm King Comics by the grand dame herself, Sandy King, when I met her in 2016 at C2E2. Since then, I have collected all the issues from Tales for a HalloweeNight as well as Asylum which was my first exposure to the great stories that come out of Storm King. And though I am not a sci-fi girl strictly speaking, I love a good crossover, which this week’s launch seems to be.

For a bit of background, John Carpenter’s Tales of Science Fiction launched in 2018 with its inaugural story Vault, telling the tale of a moon-bound crew who discover an alien vessel with English markings. Since that time there have been eleven total installments and this week the series returns with installment twelve, entitled Pause.

Here’s what you have to look forward to…

When I met Sandy in 2016

Picture this: you’re the only one not frozen in a world where time has stopped. You could lounge in a luxury Manhattan penthouse while its owner stands motionless nearby. You could feast on gourmet meals, perfectly hot and untouched, at high-end restaurants.

But what if you could bring others back to life with just a touch? Would you break the silence for companionship — or keep this frozen paradise all to yourself? The possibilities seem endless, but in a world like this, making the wrong move could unpause more than you bargained for…

Check out the trailer set to “Beyond the Gallows” from Carpenter’s latest album, Lost Themes IV: Noir.

Pause is written by Matthew K. Manning (Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures), illustrated by Conor Boyle (Judge Dredd), and lettered by Janice Chiang.

Issue #1 of the six-issue limited series is available today, with new issues arriving monthly through August.

In 2023, New Edge Sword and Sorcery Magazine (NESS) emerged, and it continues to deliver outstanding magazines, renewing past classics while showcasing contemporary and veteran authors. Notably, issues 1 and 4 include Elric tales by Michael Moorcock. Black Gate featured the crowdfunding and reviewed the initial volumes, and published an interview with editor Oliver Brackenbury (links).

A new crowdfunding campaign to bring issues 5-7 to life is live on Backerkit through March 15th. NESS continues to bring us Jirel of Joiry stories! We’ll highlight Jirel of Joiry here but the magazine offers much more.

Read this to learn the trajectory of Jirel of Joiry and NESS! Jirel is alive and well!

Press Release – NEW EDGE SWORD & SORCERY Backerkit crowdfunding for Issues 5-7: 

Building on their success in 2024, a Backerkit campaign has been launched for new issues.

TORONTO, Ontario, February 13th — Begun in Fall 2022 with issue #0, short story & non-fiction magazine New Edge Sword & Sorcery is running a crowdfunding campaign on Backerkit to produce issues #5, 6, and 7 in accessible digital, classic softcover, and luxurious hardcover (w/endpage art and a bookmark ribbon!) formats. These will be released in November of 2025.

Backing this campaign is a way to be a part of genre history: JIREL OF JOIRY will be returning with her second new story since the originals in Weird Tales! Jirel was the first Sword & Sorcery heroine, created by legendary Weird Tales regular, C.L. Moore. Like Alice in Wonderland with a big f***ing sword, Jirel had compelling adventures in bizarre dream-logic realms, balancing a rich emotional life with terrifying struggles against dark forces! Predating Red Sonja, she & Moore were a direct influence on Robert E. Howard’s writing, as well as so many who came after.

Alas, Moore only wrote a handful of Jirel tales — which are still collected, published, and read to this day. So it’s a good thing that when backers of the campaign helped it hit 100% funding in just four days, they helped make sure a new story will be published! Authorized by the estate of C.L. Moore, “Jirel Meets Death” has been written by the magnificent MOLLY TANZER (editor of Swords v. Cthulhu, author of Creatures of Charm and Hunger, and so much more).

Expanding to three issues a year also allows for the first ever special issue! NESS #7 is dedicated to S&S’ older, science-fantasy cousin Sword & Planet – featuring new S&P tales and non-fiction. Twenty-six other authors are spread across the three new issues this campaign is funding, including names like Alec “Black Beth” Worley, Premee Mohamed, and Dariel R.A. Quiogue.E

very story and non-fiction piece in the issues will be paired with two original B&W illustrations as soon as the crowdfund meets its first stretch goal – Double Art. The goal after that is a fund to cover shipping discounts for backers outside the United States, and from there every stretch goal is a pay raise for contributors. These goals make clear the magazine’s values of paying creators as much as they can, and making NESS financially accessible.

The magazine’s editor, Oliver Brackenbury, promises the magazine is “Made with love for the classics and an inclusive, boundary-pushing approach to storytelling”, delivering high quality writing and art in a wide variety of styles. Sword & Sorcery can be many things and still be Sword & Sorcery…or Sword & Planet!

Readers should race to back the magazine’s new issues before the campaign ends on March 15th, so they can benefit from crowdfund exclusives like bonus stories, discounted back issues, and cover art postcards. They can even win free, unique softcover issues annotated with behind-the-scenes info by chatting about S&S in the crowdfund’s community tab!

With the NESS pastiche continuing the heroine’s saga, here are the Jirel stories

• “Black God’s Kiss” (C.L. Moore October 1934)
• “Black God’s Shadow” (C.L. Moore December 1934)
• “Jirel Meets Magic” (C.L. Moore July 1935)
• “The Dark Land” (C.L. Moore January 1936)
• “Quest of the Starstone” (C.L. Moore with Henry Kuttner November 1937)
• “Hellsgarde” (C.L. Moore April 1939)
• “Jirel and the Mirror of Truth” (Molly Tanzer 2024)
• “Jirel Meets Death” (Molly Tanzer 2025)

Catherine Leigh Moore on Black Gate

Ryan Harvey authored two Black Gate posts in 2007, one covering the author’s life and contributions in detail (Jirel ofJoiry: The Mother of Us All) and another reviewing Black God’s Kiss, Planet Stories‘s collection of all of C.L. Moore’s Jirel stories (including a collaboration with husband Henry Kuttner).

The red-haired, yellow-eyed, and lioness-fierce sword-wielding Jirel has an unassailable place in contemporary popular culture, along with her genre cousins, the laser-gun wielding heroine and the wooden-stake-armed heroine. Fantasy, science fiction, and horror no longer have “Males Only” signs over their doors, either for their warriors or writers. So many female authors and protagonists thrive in speculative fiction today that it seems hard to imagine a time when the opposite was the case. It feels impossible to visualize fantasy before Catherine Lucille Moore broke down the gender barriers (even if she did partially disguise her sex behind her first initials, C. L.) and brought with her Jirel. Beautiful, fierce, loyal, defiant, passionate Jirel did more than raise her sword against sorcery. She slashed through the confining walls around speculative fiction and let it reach toward the horizons in a way it never could have before her advent. That achievement alone assures Jirel and her creator a place in the firmament of the stars of fantasy literature.

— Ryan Harvey, Jirel ofJoiry: The Mother of Us All

Saprophial interior art, NESS #3, Jirel Author, Artist, and RPG!

If you’re interested in learning more about Molly Tanzer and her approach to writing Jirel, check out the article Old Sorcery, New Edge: Q&A with Molly Tanzer (by Alec Worley, Feb 2024) and the Return of Jirel Interview hosted by Oliver Brackenbury, editor of NESS (2024).

NESS Magazine is always saturated with interior art. Artist Saprophial illustrated four pieces “Jirel and the Mirror of Truth”.  The artist was a perfect choice since she also created the art for the 2022 Black God’s Kiss RPG Aventure and Game (check out Blazing Worlds website for more info.)

 

Back New Edge S&S Issues 5-7 Now! (link)

S.E. Lindberg is a Managing Editor at Black Gate, regularly reviewing books and interviewing authors on the topic of “Beauty & Art in Weird-Fantasy Fiction.” He is also the lead moderator of the Goodreads Sword & Sorcery Group and an intern for Tales from the Magician’s Skull magazine. As for crafting stories, he has contributed eight entries across Perseid Press’s Heroes in Hell and Heroika series, and has an entry in Weirdbook Annual #3: Zombies. He independently publishes novels under the banner Dyscrasia Fiction; short stories of Dyscrasia Fiction have appeared in Whetstone, Swords & Sorcery online magazine, Rogues In the House Podcast’s A Book of Blades Vol I and Vol II, DMR’s Terra Incognita, and the 9th issue of Tales From the Magician’s Skull.

Good afterevenmorn!

So, my various social media algorithms were working overtime the past couple of months, bombarding me with clips and training videos for the Chinese movie Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants. And, of course, my interest was more than a little piqued. When I heard that the movie was getting an international release, I got more than a little excited.

Given how much I adore Chinese dramas, and kung fu movies, and the fact that I train kung fu and Chinese kickboxing (called San Da, or less frequently San Shou), there was no way in hell that I would not be going out to see this film.

I went in pretty much blind, with only a trailer (which gave nearly nothing away), and the training videos. So it had virtually no idea what it was all about. This will matter quite a bit, as we will see.

The trailer I saw

What I learnt after the fact is that this film is loosely based on the first (射鵰英雄傳 (The Legend of the Condor Heroes)) of a trilogy of books by Chinese author 金庸 (Jin Yong), which I have not read (but would love to get my hands on a translation of). The novels are technically Wixia, a Chinese historical fantasy, which typically follow an unattached warrior who follows a chivalric code (俠 (xia)). Emphasis on fantasy in this case. More on that later.

Now, I am quite familiar with the male lead Xiao Zhan (肖战), who has been in a number of dramas I’ve watched, but is probably most famous for his role in The Untamed here in the Western Hemisphere. He’s a very talented actor, and I’ve enjoyed most everything I’ve seen him in (and even the ones that were so-so, he was the bright spot for). And I’m so pleased that there was a foreign film that I didn’t have to find a niche theatre for. I was, and am, very happy to encourage more of that.

The last Chinese film I saw in theatres was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. So… quite a while ago. I remember it absolutely blowing me a way (and wrecking me emotionally), so I was really eager to see this. With that in mind, off I trundled with a couple of my martial arts students on Sunday to watch the movie.

There are three movies I will rewatch any time I need a good cry. This is one of them.

The movie centres on one Guo Jing (郭靖), a Han Chinese man from the Song Dynasty raised in Mongolia by the Khan who took him and his mother in following the strife between the Jin and Song empires (the Jin rise to power shattered the Song Dynasty, and they moved south to become the Southern Song Empire), and the tension between his two identities — a Han Chinese man from the Southern Song Empire and a man raised as a Mongol, by the Khan, and sworn brother to Mongols.

And it was great! A whole lot of fun; but with some caveats.

The first is that, as this was based on a novel, there is a lot of information packed into a relatively short amount of time (just over 2 hours), and if you’re not paying attention, you miss an awful lot. For those of us unfamiliar with the source material, it did lessen the emotional impact of certain scenes. It might be just my 40 episode drama-watching brain, but this probably could have been a couple of movies.

An awful lot is glossed over rather quickly in what feels like a “Previously On” moment. I was left with the feeling that there was a prequel movie that I have not seen. I haven’t done any research on whether that was the case as of the writing of this. When we finally get into the meat of the movie, Guo Jing has separated from the woman he loves, whom he travelled all over the Middle Lands and trained with, and has already mastered the techniques from a much-sought-after scroll, whom this young woman (Huang Rong (黃蓉)) apparently has possession of. Following so far?

Our heroes Huang Rong and Guo Jing

Separated, Huang Rong is pursued by three of the five masters — a martial art specialists from three of the five styles of martial arts (kung fu… sort of) in the Middle Lands. The lead, Venom West, desperately wants the scroll she carries. He was, apparently, preciously defeated by Guo Jing in an encounter we only get flashbacks of (rather disappointingly).

I’m not going to give too much away, but eventually the lovers reunite, and simultaneously save both the Khan and the Southern Song Empire; the Khan from Venom West, who has gone mad, and the Southern Song from the Mongols, who were just themselves saved.

The story itself was very fun, with some impressive action sequences, but I find myself a little disappointed that they weren’t more grounded. Remember when I mentioned that the emphasis was on fantasy? Well, all the fighting in this was basically magic battles between wizards. There was actually very little proper fighting involved. Given the training videos I saw, I was expecting a little more proper combat.

One of several videos that promised something that wasn’t delivered.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon leant into the fantasy, what with the flying through the air and landing on bamboo as if their bones were hollow/they could actually levitate. But the fighting in that was actual fighting; highly choreographed, but fighting all the same. With that as my only reference for Chinese movies, and with the training videos, I do feel a little cheated. Particularly since in several of the training videos, I could recognise the styles employed.

There was no real hand-to-hand combat in the film.

Now, it’s entirely possible that the training shorts I saw were actually for a completely different project. I do know that many of these actors are incredibly busy, working or three or more projects a year. So it’s entirely possible that all the videos were mislabelled and were for something else entirely.

The movie also ends in what feels like the middle of the story. Hardly surprising since it’s the first book in a trilogy. The sort-of middle-of-the-story vignette that this film presents is not unlike My Neighbour Totoro. Both movies left me with an “this is unfinished” feeling.

The Khan’s daughter and a love rival. I loved her character a lot.

Despite the slight disappointment of all the fights being wizard battles, and the unusual feeling of being shown but a snippet of a story, however, the movie was a whole lot of fun. I loved hearing both Mandarin and Mongolian. I loved how the Mongols weren’t made the villains (I initially thought they were, and it would have been easy to have made them thus — kind of like Russians for 80s Hollywood movies). And I adored having something other than the increasingly formulaic and mindless films we’ve been fed of late to spend a Sunday afternoon watching.

I really do wish more foreign films would get wide releases like this. We could use the fresh perspectives and fascinating stories other cultures bring. I had a lot of fun with this one. If you are going to see it, you must pay close attention, but it was certainly worth it. If there are sequels that make it out our way, I’ll definitely be watching. But first, I need to get my hands on English versions of these books!

When S.M. Carrière isn’t brutally killing your favorite characters, she spends her time teaching martial arts, live streaming video games, and cuddling her cat. In other words, she spends her time teaching others to kill, streaming her digital kills, and a cuddling furry murderer. Her most recent titles include Daughters of Britain, Skylark and Human. Her serial The New Haven Incident is free and goes up every Friday on her blog.

I came to Total War way back when, through TW: Rome. Arriving in 2004, it was the third game in the TW series, after Shogun, and Medieval. I liked it, though I wasn’t addicted – as I was to many games back then. But it was fun marshaling armies, and then marching them out to crush your enemies. I talked about it a little bit a few weeks ago in my RTS overview (man, Myth: The Fallen Lords was such a great game!).

Sort of the “What is best in life?” response from the first Conan movie with Ah-nuld:

“To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women.”

There have been over a dozen incarnations, with the Egyptian-themed Pharaoh just dropping in 2023. What I’d LOOOOOVE, is for them to get the license from the Tolkien Estate and do TW: Middle Earth. I enjoyed Battle for Middle Earth I (never played II). But even a decently-done TW: Middle Earth would be FANTASTIC!!!!

Anywhoo. I’ve never done the Warhammer thing, but TW: Warhammer I came out in 2016. And TW: Warhammer II followed the next year. WH II has become the rabbit hole I periodically jump down. This game is — as my buddy Tony dubbed Diablo II long ago — electronic crack.

If you have WH I, you can use those factions/lords some in WH II. But you don’t need them at all. And while the base game is more than enough, part of the TW fun is buying the DLC – they add heroes, factions, and even a few campaigns. I don’t have WH III, but I the model is the same.

I have all the DLC for both WH I, and II. They are frequently 50% off+ on sale. Total War keeps ‘old’ product at original prices. It’s an annoying business model, and they do a boatload of DLC. But the base games have more than enough content. I just like the extra stuff to check out. And you don’t have to buy it, off course.

The Game

Some basics about Total War – at least, the Warhammer II version. The principles of the series are generally the same. You know what you’re getting, but the engine has evolved over the years. Warhammer II is pretty similar to I. I have not played III yet. I tried to go back to Rome Remastered earlier this year, and that old engine just didn’t work for me anymore.

The general concept is you take charge of a faction (Elves, dwarves, vampire pirates, etc. In other games it’s Roman families, or medieval countries. You get it).

You build up settlements, and armies on a unit basis, for your faction. You can choose to fight the battles yourself (usually advantageous in outcome) or use auto-resolve. I find the battles time-consuming and not that much fun, so I auto-resolve. The benefits of auto-resolve seem to be reduced from winning the actual fights yourself, though.

Terrain matters in battles, and also on the global map. Dwarven settlements thrive in mountain regions. The vampire lords corrupt the land, making it less/unsuitable for some factions. The lizardmen are primarily in the jungles. So, the faction you choose often impacts what part of the world you start in, and where you choose to expand to.

You attack other armies, and settlements, or colonize ruined ones. You build them up, gaining advantages if you control all the settlements in a single province. You have to balance chasing quests, conquering settlements, and being strong enough on defense to protect what you already have. Random wandering warherds, or rogue armies (frigging pirates) can seriously blow up your plans.

You can form military alliances (as can your enemies), and when you’re strong enough, you can make a confederation with a same-race faction: absorbing all their assets – and their financial obligations!

I just keep playing and trying to expand without a debacle happening. The first ten to fifteen turns usually indicate whether I’m gonna be able to make a go of it with this faction.

Two Game Options

The base campaign is Battle for the Vortex. There are game-given quests, and faction quests as well. You try to build up your settlements and armies, eliminate enemies, and accomplish the various quests. I’ve never made it to the end game. Even on Easy, the computer AI is a pain in the ass. I’ve rarely made it past 100 turns before it got too messed up.

WH II also has a Mortal Empires option. It lets you pick any lord/faction from I or II, and compete against all the other factions. Last one standing wins: No over-arching campaign. I’ve played Mortal Empires a few times, and it’s a neat option, but I prefer playing the official campaign. So….

‘Guns or Butter’

‘Guns or butter’ is an old economic model that shows how governments have to choose between spending for defense or domestic uses. TW play is a variation on that which is pretty much the over-arching element of the game.

You can primarily choose to spend gold on military units, or settlement buildings (there can be a couple other options, like temporary enhancements, but you’re mostly putting your gold into your settlements, or your armies).

And your armies (you start with one, but need multiple ones to survive) have upkeep costs. So, you have a one-time cost to add the unit, then an ongoing cost per turn, to keep it. The bigger your army, and the more advanced the units you use, the greater your upkeep. Which means less gold for your settlement buildings.

Each Province has a capital settlement, with five levels. And except for a couple exceptions, one to three minor settlements, with three levels. You build up your Province Capital, which opens up additional slots for new buildings. There can be a total of ten building slots in a Capital, and there are usually only three additional slots in a minor settlement.

Building Categories Choosing available options for a small settlement slot

There are different types of ‘chains’ you can pick your settlement upgrades from. I really like this part of game management. And it’s essentially guns or butter. They have different classifications for different factions, but that’s just wording.

Resources – Available in certain settlements. They provide specific goods, like tradable resources (hides, marble, clay), plaques (related to some faction goals), or other benefits. Most settlements do not have this option, so I often take whatever it is. It’s nice when it’s a gold mine, as that is the best source of gold in the game.

Military Recruitment – These produce basic, and advanced, military units.

Basic buildings usually only have three levels, and you can start them when your Province Capital is only first level. They usually offer some other minor benefits, but this is where the meat shields and lower-level units come from. You build your starter armies here.

Advanced buildings usually go up to levels four or five, and provide elite units and enhancements. You need advanced units to get through the middle, and end, games. Purely gun stuff here.

Military Support – These buildings support your armies, lords (Each army is led by a lord), and heroes (a hero is a unique unit that can perform helpful actions and also provides benefits), and settlements. They might make recruitment costs less, reduce your casualty replenishment rates, or let you recruit infantry units with shields. More guns.

Defense – This a limited category, usually letting you add walls to your settlements, or some other defensive improvement for it. I always add walls to smaller settlements, but otherwise, this is my least-used category. As the title implies, this is a defensive category and kind of feels like a mix of guns and butter.

Infrastructure – Here you really get into the guns or butter dichotomy. There’s a wide range of options. Your main gold-making options are here. Also, you can focus on growth (how fast your settlements expand), and public order (if public order gets to-100, you have to put down a rebellion).

There are a lot of options here. Since you only get three additional slots in a smaller settlements, the choices are important. I do try to put up walls in small ones, so, with the Capital building, you only have two free slots. And you’re really choosing between guns and butter.

Misc. -Some settlements have Ports, and some have Landmarks. Ports generate gold and have their own chain. Landmarks are unique to a specific settlement and offer some benefit often worth taking. Even if it’s just a one-level use of a slot.

Choosing Your Building

The game randomly has factions declare war on you. And you can also end up at war with other factions through diplomacy options (that’s part of a follow-up post). You need to build up your first army in a hurry (you start the game with a lord and a small army of five-eight units, usually). Some faction is already pissed at you.

It’s tempting to use an early slot to pick a chain with a new military unit. You can get a more diverse, more effective, army, right out of the gate. Guns over butter.

But you gotta pay for all these troop units, and the constantly being constructed new buildings. So, taking that industrial building with a big per turn revenue, is tempting. The gold mine is a no brainer. In a small settlement (remember, only three slots in addition to the Capital), I almost always choose the max revenue building first. I need that stream started to build that first army.

The third (and last) slot usually goes to walls, which help with defense if you end up under siege. It’s the second slot that lets me shade towards guns or butter. For purposes of this discussion, growth and other things that primarily affect the settlement, or my revenue stream, are butter.

Since the capitals have eight to ten slots, and they go up to level five, I tend to use them for the advanced military buildings, to maximize my firepower. Some support, and non-military buildings go up to level five, so you have to factor that in as well. And walls never hurt.

Technologies

Factions have unique Technology trees. Some are easier to develop than others. But they also reflect the guns or butter dilemma. Especially early on, you can choose technologies (which take multiple terms to develop) to enhance troop unit strength. And also to decrease recruiting costs.

Alternately, technologies that enhance your revenue stream can be vital in providing gold to maintain your growing army. Or building up your settlements.

And any time you can increase your growth or public order, you need to weigh those as immediate needs against those other areas. Butter.

Army Units

Basic units (like spearmen, or archers) cost a lot less to hire recruit and maintain, than ones such as knights, war eagles, or catapults. The stronger your army, the more it’s gonna cost you. And by mid-game, your main armies had better not still include a bunch of grunts; even if they have leveled up. You needs some higher power units.

Armies are capped at a total of 20 units. Do you want a second full-size army? Or two medium-sized ones? Recruit a lord and build a 6 unit army to provide a military presence in a province with falling public order? All those units have an ongoing cost every turn…

You have multiple layers of guns or butter to decide upon. Bad things start to happen if your revenue stream goes negative. And enemies can raid your province, decreasing revenue. Or sack, burn to the ground, or even take over your settlements. And those things can hit your stream.

So, you need to have armies ready not only for attack, but defense. Again – that takes gold.

Wanna hire more lords or heroes? Cha-ching!

In the pic to the right, recruiting a knight will cost about three times as much as recruiting the spearman at arms next to him. But maintaining him each turn will cost ten times more.

So…

Budgeting is the allocation of resources among multiple activities. Total War is strategic and tactical game of allocating resources. And basically, you decided whether to spend your gold on guns or butter. And you need the butter to make more gold. To pay for the guns.

I know folks who like playing out the battles. I have fought my share over the years, and I get it. But the faction management part of the game is what keeps me coming back. Guns or butter.

Crusader Kings

A quick mention of another game.

For a kingdom management-and-war type of game, the Crusader Kings line (three so far) looks to be the standard. I have tried the first game a few times, and it’s got a MASSIVE learning curve. I think it’s manageable, I just haven’t been motivated to master the basics enough to continue on. But it does look like an awful lot of fun if you figure it out.

Next Time

There will be a follow-up Total War post, in which I’m going to talk about how I recently had two of my most successful games by applying principles contained in George Washington’s Farewell Address. That was actually the original intent of this post, but I really enjoyed the guns or butter discussion.

Other Video Gaming Posts

RTS’ and Myth: Fallen Lords
Mount and Blade – Part One
Mount and Blade – Part Two
Steamed: What I’ve Been Playing (December, 2023)
Steamed: What I’ve Been Playing (October, 2022)
Fortnite (one of several mentions)

Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every summer since.

His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).

He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’

He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.

He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.

Yesterday was the 100th birthday of Edward Gorey, one of the most unique, unclassifiable artists that this country has ever produced. Though he died in 2000, he has a continuing cultural presence; he certainly lives on in my life and in the lives of a great many people.

Back in the incumbency of Jimmy Carter, when I was studying theater and living in the dorms of California State University Long Beach, one year I had a roommate named Scott. Scott didn’t fit into our tight-knit little community very well, and while I’ve always prided myself on my ability to get along with everyone, I didn’t get along very well with him. We had a bumpy year together, but I will always be glad that we were roommates, because Scott introduced me to the work of Edward Gorey, and that was a priceless gift that I can never repay him for.

Edward Gorey was a man of many talents — He did scenic and costume design for the stage, winning a Tony Award in 1978 for his costume designs for Dracula (his set design for that production was also nominated) and several of his stories are about ballet, which was one of his supreme passions. Additionally, he did highly individual book covers; for several years he did them for Anchor Paperbacks (including, among many others, editions of H.G. Wells’s The War of the Worlds, Franz Kafka’s Amerika, and T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats), which are highly prized today simply for their Gorey covers. He also edited and illustrated a collection of classic ghost stories (1959’s Edward Gorey’s Haunted Looking-Glass) and did covers and illustrations for several of the supernatural mysteries of John Bellairs.

Beginning in the mid-1950’s, Gorey wrote and illustrated his own very short books, and these are the works that his fame mostly rests on. (Many were published under absurdly comical names that are anagrams of his own, like Ogdred Weary or Mrs. Regera Dowdy.) Visually, they are almost always set in the Victorian or Edwardian era (the closest to our own time that I can ever remember him coming was the 1920’s) and are full of bizarre, grotesque, violent, comic, cryptic, and occasionally supernatural incidents, often involving children; in fact, they are usually “children’s books” in form if not in content. The original small hardcover volumes are hard to come by and are pricey when you can find them, but there are four large omnibus volumes, each collecting a dozen or more of the short works — Amphigorey (1972), Amphigorey Too (1975), Amphigorey Also (1983), and Amphigorey Again (2006).  

The first thing of Gorey’s that I ever read was “The Hapless Child”, which chronicles the travails of a lovely little girl named Charlotte Sophia. When the story begins, she’s safely ensconced in the bosom of her loving family (“Her parents were kind and well-to-do.”) Then her father, a military man, is reported killed in a native uprising and her grieving mother wastes away and dies, leaving the girl in the cold, utilitarian hands of the family lawyer, who loses no time in sending her to a boarding school where students and staff range from the merely unsympathetic to the positively sadistic. Things rapidly go from bad to worse, and from this point on, the hapless child is subjected to every horror that could befall a person in the most lurid melodrama, all rendered by Gorey in deadpan language and meticulous pen-and-ink images. Things don’t end well for the poor child, and the first time I read her tale, tears rolled down my face, but they weren’t tears of sadness; I was literally shaking with laughter. (Once the story almost got me thrown out of the college library where I was supposed to be working, when I showed it to a friend who was unacquainted with Gorey. We just couldn’t control ourselves.)

It does no good to try and explain to someone who is appalled by “The Hapless Child” rather than delighted by it that what’s being mocked is not the suffering of an innocent child (there was no Charlotte Sophia — Gorey made her up) but rather the reflexive, self-indulgent sentimentality of a hypocritical era and of readers still shackled to its sticky standards. (And one of the things that makes Gorey a complex artist is that he both recognizes the deficiencies of the Victorian age while at the same time clearly adoring many aspects of it.) Either Gorey lands with you or he doesn’t. For myself, there’s nothing that I like more than a good, Gorey story.

Other Gorey delights are “The Willowdale Handcar”, a series of strange, seemingly disjointed incidents that can, with a little imagination and a close examination of the illustrations, be connected into a coherent (if admittedly dark) narrative. (The story features The Black Doll, a sinister, featureless figure which haunts the edges of many of Gorey’s works.) Gorey could be genuinely frightening, as in “The Insect God”, in which huge insects kidnap children and mercilessly sacrifice them to their chitinous deity, and “The West Wing”, a succession of wordless images showing various rooms in a house that you definitely wouldn’t want to spend any time in. (Gorey could make a patch of peeling wallpaper radiate unease.)

Gorey would sometimes make mere objects his protagonists. In “The Inanimate Tragedy” Pins, Needles, a Glass Marble, a Four-Holed Button, and a Piece of Knotted String become embroiled in conflicts and misunderstandings that end in murder and suicide, if those terms are applicable to the fates suffered by a Half-Inch Thumbtack and a No. 37 Penpoint. Gorey would probably say that the word “tragedy” is no more out of place with junk-drawer contents than it is with the equally mundane and transient objects that we call human beings, and in “The Abandoned Sock” you feel genuine apprehension for the sock who foolishly deserts his mate on the clothesline to go adventuring and gets used for a dust rag, chewed by a dog, caught in a tree, and picked apart by birds to use for their nests until nothing is left of it. Does the sock’s life (which it found “tedious and unpleasant” when it was pinned on the line next to its dull mate) turn out all that differently from our own personal dramas?

One of Gorey’s most famous stories is “The Doubtful Guest”, which sees an odd, penguinish-looking creature attired in tennis shoes and a striped scarf turn up one night at the house of a settled, respectable (boring!) family and proceed to turn things upside down. Without ever uttering a sound, the uninvited visitor eats the plates at dinner, tears chapters out of books, suffers fits of bad temper during which it hides all the bath towels, safeguards objects that it takes a liking to (like expensive pocket watches) by dropping them in a pond, eerily sleepwalks up and down the hallways at night, and otherwise disrupts the placid routines of the baffled family, who have no hope of ever going back to life as it was, because “It came seventeen years ago — and to this day / It has shown no intention of going away.” (Many of Gorey’s stories are written in verse.) You understand the family’s frustration and despair, but you may also feel that a little unpredictability might do them some good. I have my own Doubtful Guest — a college friend of my wife made him for me, and I was delighted to learn that Gorey had several himself, that admirers had made and sent to him. (I have a Black Doll too, but that I had to buy.)

Gorey did several alphabet books; the most well-known (images from it have appeared on calendars, tee-shirts, coffee mugs etc.) is “The Ghastlycrumb Tinies.” Here dewy-eyed tots come to shocking and painful ends (“A is for Amy who fell down the stairs / B is for Basil assaulted by bears / C is for Clara who wasted away / D is for Desmond thrown out of a sleigh). Gorey doesn’t imply that these grim events are the children’s faults, but he doesn’t imply that they aren’t, either.

Gorey wasn’t uplifting or heartwarming, (except perhaps in “The Pious Infant”, the story of Henry Clump, a little boy who is too good to live long, and thank God he doesn’t) but now and then justice is served, as it is in “The Bug Book”, one of the few Gorey stories that’s not in black-and-white. In this tale of collective security and well-earned retribution, a peaceful group of bugs have their happy society wrecked by a new bug in the neighborhood, a big, brutish interloper who, despite their best efforts to be friendly and welcoming, “broke up their parties” and “waylaid them whenever they went visiting.” After a secret meeting in the dead of night, the problem is solved by squashing the obstreperous insect flat with a big rock. His remains are placed in an envelope addressed “To whom it may concern” and a pleasant and lively social life is resumed (in Gorey’s world, clearly the happiest of happy endings).

The great Literary critic Edmund Wilson (he who disparaged detective stories and sneered at Tolkien and Lovecraft) was an early admirer of Gorey; he found the artist’s singular little books pleasingly suggestive and allusive. “I find that I like to return to them,” Wilson said. The critic was wrong about a lot of things, but he was right about Edward Gorey. Over almost a half a century, I too have continued to come back to Gorey’s strange, sinister, darkly comic world. There is truly nowhere else like it.

Edward Gorey, this contradictory man who loved attending classical ballet (he was present for every performance of the New York City Ballet for twenty-five straight years) and watching “trash TV movies on the USA Network” was sui generis, the sort of one-of-a-kind genius who can only be appreciated and enjoyed, never imitated or emulated. The mark he set was too high for anyone else to reach… or maybe it would be more accurate to say that it wasn’t too high, exactly; rather, it was too far off to the side.

Whatever deserted house, sinister garden, enigmatic landscape or dimly-lit stage your eccentric spirit now haunts, Edward Gorey, happy birthday to you. Your ashes may have been scattered to the four winds, but your work goes marching on; I fully expect your macabre miniatures to be around for at least another hundred years.

Thomas Parker is a native Southern Californian and a lifelong science fiction, fantasy, and mystery fan. When not corrupting the next generation as a fourth grade teacher, he collects Roger Corman movies, Silver Age comic books, Ace doubles, and despairing looks from his wife. His last article for us was Reading for the End of the World Redux

Werewolf Rising (RLJ Entertainment, October 14, 2014)

A 20 film marathon of werewolf movies I’ve never seen before.

As usual, the films must be free to stream.

I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

Werewolf Rising (2014) YouTube

Man or beast? It looks more like a hairy extra from The Hobbit.

Howling’ good time? Nope. We are off to a rip-roaring start with this dull effort shot entirely in Arkansas, if that floats your boat.

A paper thin plot is played out in a forest with a single digit, lacklustre cast and the whole shebang is shot in glorious murky-vision. The only redeeming feature might have been the beast(s), but they are rubbish.

Oh god. What have I started?

3/10

Werewolf Woman (Agorà, March 18, 1976) and Another Wolfcop (RLJE Films, July 29, 2017)

Werewolf Woman (1976) Tubi

Man or beast? Naked, hairy, black-nosed lady.

Howling’ good time? Apparently, this is a favorite of Quentin Tarantino, but I swear half of his favorites are just obscure titles that he had access to while working in a dodgy video store that he could use as bragging rights. It has elements of revenge flicks that he would use in his own films, but the rest is a messy potpourri of sex, violence, and sexual violence. This being the 70s and Italian, the main feature is hair, whether it is covering the voluptuous frame of the titular lady, the upper lips of the men, or more nether-regions than a topiary enthusiast could ever dream of.

It’s a sordidly strange tale of a woman who is horrifically raped and her lover murdered, who exacts revenge in the guise of a werewolf without any transformation due to recurring dreams that she is the descendant of a werewolf. Confused? You will be. Weird, uncomfortable, badly dubbed.

Can’t say I loved it – but it had a couple of decent moments and some good old-fashioned Italian exploitation gore.

6/10

Another Wolfcop (2017) Prime

Man or beast? Great, practical, wolf. Cop.

Howling’ good time? A proudly Canadian production, this sequel takes the original concept (cop Lou Garou is bitten by a werewolf and brings his new persona to the job) and ramps up the insanity. Reptilian mutants, moustachioed parasitic stomach worms, extremely hairy sex, extremely gory deaths, Gowan on repeat and Kevin Smith yelling ‘slam a cold cock!’ at any given moment. It’s stupid as all hell and I loved it.

Bonus points for enormous werewang.

8/10

Iron Wolf (RJ Nier Films, September 13, 2013) and Dr. Jekyll vs. the Werewolf (Filmaco, 1972)

Iron Wolf (2013) YouTube

Man or beast? Ruby’s bottom of the line costume.

Howling’ good time? Don’t be fooled by the poster (or any poster for that matter), this is not a jolly werewolf romp set in WW2. The film begins that way, with some mis-matched Nazis working in a secret lab (industrial site) and showing off their werewolf that they have trained to only attack non-Nazis.

It’s cheap and cheerful, and somewhat passable, but then is brutally cut short and jumps forward in time to some extremely dull modern, German teenagers. They are hanging around the semi-ruined labs for some B.S. reason, the wolf creature gets out, and it becomes a ‘desperate fight for survival’. The direction is pretty limp, and the acting isn’t great – I really wish the German cast had been allowed to speak German and for the film to be subtitled. It makes no sense to flatly deliver the lines – lines that are flat to begin with.

As usual, the only saving grace could have been the werewolf, but this big doofus is just a dude in a Halloween wolf costume (and not the deluxe version) stuffed into a Nazi uniform. Laughably bad.

4/10

Dr. Jekyll vs. the Werewolf (1972) Tubi

Man or beast? Hairy-faced fella.

Howlin’ good time? I’m no stranger to Paul Naschy werewolf flicks, but this is one of the dozen movies he made that I missed. As with the other Spanish-produced films in this series, Naschy plays the wolfman, searching for a cure, and the whole shebang has that lovely dark gothic feel of the other films.

However, this one has a personality split as broad as the titular characters. The first hour is tedious, lots of sitting around talking, but then, once Dr. Jekyll’s grandson starts shooting up the wolfman, it goes batshit crazy. Cue Hyde going on a sadistic rampage, whipping every bosom he lays eyes on, go-go dancing, drunk tipping and other nefarious tomfoolery. It’s not enough to save the movie, but it is daft enough to warrant an extra mark.

5/10

The Shattering (Film Cartel Entertainment, March 24, 2015) and Werewolves Within (IFC Films, June 25, 2021)

The Shattering (2015) YouTube

Man or beast? Unseen thingy.

Howlin’ good time? Let’s get this one out of the way. A group of randos are stuck in a cabin due to a bullshit plot line involving a healer. Some hunters are stuck in the woods due to some bullshit plot line about collecting wolf spit. A POV camera eats most of them. A very bold decision to not show a single werewolf in this badly shot, badly acted, werewolf flick. The only shattering that went on was in my pants when I realized I had to sit through this tedious dirge.

3/10

Werewolves Within (2021) Netflix

Man or beast? Nice, practical werewolf.

Howlin’ good time? I really should have saved this until last, but I needed a little pick-me-up, and this sure hit the spot. Based on the videogame Werewolf, this film is a joy from start to finish. It’s a horror comedy in the same vein as Shaun of the Dead, even going so far as to include some Edgar Wright-type editing, and for the most part, the comedy sticks the landing.

It helps that the two leads are so likeable and awkward; Sam Richardson is perfect as a spineless park ranger, and Milana Vayntrub is adorable (and renews my pining for the aborted Squirrel Girl series). The setting is a hokey town in Vermont, full of troubled characters that put me in mind of Northern Exposure, or even Twin Peaks, and the plot weaves in a bit of social commentary about pipelines, gentrification, and acceptance.

For a further comparison, I had as much fun with this as I did with The Beast Must Die, and I even guessed correctly! Highly recommended.

9/10

Previous Murkey Movie surveys from Neil Baker include:

What a Croc
Prehistrionics
Jumping the Shark
Alien Overlords
Biggus Footus
I Like Big Bugs and I Cannot Lie
The Weird, Weird West
Warrior Women Watch-a-thon

Neil Baker’s last article for us was What a Croc, Part III. Neil spends his days watching dodgy movies, most of them terrible, in the hope that you might be inspired to watch them too. He is often asked why he doesn’t watch ‘proper’ films, and he honestly doesn’t have a good answer. He is an author, illustrator, outdoor educator and owner of April Moon Books (AprilMoonBooks.com).

The Hollow Earth novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs: At the Earth’s Core (Ace Books, August 1978), Pellucidar (Del Rey, May 1990), Tanar of Pellucidar, Back to the Stone Age, Land of Terror, and Savage Pellucidar (Ace Books, January 1973). Covers by Frank Frazetta and David Mattingly (Pellucidar)

Above are my Edgar Rice Burroughs Pellucidar books. Tarzan at the Earth’s Core goes with this series as well, although I included it in Part II of this series, with my Tarzan collection. In these stories, Pellucidar is a hollow area at the center of the Earth. There are openings into it at the North and South poles, but in the initial book, At the Earth’s Core, an American named David Innes reaches the interior by riding inside a giant drill. This is kind of a reverse of the Sword & Planet plot in which the Earthman is taken outward to another world.

Pellucidar is an interesting construction and ERB clearly gave it some thought. There’s a miniature sun at the center that leads to perpetual day, and the only shadowy area on the surface of Pellucidar is an area of constant twilight beneath the bulk of the unmoving moon. The interior has no horizon because everything curves up and away from the viewer, and the land and water masses are the reverse of the surface, leaving a lot of land. The world is populated by all kinds of extinct outer lifeforms that wandered in through the polar entrances, including some dinosaurs and the remnants of the mammal megafauna.

It also contains humans, and some weird races that never existed on the surface, including the Mahars, who are winged reptilian-like beings possibly evolved from Pterodactyl-like ancestors. The Mahars rule the interior world and David Innes leads a revolt against them that is fought out during the first few books. In Tarzan at the Earth’s Core, Tarzan takes an airship into the interior world and gets involved in the war. Some of the later books are made up of stories that were originally published separately.

There are 7 Pellucidar books, listed below with first publication dates. My copies are all later releases, of course, and all from Ace Books, except for Book 2, From Del Rey. I’ve also listed the publication dates and cover artists here for my copies.

At the Earth’s Core, 1914: 1978, Frazetta
Pellucidar, 1915: 1990, David B. Mattingly
Tanar of Pellucidar, 1929: 1978, Frazetta
Tarzan at the Earth’s Core, 1929-1930 (not shown above)
Back to the Stone Age, 1936-1937: Frazetta cover (My Favorite)
Land of Terror, 1944: 1973, Frazetta
Savage Pellucidar, 1963: 1978, Frazetta

I like the Pellucidar series a lot, and it was the single biggest influence on Lin Carter’s Zanthadon, which I wrote about in a Facebook post quite a while back.

Lin Carter’s Zanthodon novels: Journey to the Underground World, Eric of Zanthodon, Hurok of the Stone Age, Darya of the Bronze Age, and Zanthodon (DAW Books, November 1979, May 1982, February 1981, September 1981, and June 1980). Covers by Josh Kirby and Thomas Kidd (Zanthodon)

The idea of a Hollow Earth that Burroughs used in his Pellucidar books, or at least of great caverns beneath the earth, is very old. Quite a few Native American tribes have origin stories that include them coming from out of hollows in the earth. Edmond Halley proposed it as a serious theory in 1692, and, of course, there’s Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth, published in 1864.

A couple of years ago, my wife and I visited Mammoth Cave in Kentucky and saw evidence of Native Americans having visited and perhaps lived there. I also found out about a book with the lengthy title Wonderful Discovery: Being an account of a recent exploration of the celebrated Mammoth Cave, in Edmonson County, Kentucky, by Dr. Rowan, Professor Simmons and others, of Louisville, to its termination in an inhabited region, in the interior of the Earth.” I managed to find a copy online.

Wonderful Discovery by Montgomery E. Letcher (Forgotten Books, August 24, 2018)

Written in 1839, this story purports to be a journey into the Hollow Earth through the Mammoth Cave system. It’s only a long opening chapter, and supposedly there were to be further installments. This is the only one I’m aware of. This piece has the intrepid explorers getting through the cave system into the inner world where they meet a peaceful group of humans. There’s not much excitement; no “narrative drive,” like you get from ERB.

I was unable to find anything on the author Montgomery E. Letcher. My search suggests this is the only work he ever did. The writing is, naturally, very old fashioned, and the concept was apparently derived from Halley’s suggestion of the Hollow Earth. The story precedes Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth by decades, since that book was published in 1864. It seems likely to me, however, that Verne arrived at the idea directly from Halley’s writings rather than from having read this work. And I doubt Burroughs knew about it either.

Map of Pellucidar from An Atlas of Fantasy by Jeremiah Benjamin Post (Ballantine Books, January 1, 1979)

Above is a map of Pellucidar, from An Atlas of Fantasy. The same basic map is featured in some of the books as well. ERB drew it himself.

ERB and Some Pastiches

Getting back to ERB’s Pellucidar, there’s also a sequel to the series written by John Eric Holmes (1930 – 2010) called Mahars of Pellucidar. It follows the events of Savage Pellucidar. My copy appears to be from the first printing, from ACE, 1976, with a great cover by Boris. I actually enjoyed this tale quite a bit. It was authorized by ERB’s heirs, although they originally nixed a sequel Holmes wrote called Red Axe of Pellucidar. This was eventually published, with the consent of ERB, Inc, although I don’t have it and haven’t read it.

Mahars of Pellucidar by John Eric Holmes (Ace, 1976), Bunduki by J.T. Edson (DAW, April 1975), and Tarzan: The Lost Adventure, by Edgar Rice Burroughs and Joe R. Lansdale (Del Rey, June 1997). Covers by Boris Vallejo, Michael Whelan, and Raymond Verdaguer

The other books I have shown above with Mahars is Joe Lansdale’s (1951-) fleshed out Tarzan novel Tarzan: The Lost Adventure, which he wrote from a long outline found in ERB’s effects after his death. It’s not quite a pastiche. Nor is it my favorite book from Lansdale, who has written many truly wonderful works. This is from Del Rey, first published in 1995. The cover is by Raymond Verdaguer. I’m sure this is perfectly competent work of art but it didn’t do much for me, and I don’t understand why they didn’t use one of the artists who did the great interior sketches, such as Gary Gianni or Michael Kaluta.

The last pastiche shown here is Bunduki, by J. T. Edson (1928 – 2014), cover by Michael Whelan. It features Tarzan’s adopted son and adopted granddaughter (Bunduki and Dawn). It throws us right into a mystery. Bunduki wakes up in a tree in a tropical jungle, but it isn’t Africa. He’s amazed since he was in a Land Rover that ran over a cliff and should have been dead. Dawn was with him but is missing. It turns out that the two have been mysteriously transported to another world, which turns out to be a counter-earth (opposite our Earth) called Zillikian. This makes it essentially a Sword & Planet novel, although pretty light on the sword part.

Edson wrote three approved novels of Bunduki and a fourth one and some short stories that were not approved by the ERB heirs. I’ve only read the first one but the complete series is:

1. Bunduki, 1975
2. Bunduki and Dawn, 1976
3. Sacrifice for the Quagga God, 1976
4. Fearless Master of the Jungle, 1980

Edson had written a partial fifth novel called Amazons of Zillikian, which was published in 2023. I’ve never seen it. Edson, a British author, was best known for his westerns, particularly a very long series about the Floating Outfit, which ran to 66 books. I’ve read one of those, which was rather intriguing since it involved Cowboys and Aliens.

I might have picked up the other Bunduki books but they are exceedingly expensive in paperback. They are cheap for the Kindle but I’ve got way too many books on Kindle already.

Previous installments in this series include:

The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part I: Sword and Planet
The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part II: Tarzan and The Land That Time Forgot
The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part III: The Westerns and The Mucker

Charles Gramlich administers The Swords & Planet League group on Facebook, where this post first appeared. His last article for Black Gate was The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part III: The Westerns and The Mucker.

Heavy Metal #319, the penultimate issue of the original run (November 2022). Cover by Pascal Blanche

Okay, strictly speaking, this topic doesn’t fall into a standard (notice I didn’t say “normal”) Goth Chick category. But bear with me for a short story.

A long time ago in a small midwestern town far, far away, I experienced my first hardcore crush. The subject in question was not only tantalizingly a few years older than me but he was decidedly gothy in a dark-warrior kind of way. Therefore, in my youthful opinion, he was perfection on two feet. That same year as I was sitting cross-legged on the floor of my local bookstore my eyes fell on an issue of Heavy Metal magazine where low and behold was my crush, or someone who looked darn close, personified in all his brooding magicalness, right there on the cover. That day my allowance went to my first issue of Heavy Metal and though I was a rabid fan for years afterward, I admittedly became hit and miss, buying only sporadic issues throughout the 2000’s.

Heavy Metal magazine, which had been in constant publication since 1977, printed its last issue in 2022 after a series of attempts to keep it viable, and an era came to an end.

Until now.

Heavy Metal issue #1, April 1977. Cover by Jean-Michel Nicollet

Before we get to that, let’s back up for some history.

Heavy Metal debuted in April 1977, bringing avant-garde European comic art and adult-oriented storytelling to American readers. Inspired by the French magazine Métal Hurlant (“Screaming Metal”), Heavy Metal was launched by Leonard Mogel, who licensed the rights to translate and publish content from its French counterpart. The magazine quickly distinguished itself with its blend of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and erotica, rendered in fantastic artwork and experimental narratives.

In its heyday, the contributors to Heavy Metal included legendary artists like Moebius, H.R. Giger, and Philippe Druillet, alongside American talents such as Richard Corben. Heavy Metal became the go-to publication for visionary creators, showcasing serialized stories, one-shot comics, and memorable (and boy were they memorable) covers that pushed boundaries all over the place.

Heavy Metal #1 (April 30, 2025). Cover by Greg Hildebrandt

The magazine reached a broader audience with the release of the cult animated film Heavy Metal (1981), an anthology of shorts inspired by its comics and featuring a soundtrack of iconic rock and metal bands. This cemented its reputation as a cultural touchstone for fans of both countercultural comics and rock music.

Over the years, Heavy Metal evolved under various editors and owners, including Kevin Eastman, co-creator of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. In January 2014, its ownership transitioned to digital and music veteran David Boxenbaum and film producer Jeff Krelitz. Eastman, though stepping back from majority control, remained as publisher until 2020 and retained a minority stake in the magazine under Heavy Metal Media, LLC.

In early 2020 CEO Matthew Medney and “Creative Overlord” David Erwin (formerly of DC Entertainment) took the helm. They launched new publishing initiatives, Virus and Magma Comix, though neither gained much traction. In 2021, Heavy Metal celebrated its 300th issue, featuring work by legendary artists and tributes to its cultural impact.

Heavy Metal #1, Sword & Sorcery variant (April 30, 2025). Cover by Frazetta.

Financial struggles loomed, leading to a partnership with Whatnot Publishing in 2022 to produce future issues. However, cash flow problems forced Heavy Metal to cease publication in December 2022, ending its continuous run since 1977. Despite efforts to revive operations and fulfill obligations, only one additional issue was produced, and the magazine was officially canceled in mid-2023.

Which brings us to today.

In October 2024, Heavy Metal International, LLC announced a relaunch planned for 2025, backed by a Kickstarter campaign to fund it. The campaign had a modest $5000 goal but nearly 11,000 fans proceeded to blow that right out of the water and contributed a whopping $781K. HMI put together this short video announcing the comeback of the magazine so check it.

Heavy Metal magazine (new) issue 1 is set to drop in April in stores, and the magazine’s website indicates that subscriptions to the new version will be available there soon. I’m definitely going to give this a look when it hits shelves to see if Heavy Metal was a point in time, or if it can be successful in this era.

Thoughts?

The Eye of Sounnu (DMR Books, May 3, 2020)

The concept of barbarism vs. civilization is a topic that Robert E. Howard often explored in his incredibly crafted fiction. Other authors, many inspired by Howard, have explored the concept through their own creations.

Notable among these is modern sword-and-sorcery author Schuyler Hernstrom, whose collection of short stories, The Eye of Sounnu, was published by DMR Books. The collection contains a wonderful story called “Mortu and Kyrus in the White City,” which features northland, pagan barbarian (Mortu) and his learned companion (Kryus), a monotheistic monk who suffers a curse and now lives in the body of a monkey — but that does not preclude him from waxing philosophically about the world and mankind’s place in it.

There was an exchange between the two that I recently read, and I had to reread it, and then reread it again, because I enjoyed it so much, so I share it here, for my friends of similar interests.

(This takes place shortly after the two arrived in “the White City.”)

Mortu whispered to his friend. “How old do you reckon she is?”
Kyrus shrugged. “Perhaps thirty-five, forty? Forty-five at the oldest.”
“Everyone here, the men and the women, all seem to be the same age save Nathia and the (two) children. Where are the families? Where are the elderly?”
“In mankind’s long history, many people have struck off in order to found their idea of a utopia. I suspect the denizens of the White City are such a group. All those that turn away from society in such a way meet a similar fate, gradual disillusionment and dissolution.”
“Utopia?”
Kyrus’ tone became pedantic. “A perfect society.”
Mortu scoffed. “There is such a place, the north, where my people live as the gods intended.”
“My young friend, once again the essential concepts escape your grasp, like eels slipping from your thick fingers. While you may wrongly believe the savages that raised you to be of a perfect society, I refer to man’s long dream of living without inequality or strife.”
The barbarian scoffed again. “Life is conflict. We are but wolves that walk on two legs. Build your temples, write your books, nothing will ever change.”

Lastly, I’d like to thank my friend Morgan for recommending this excellent collection a few years ago. I am enjoying it immensely.

Order copies directly from DMR’s website.

Jeffrey P. Talanian’s last article for Black Gate was Roy Thomas’ Barbarian Life. He is the creator and publisher of the Hyperborea sword-and-sorcery and weird science-fantasy RPG from North Wind Adventures. He was the co-author, with E. Gary Gygax, of the Castle Zagyg releases, including several Yggsburgh city supplements, Castle Zagyg: The East Mark Gazetteer, and Castle Zagyg: The Upper Works. Read Gabe Gybing’s interview with Jeffrey here, and follow his latest projects on Facebook and at www.hyperborea.tv.

Black Gate’s interview series on “Beauty in Weird Fiction” queries authors/artists about their muses and methods to make ‘repulsive things’ become ‘attractive.’  We’ve hosted C.S. Friedman, Carol Berg, Darrell Schweitzer, Anna Smith Spark, and Janet E Morris (full list of 29 interviews, with Black Gate hosting since 2018).

This round features C. S. E. Cooney (CSEC), who is no stranger to Black Gate [link to listings]. She is a two-time World Fantasy Award-winning author: first, for Bone Swans: Stories, and most recently for Saint Death’s Daughter. Previously on Black Gate, an all-star crew heralded its release with a video cast including readings of Saint Death’s Daughter by C.S.E. Cooney.

Forthcoming in April 2025 is Saint Death’s Herald, the second in the Saint Death series. In this post, we reveal exclusive details, CSEC’s creative process, and hint of Book #3’s contents! Read this and her contagious energy will infect you! Cripes, simply by doing this interview, I was infected with a buttery aura! Read more and learn C.S.E. Cooney’s real identity and code name too (Tiger of the gods? Or is it Lainey!)

An Interview with Saint Death’s Daughter (a.k.a. C.S.E. Cooney)

 

SEL:  Saint Death’s Daughter was released in 2022, and we’ll dig into that momentarily.  Mark Rigney interviewed you a decade ago Black Gate (2014 link). How have you changed as an author since then? Were you inspired by your Lord Dunsany readings?

Re-reading that 2014 interview is hilarious. And exuberant. And painful. Oof. That line towards the end about Howard making me read Lord Dunsany? Seth, I have to say that right now, I just want Howard alive again, and making me read anything at all. That’s what I want.

[SEL Sidebar: Howard Andrew Jones, Black Gate print magazine editor, longtime author, and friend/mentor to countless writers, passed away this January after battling aggressive brain cancer. CSEC led the charge with a GoFundMe campaign for his family (with help from a crew including the just-mentioned Mark Rigney), and Black Gate has hosted several tributes (i.e., from John O’Neill, Jason Ray Carney, & Bob Byrne); as one of HAJ’s Skull Interns, I am capturing links to many more memorials. Peace to our dear friend.]

Otherwise, sadly: I don’t recall much about my Lord Dunsany readings. I didn’t even remember that reading Dunsany made me want to be referred to as “the tiger of the gods.” Now, why didn’t that catch on, I wonder? You may henceforth refer to me in this interview as “tiger of the gods,” please.

Have I changed as an author since then? Yes. Yes, I’m not as fast as I was ten years ago, and everything about the world seems harder, and sadder. I think it was always hard and sad, but I’m feeling it more now, I guess.

But also… also, it’s all so much more interesting.

Over the last ten years, I’d experienced such burnout, such weariness and bitterness about the craft, that at one point I announced I wasn’t going to write again until I wanted to write. My friends and family were afraid I was serious. (I was.) They were like, “Claire, what are you doing?”

But I really just wanted to want to write. Was any of the work even worth it if I didn’t want it anymore?

And it took a few weeks of me staring out a window, giving myself permission not to write. But then, suddenly and spontaneously one morning, I had one of those magical “what if” thoughts. That was something that hadn’t happened in literally years of revision and submission and revision and submission. The next morning, that “what if” had built into a whole dang story idea. So I sat down and started writing it out long hand — something I’d also not done in years. The experience was so pleasurable, so permissive, and so, I don’t know. Healing.

The whole world seemed new. Writing was possible again. Phew! I’d made it through the wasteland and to the other side.

Since then, the whole creative process just keeps getting weirder and more wonderful. Concentrating on the unique bizarreness of process has really opened me up to so many branching avenues of boundless curiosity.

Now I know: if I need to stop writing for a while, I will. (After I meet my deadlines, of course. That’s what a professional does.)

For me, the sensual ritual of writing has become the point. And community. Community is the point.

What else has changed? I’ve never done so much body mirroring while writing in my life: writing in silent zooms, or with people in the room. I’ve never done so much timed writing. I even started listening to music while writing — which I never used to do. I still can’t listen to anything with words (some Hildegard von Bingen chanting aside). I started listening to fantasy gaming soundtracks, because if I listen to movie soundtracks, I just have that movie’s story and dialogue running through my brain. But since I’ve not played most fantasy games, that’s not a problem. (I can’t, for example, listen to the Baldur’s Gate soundtrack, because I did play that. Which was awesome.)

I know this now: even when I’m sad, and tired, and lacking all motivation, I still want to want to write. All the rest is hacking my brain to get the motor running. Music, company, handwriting, candlelight… all of those rituals put me in a more celebratory and ludic headspace for writing.

What’s the same? Well… every time I have to write something new, it’s still like learning how to write all over again. Some of the same skills apply, sure, but I’m constantly learning how to write something I couldn’t even fathom before I started.

Like fight scenes. Fight scenes are so hard.

“Henceforth refer to me in this interview as ‘Tiger of the Gods’ ” — C.S.E. Cooney Saint Death’s Daughter (2023 World Fantasy Winner) Blurb

Nothing complicates life like Death.

Lanie Stones, the daughter of the Royal Assassin and Chief Executioner of Liriat, has never led a normal life. Born with a gift for necromancy and a literal allergy to violence, she was raised in isolation in the family’s crumbling mansion by her oldest friend, the ancient revenant Goody Graves.

When her parents are murdered, it falls on Lanie and her cheerfully psychotic sister Nita to settle their extensive debts or lose their ancestral home — and Goody with it. Appeals to Liriat’s ruler to protect them fall on indifferent ears… until she, too, is murdered, throwing the nation’s future into doubt.

Hunted by Liriat’s enemies, hounded by her family’s creditors and terrorised by the ghost of her great-grandfather, Lanie will need more than luck to get through the next few  months — but when the goddess of Death is on your side, anything is possible.

At first glance, the summary of Saint Death’s Daughter sounds like a horror adventure, but it reads more like a comedic/fun, coming-of-age story. How would you describe the book to new readers?

TIGER OF THE GODS: Generally, I give this elevator pitch: “Girl grows up in a family of assassins, but is allergic to violence. Her allergy indicates that one day, if she survives long enough, her aversion to violence will be so strong, she’ll be able to RAISE THE DEAD.”

Boom! Necromancy book, baby.

For comp titles, I say something along these lines: “Like if Terry Pratchett and the Addams Family had a necromancer baby who really liked pink frilly dresses and cutie patootie mouse skeletons.”

Those are light, easy ways about talking about my book. My book which is, in reality… much weirder.

BUT! I really don’t want to intimidate people. I want to invite people.

I also like to describe Saint Death’s Daughter as a Bildungsroman — a coming-of-age story. Now, I know that all YA books must perforce be coming-of-age stories. That’s the genre. It’s just that, at no point in the drafting process, did I imagine I was writing YA with Saint Death’s Daughter. But it is still a Bildungsroman.

I am, as I was ten years ago, still under the influence of Lois McMaster Bujold. I wanted to write a character like Bujold’s Miles Vorkosigan. The first few novellas about him may have covered his childhood, but over time, we get to experience him at many ages.

Saint Death’s Daughter is just Lanie Stones’s first book. It’s just one point in the timeline of her full life — perhaps not even the most important part. I imagine her in her thirties. (Sexy beast!) Her forties! (Whoa, what a powerhouse!) I imagine her as an old woman — with even more wisdom and compassion and mischief, and far, far more powerful. (Also, probably a foodie.) I imagine her on her deathbed. I imagine future scholars writing about her as a historical figure of a certain time and place that is perhaps no more. (This makes footnotes very fun.)

SEL: Discuss the media of necromancy which feels very artistic, especially the paint-like, colored essences of panthuama and ectenica.

TIGER OF THE GODS: I made up the word “panthauma” out of the words “pan” (all) and “thaumaturgy” (miracle or marvel-working). I wanted a word for sorcery that was slightly alien, so I could apply my own set of rules to it without previous reader bias. But I also wanted, in addition to that whiff of mysterious, a sense of familiarity, linguistically-speaking.

And then I wanted a new word for “death magic” that wasn’t just, you know “death magic.” “Necromancy” is the obvious word, and I do use it in the book. But its actual etymology has more to do with divining via the dead than raising them up. (All the “-mancy” words have to do with divination.) So I wanted necromancy to be a specific kind of death magic, not the word for death magic.

I wanted a new word, something more flexible, less familiar. A word that evoked ghosts! And also super fun to say. So I took a closer look at our word “ectoplasm,” and then just sort of f*&%ed with it to make “ectenica.” Just say it aloud. All those clicky consonants!

Lanie’s a bit of a synesthete, in that she associates smells and colors with magic; that’s her brain trying to process the unimaginable. So, for panthauma, when the gods are drawing close and lighting up the world with Their attention, her vision goes bright-yellow with hard edges, like faceted topaz, and her body responds with a kind of champagne-y, effervescent reaction. Her sensual reaction to ectenica is much colder. She perceived it as a sort of starry blue. And the smell of her god, and of death magic, is always some variation of citrus. Other gods have other smells. I think, to some degree, most of the sorcerers/saints in my world have synesthesia.

SEL: Celerity Stones, one of Lanie’s aunts, was also a traditional artist, and her portfolio included portraiture like “Barely There: The Exquisite Art of Excoriation, With (Predominantly) Live Models”.  I’d love to see her collection. Can you tell us more about Celerity’s inspiration and art?

Celerity had been much in demand for her pen and ink drawings, her sanguine sketches, her oils, watercolors, and illuminated calligraphy. Later, she won renown as an anatomical scientist. Very precise with spreader, was never easy to ignore her most famous work, The Flayed Ideal, which hung on the wall of Stones Gallery and had a way of glaring at you. Its exposed and accusatory eyeballs, rendered in oil on canvas with exquisite delicacy, followed you around the room — and very often out the door and down the hall.

— from Saint Death’s Daughter

TIGER OF THE GODS: You know those stories we have of anatomists and resurrection men in prior centuries who’d illegally dig up bodies in order to study them, to become better doctors? (I’m glad that the laws — and some minds — have changed to allow for voluntary donation in such endeavors, but for a while it was considered absolutely heinous.) And you know all those stories about how powerful people in history — doctors, surgeons, psychologists, prisons, military — exploited marginalized communities, sometimes going so far as to medically experiment on people without their informed consent, for purposes of their own research?

That’s my inspiration for Celerity Stones.

She was not a good person. She was talented and precise and obsessed with her work. But she — like the whole toxic Stones family — hurt people to achieve her greatness.

One of the reasons that the Stones family ultimately falls is that cruelty like that is not sustainable, however it sometimes seems to advance society in the moment. Undoing the Stones’s legacy, and especially the glamorization of the violent family narrative, is something that Lanie has to consciously learn how to do as she gets older.

SEL: Every time I’ve seen you at Gen Con, you are wearing impressive regalia. Do you craft the costumes?  Do they represent characters?

TIGER OF THE GODS: I don’t craft costumes, per se. Like, I don’t think of myself as dressing up as certain characters. But I do dress according to my mood that day — or the mood I’d like to have. Heck, I just like dressing up. When I was a kid I had a “dress-up trunk” and I just preferred every secondhand prom dress and thrift store “glass slipper” (plastic with rhinestones) and dilapidated tiara to any of my school uniforms, softball jerseys, or neon skorts in my regular wardrobe. All these years later, I still do. Only now MOST of my closet is “dress-up” trunk.

These days, if I have to dress to go somewhere where there’s an expectation of dress code, that’s when I feel like I’m in costume. Like, when I go into the booth for audiobook narration, I have to wear “soft clothes.” I think of them as “ninja clothes,” but a friend of mine said it just looked like I was wearing pajamas. But you can’t wear anything that tinkles or rustles or chimes!

I was watching a “maximalist” influencer talking on Instagram about how the act of getting dressed is a creative process. And when you put together an outfit (or “fit” as the kids are calling it) to completion, you get that little bump of dopamine, like when you finish a puzzle or complete a recipe or win a game. Creative clothing is a small, achievable goal, and it makes me happy. Maybe, in some ways, I’ve been sartorially self-medicating since childhood!

Saint Death’s Herald Blurb

Much-anticipated follow-up to the whimsical, joyous, zombie-packed World Fantasy Award-winning Saint Death’s Daughter

Lanie Stones is the necromancer that Death has been praying for.

Heartbroken, exiled from her homeland as a traitor, Lanie Stones would rather take refuge in good books and delicate pastries than hunt a deathless abomination, but that is the duty she has chosen.

The abomination in question happens to be her own great-grandfather, the powerful necromancer Irradiant Stones. Grandpa Rad has escaped from his prison and stolen a body, and is heading to the icy country of Skakhmat where he died, to finish the genocide he started. Fortunately for her, Lanie has her powerful death magic, including the power to sing the restless dead to their eternal slumber; and she has her new family by her side.

Grandpa Rad may have finally met his match.

Saint Death’s Herald (preorder link) is coming in April 2025. What can we reveal? Anything special we can say about this, only heralded via Black Gate?

TIGER OF THE GODS: Oh, gosh. Well. A Black Gate exclusive, eh?

Well, here’s the thing. I LOVE spoilers. I don’t even call them spoilers. I call them SPICERS. But not everybody (not even most people) think of them that way. So, with the caveat that those people who consider any information at all a SPOILER, perhaps they could skip this part?

Hush, come close! I’ll tell you, dear Black Gate readers, that Lanie Stones has only grown in power since Saint Death’s Daughter. I’ll tell you that when she enters fully into sympathy with a dead object, she can… SHARE PARTS OF ITS SHAPE.

She is also learning how to communicate through the dead — so if she has a… a toe bone, for example, from a particular corpse, and if you have a different toe bone from that same corpse, she’ll be able to call you. Like a one-way cell-phone.

My plan is, for Book 3, that Lanie will be so good at sharing shapes with the dead, that she can basically take on and maintain the appearance of any dead creature whose accident (physical material) she is in contact with. This makes going undercover to investigate crimes against the death god (totally random plot idea, not the basis for Book 3 at all, doo-dee-doo) much easier.

Can you discuss the cover art creation and artist?

TIGER OF THE GODS: Oh, this is the wonderful, wonderful Kate Forrester! Fantasy readers will already know and love her work from such glorious novels as Zen Cho’s The True Queen and Theodora Goss’s Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club trilogy. Basically, for Book 1, my editor Kate Coe consulted me about different cover artist options, and some ideas for the art.

When Kate Forrester was chosen, Kate Coe and I generated a few wild cover ideas to throw her way. Then Forrester came up with the wonderful silhouette idea. My editor asked if I could send the artist a few elements from the book that the silhouette could have trapped in her hair.

Then, for Saint Death’s Herald, my editor David Moore arranged the same sort of information exchange. In Book 2, the silhouette is facing the opposite direction, with different elements caught in her hair. The cover was done long before the book was done — so I had to make sure that my final draft included all the visual cues that I had originally suggested when I was still in the early stages of writing! Phew!

I wonder what Book 3 will look like? Forward facing? Or two silhouettes facing in opposite directions? That would be kind of cool: especially if Lanie spends most of the book incognito — as both herself and not herself!

But that’s years away.

“For me, the sensual ritual of writing has become the point. And community. Community is the point…even when I’m sad, and tired, and lacking all motivation, I still want to want to write” – C.S.E. Cooney

 

I adore your character names. For example, the protagonist & heroine “Lanie Stones” has a formal name of “Miscellaneous Stones”; and her contentious grandfather  Irradiant ‘Grandpa Rad’ Stones. Can we contract you to assign us pseudonyms with all the grandeur your characters’ names have? I’d love to lure you into calling me names.

Tiger:  That sounds like SO MUCH WORK! But it reminds me of the Fairy Tale Heroines workshop that The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic runs. One of the last things everyone does is assign themselves a “fairy tale heroine” (or hero/non-binary) name. But to do this, here are some questions: What’s your favorite animal? What kind of magic user would you be? If you could choose one of these to be: human, gentry (fairy folk), or goblin, which one would you be? If you were to choose one of the 12 gods from Saint Death’s Daughter, which would you choose? What’s your favorite obscure or forgotten word?

SEL:  Eh gad, return fire. Those are hard questions! Fairy and “humors” (alchemical medicinal version) … and I am still learning the 12 gods of your stories. I’m too young and ignorant to recall them all and choose (I’m not worthy). I do love Lainey and her scarecrow though.

Tiger: Okay, then, so if you were a Stones, you’d probably be named Butter-of-Antimony Stones, son of Alkahest and Argyropoeia Stones…. Friends would call you “Bu” for short. (We won’t get into what your enemies call you.) And if you were a gentry, you probably would be named Crasis, a cloudskin (sometimes “cloud — skin” and sometimes “clouds-kin”) who can transform into whatever shape they please, though you will be insubstantial as vapor.

SEL: Okay, I want to know your secret Stoneses name too.

Tiger: Miscellaneous, of course!

BU: You are an award-winning poet (Rhysling Award-winning poem “The Sea King’s Second Bride” included in How to Flirt in Faerieland and Other Wild Rhymes), and have written plays. The previous Black Gate interview mentioned you also sing! Please discuss how expression works across media.

TIGER OF THE GODS: Oh, gosh. I’m just drawn to some kinds of media over others. Like, I don’t have any current desire to write a screenplay or a graphic novel or MG/YA. But I often get the itch to write plays and musicals and poetry.

I just wrote a 10-minute play to submit to a local theatre festival for fun, and it felt so good to stretch those playwriting muscles again. My husband Carlos wrote one too! We both submitted to the same festival. Whatever happens now, at least we’ll have done something that challenged us artistically and brought us delight.

Re: musicals and albums: for the past few years, as time allows, I’ve been collaborating with Tina Connolly and Dr. Mary Crowell on a 6-episode musical theatre podcast called The Devil and Lady Midnight. And in 2023, I mounted a short, collaborative musical called Ballads from Distant Stars, with songs by myself, Amal El-Mohtar, and Caitlyn Paxson (with occasional melodies and harmonies by my brother Jeremy Cooney and Dr. Mary Crowell).

Eventually, I’d love to figure out how to bring both of the projects to full audio production. I’ll probably record Ballads from a Distant Star myself, with the help of my awesome musician brothers, and helpmate husband — like I did with my Brimstone Rhine album and EPs. However, The Devil and Lady Midnight will be a lot more complicated and expensive — but super rewarding if we can do the work!

What I’ve learned over the last 10 years about making albums and theatre: without an infrastructure already in place, a space to perform in, and people wanting to produce the work for you, you have to build that infrastructure from scratch. So there’s either a lot of crowdfunding involved, so you can hire people who already know what they’re doing to help you, or you’d better be ready to go full autodidact and learn how to do it all yourself. Whichever way you go, there’s still a cost: in time, in equipment, in the goodwill of the community, etc.

I try to find collaborators who are interested in making art for art’s sake with me. It’s not like I think we shouldn’t get paid, but I don’t really go into a creative project dreaming about all the money it might rake in. That said, I’m interested in collaborative partners who, once the creative process part is done, are also interested in taking that piece of polished art to production or publication — either via crowdfunding, bootstrapping, submitting, or grant-writing. Because it’s really daunting to try to run that gauntlet alone.

I also adore writing poetry. I stopped for a while — though in that lacuna, I did start writing songs — and now that I’m writing poetry again, I’ve got enough for a collection. I’m calling it The Day I Superglued the Moon: 10 Years in the Life of a Speculative Poet. It’s massive. It needs curation. I don’t know what to do with it. Self-publish? Ask my agent to submit it? Approach a small press?

Meanwhile, I feel so raw and tender and personal about it, because it’s poetry! so I keep avoiding doing anything at all. For now.

BU:  ‘Macabre and beautiful’ (and fun) has even taken root in a game! You and your husband Carlos Hernandez co-designed a table-top roleplaying game called Negocios Infernales, Kickstarted October 2023. What is this game about? Does it inspire storytelling? Weirdly beautiful stories?

“In the initial design, taking this all into account: here’s what we did. One of Claire’s favorite games is Mysterium, which she loves in part for its gorgeous, surreal cards that have this melancholy timbre to them. You can look at the cards and be inspired, even outside of the game. So I thought: What about instead of dice and all the rules that govern them, you have a deck of beautiful cards, maybe a little macabre, but also inspiring? It’s always very simple to determine success or failure in Negocios, as easy as Candyland. If your card matches one of the cards on your character sheet, success. If it doesn’t, not success! And everything else you just get to make up.” – Cultureslate Interview, Carlos Hernandez quoted

TIGER OF THE GODS: Co-designing a narrative game was a wild departure from my personal normal. And I’m so grateful that Carlos nudged me in that direction, because it opened up the whole world of gaming to me — board games, TTRPGs, and video games!

Carlos is a game designer, and when we first got together, he said I was perfect, I was MORE than perfect; maybe my only flaws were that I don’t like coffee and I don’t really play games.

Dear Black Gate Readers, I now like espresso. Okay, just a little bit of an espresso—¡un pocito espressito!—once every few months, but I can honestly say I like it.

And now, I also like games. But I didn’t always. In fact, I liked board games much better than TTRPGs when we first started playing together, for all that I’m an actor and a writer, and by my nature should be a shoe-in for roleplaying games. But I’d sort of had a “meh” view of TTRPGs, due to some less than stellar experiences, so Carlos suggested we design one together that I’d actually like.

We designed a game that has some moving pieces and some timed elements (like a board game), that’s big on character creation and world building and plot development, that’s easy for beginners, but also incredibly rich for experienced players. It’s so much fun, and so weird, and so moving.

Negocios Infernales’s tag line is: “The Spanish Inquisition… INTERRUPTED by aliens!”

Imagine a fantasy world — Gloriana — much like Earth (Gloriana’s more of a superplanet that’s mostly water, and it has two suns, but bear with me here). Now imagine a country called “Espada”—Spanish for “blade” — which is a lot like our Spain in the 15th century. The queen, Reina Resoluta, is about to sign religious persecution into law. Then… benevolent, enlightened aliens intervene! They offer cosmic powers in exchange for a zero-genocide policy on Espada.

Of course, the Espadans mistake the aliens for devils (because their deelie boppers look like horns), and while they do strike a deal for “magic powers,” they think their bargain is an infernal one.

So you play a “wizard” with “magical powers,” certain that you’ll be damned for all time for it. It is a game of cosmic irony.

One of the best things about it is our “Deck of Destiny.” It’s a 70-card oracle deck, and it’s our main mechanic for character creation, world-building, magic checks, inspiration, all of that.

But separate from the roleplaying game, we use the Deck of Destiny to run what we call “Infernal Salons,” where we invite writers and artists of every stripe to pull a card prompt or three. We set a timer. Everyone writes something, no matter what form it takes. And then, whoever wants to, shares aloud. This creates such fantastic, generative, creative nights. Many published stories and poems have come out of these salons, both for Carlos and myself, and also for many of the people who’ve participated. The “Infernal Salons may be my favorite thing that has come from designing this game.

Negocios Infernales is available for pre-order right now from Outland Entertainment, and should be in our backers’ hands in a few months — if the International Shipping gods are kind.

C. S. E. Cooney

C. S. E. Cooney (she/her) is a two-time World Fantasy Award-winning author: for novel Saint Death’s Daughter, and collection Bone Swans, Stories. Other work includes The Twice-Drowned Saint, Dark Breakers, and Desdemona and the Deep. Forthcoming in 2025 is Saint Death’s Herald, second in the Saint Death Series. As a voice actor, Cooney has narrated over 120 audiobooks, and short fiction for podcasts like Uncanny Magazine, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Tales to Terrify, and Podcastle. In March 2023, she produced her collaborative sci-fi musical, Ballads from a Distant Star, at New York City’s Arts on Site. (Find her music at Bandcamp under Brimstone Rhine.) Forthcoming from Outland Entertainment is the GM-less TTRPG Negocios Infernales (“the Spanish Inquisition… INTERRUPTED by aliens!”), co-designed with her husband, writer and game-designer Carlos Hernandez. Find her website and Substack newsletter via her Linktree or try “csecooney” on various social media platforms.

Other Weird and Beautiful Interviews #Weird Beauty Interviews on Black Gate:

1. Darrel Schweitzer THE BEAUTY IN HORROR AND SADNESS: AN INTERVIEW WITH DARRELL SCHWEITZER 2018
2. Sebastian Jones THE BEAUTY IN LIFE AND DEATH: AN INTERVIEW WITH SEBASTIAN JONES 2018
3. Charles Gramlich THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE REPELLENT: AN INTERVIEW WITH CHARLES A. GRAMLICH  2019
4. Anna Smith Spark DISGUST AND DESIRE: AN INTERVIEW WITH ANNA SMITH SPARK  2019
5. Carol Berg ACCESSIBLE DARK FANTASY: AN INTERVIEW WITH CAROL BERG 2019
6. Byron Leavitt GOD, DARKNESS, & WONDER: AN INTERVIEW WITH BYRON LEAVITT 2021
7. Philip Emery THE AESTHETICS OF SWORD & SORCERY: AN INTERVIEW WITH PHILIP EMERY  2021
8. C. Dean Andersson DEAN ANDERSSON TRIBUTE INTERVIEW AND TOUR GUIDE OF HEL: BLOODSONG AND FREEDOM! (2021 repost of 2014)
9. Jason Ray Carney SUBLIME, CRUEL BEAUTY: AN INTERVIEW WITH JASON RAY CARNEY(2021)
10. Stephen Leigh IMMORTAL MUSE BY STEPHEN LEIGH: REVIEW, INTERVIEW, AND PRELUDE TO A SECRET CHAPTER(2021)
11. John C. Hocking BEAUTIFUL PLAGUES: AN INTERVIEW WITH JOHN C. HOCKING (2022)
12. Matt Stern BEAUTIFUL AND REPULSIVE BUTTERFLIES: AN INTERVIEW WITH M. STERN(2022)
13. Joe Bonadonna MAKING WEIRD FICTION FUN: GRILLING DORGO THE DOWSER! 2022
14. C.S. Friedman.  BEAUTY AND NIGHTMARES ON ALIENS WORLDS: INTERVIEWING C. S. FRIEDMAN2023
15. John R Fultz BEAUTIFUL DARK WORLDS: AN INTERVIEW WITH JOHN R. FULTZ(reboot of 2017 interview)
16. John R Fultz, THE REVELATIONS OF ZANGBY JOHN R. FULTZ: READ THE FOREWORD AND INTERVIEW (2023)
17. Robert Allen Lupton (2024) https://www.blackgate.com/2024/05/26/horror-and-beauty-in-edgar-rice-burroughs-work-an-interview-with-robert-allen-lupton/
18. C.S.E. Cooney (2025) You are here!
19. Interviews prior 2018 (i.e., with Janet E. Morris, Richard Lee Byers, Aliya Whitely …and many more) are on S.E. Lindberg’s website

SE Bio, aka Bu

S.E. Lindberg is a Managing Editor at Black Gate, regularly reviewing books and interviewing authors on the topic of “Beauty & Art in Weird-Fantasy Fiction.” He is also the lead moderator of the Goodreads Sword & Sorcery Group and an intern for Tales from the Magician’s Skull magazine. As for crafting stories, he has contributed eight entries across Perseid Press’s Heroes in Hell and Heroika series, and has an entry in Weirdbook Annual #3: Zombies. He independently publishes novels under the banner Dyscrasia Fiction; short stories of Dyscrasia Fiction have appeared in Whetstone, Swords & Sorcery online magazine, Rogues In the House Podcast’s A Book of Blades Vol I and Vol II, DMR’s Terra Incognita, and the 9th issue of Tales From the Magician’s Skull.

I haven’t shared what I’ve been listening to, since November. How have you lasted this long??? Let’s rectify that right now, shall we?

ISAAC STEELE & THE FOREVER MAN – Daniel Rigby

This is the first of two originals produced by Audible as The Isaac Steele Chronicles – it’s not a print or digital book turned into an audiobook.

Rigby wrote it, and he narrates as well. He sounds a lot like Cary Elwes, which totally works for me (you want a great audiobook – Elwes’ memoir about the making of The Princess Bride, with several cast members reading their own parts, is superb).

It’s NSFW – I don’t play this one out loud in the office. I’d say ‘raunchy.’ So, take that for what it is.

Steele works for Greatest Britain’s Department of Clarification. He’s basically a police detective for the intergalactic British government. Greatest Britain is about as beloved as Britain was during the Colonial Era. Steele is never the most popular guy in the room. He also drinks, does drugs, has unresolved parental issues, and he’s not exactly a stickler for the rules. A scifi version of the hardboiled private eye trope.

He can be his own worst enemy, but there are plenty of other people, robots, and monsters, willing to make his life worse for him. He has a robotic partner, Timothy, who sulks in his tent like Achilles, after getting benched on the case. Steele is less than gracious in welcoming his new, temporary partner.

This is campy fun, without being silly. I can imagine that there are some seriously devoted fans, on board for more.

It came out in 2021, and a sequel, Isaac Steele and the Best Idea in the Universe, followed up in 2024. I’m gonna listen to that after I finish this first one.

Also, I listened to Larry Correia’s three-book Lost Planet Homicide series. I don’t care how you feel about him, or David Eddings, or Josh Whedon (I’m re-watching Firefly right now: man, Fox messed up with that one), or Orson Scott Card, or Neil Gaiman, or whoever. We all make our own decisions on what we watch and read (and what Eddings did hung a bit over my re-read of The Belgariad, which I still love). And the Hugos matter not a whit in my life. If you are bothered I listened to Correia, just move along, or quit reading me, or whatever. Let’s be adults.

Lost Planet Homicide is the title of the first book of the series of the same name. It’s a hardboiled cop (detective) book set in space. It’s definitely tongue-in-cheek, and I get if some people think it’s too over-the-top. But it’s intended to be, and I think it’s more homage than parody.

A colony ship went off course and ended up a thousand light years from Earth. Croatan has five mountain peaks the rise above a fatal cloud of acid that blankets the world. This is not a fun place. Corporations and criminal syndicates call the shots. Murder can be bought off usually. When it can’t, DCI Lutero Cade is called in to…gasp…actually solve the crime! If you think Chandler’s Philip Marlowe and Bay City was cynical, welcome to Five Peaks.

The stakes are epic, and the stories link together, but also stand-alone. Oliver Wyman does hardboiled PI pretty well. Good choice.

I’m a fan of Isaac Asimov’s R. Daneel Olivaw books (I wrote about them here). So, while I don’t do much scifi (which relegates me to the kiddie table at Black Gate gatherings), I don’t mind scifi cop/PI stuff. Both of these were fun listens, with different vibes.

MALIBU BURNING – Lee Goldberg

I’m a huge fan of Lee Goldberg’s Monk books. I’ve also listened to all but the most recent Eve Ronin novel, and that is a terrific buddy cop series, set in Hollywood. It occasionally borders on as dark as I get (for a hardboiled fan, I’m a little squeamish), but never goes too far. Can’t wait to get to the most recent one, Dream Town.

Anywhoo, book three of his Sharpe & Walker series is coming in April. Walter Sharpe is an arson investigator, and his new partner is former US marshal Andrew Walker. And this 2023 title about central CA on fire, certainly is timely.

Lee was a terrific screenwriter. Go look up his IMDB page. He and his writing partner William Rabkin penned a couple excellent episodes for A&E’s A Nero Wolfe Mystery. But now Lee is a regular tenant on the NY Times’ best-seller list. He writes fast-paced, absorbing thrillers and crime dramas. I haven’t even managed to get around to his hit series co-written with Janet Evanovich.

I think you could pick any of his series’ (and you can never go wrong with Monk!) and be glad you did. I’m a fan of pulpster Stewart Sterling (real-name, Prentice Winchell). Which includes his Fire Marshal Pedley books (NY Harbor cop Steve Kosko is also fine ‘unconventional’ hardboiled PI). So, a current series, about an arson investigator, written by a top flight novelist, is right up my alley. Definitely recommended.

A POINT OF LAW – John Maddox Roberts

Book ten of thirteen in Roberts’ fantastic SPQR series of mysteries set in Ancient Rome. I’ve talked about them here. I absolutely love these stories, and John Lee is the perfect narrator. Click on the link for more info. I have not been disappointed with a single book so far, and I am spacing out the remaining three (Roberts died last year).

He was long working on the next book in the series. I hope they decide to find somebody of quality and have them finish it (Scott Oden?). But I’m really glad I discovered these, late to the party as I was. It sparked an interest in Ancient Rome stuff again. For example, I went and read Michael Kurland’s Roman mysteries short story collection.

ROMAN BLOOD – Steven Saylor

I have written about Saylor’s fictional recounting of the real-life Austin Servant Girl Annihilator. You read that, RIGHT? Saylor is best known for his Roma Sub Rosa mysteries set in…you guessed it, Ancient Rome!

With the Roberts audiobooks fanning the flames; and having read Kurland’s stories: I was ready for more. Saylor was a no brainer.

He has written over a dozen books featuring Gordianus the Finder. Now, he ‘went back’ and wrote a prequel trilogy. I tried to start the first one, The Seven Wonders. Stephen Plunkett was unlistenable. It felt like he was trying to read the entire thing in a monotone. I had to quit.

However, I still wanted to give Saylor a try, so I got the first ‘proper’ Gordianus book, Roman Blood. Scott Harrison was much better as a narrator. I completed it and immediately moved on to Arms of Nemesis.

I like Gordianus. He’s not a public office holder doing official investigations, like Decius Caeceillius Metellus the younger. Gordianus is essentially a private eye. His bartering to get a bigger fee early in book two was amusing. As with most private eyes, he finds himself in peril more than once. And he ruffles important feathers.

I like the authenticity of the Roman world in Saylor’s and Roberts’ books. It really creates a vivid background. And while I love my Hammett and Nebel, the ancient world setting is pretty cool. Roman Blood taker place in 80 AD, in Rome.

I definitely recommend checking out Saylor, and Roberts, if this kind of thing appeals to you.

THE TROJAN WAR: A NEW HISTORY – Barry Strauss

So, last week’s post was all about my life-long love of the Trojan War. Which is rooted in the Iliad. I listened to this non-fiction book on the topic, which got me fired up to write last week’s entry. This was a g

I am not really interested in the spate of Trojan War novels (especially the romance ones. Ugh). Though I mentioned last week, being a huge Rex Stout fan, I like The Great Legend. I’ve long intended to read some David Gemmell, and his trilogy of Trojan War novels seems like a no-brainer for that.

But I’m into the original myth, and the study of the war, and the real-life history around it.

Been awhile since I did a non-fiction book. I learned some things. It mixed content from The Iliad, with information related to it. I learned about battering rams (apparently the real ones weren’t like Grond…), sea power, the Greek city-states: just lots of interesting info. And, I always like hearing about Iliad stuff.

This was a good listen, letting me revisit the Trojan War. Sitting and reading this would have been more difficult, for a couple reasons. But the audiobook totally worked.

Prior Audio Posts:

What I’ve Been Listening To: November, 2024
What I’ve Been Listening To: Sepetember, 2024
What I’ve Been Listening To: August, 2024
What I’ve Been Listening To: July, 2024
What I’ve Been Listening To: September 2022
May I Read You This Book?

Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every summer since.

His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).

He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’

He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.

He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.

January-February 2025 issues of Analog Science Fiction & Fact and Asimov’s Science
Fiction. Cover art by Tomislav Tikulin (for “Our Lady of the Gyre”) and Shutterstock

Still no sign of the next issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, which is disheartening. That leaves us with only two issues published last year (Winter 2024 and Summer 2024), and no hint when the next one might arrive. I’m hearing rumors that the magazine has been sold, but I’ve been unable to confirm that, so for now it’s just gossip.

But we’ve got issues of Asimov’s Science Fiction and Analog Science Fiction & Fact in hand, and they’re just as enticing as usual, with contributions from John Shirley, Sean McMullen, Mark W. Teidemann, Steve Rasnic Tem, Paul Di Filippo, Sakinah Hofler, James Van Pelt, James Patrick Kelly, Siobhan Carroll, Robert Reed, Faith Merino, Matthew Kressel, Rick Wilber, Jane Yolen, Kendall Evans, and many more.

The issues contain a new Great Ship tale by Robert Reed, a new Unsettled Worlds story by Siobhan Carroll (which Sam Tomaino calls a “suspenseful, exciting tale”), a new novelette “Rejuve Blues” from John Shirley (which Victoria Silverwolf labels “a suspenseful crime story and psychological study”), and the last installment in James Patrick Kelly’s trio of stories about Marishka Volochkova, “Moon and Mars,” which Sam proclaims is “probably another Nebula nominee.”

Victoria Silverwolf at Tangent Online enjoyed in the latest Analog.

“Our Lady of the Gyre” by Doug Franklin mostly takes place aboard a sea vessel that fights excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere via bioengineered diatoms. The protagonist, who communicates with an artificial intelligence orbiting the Earth, takes two young people on his ship and faces a dangerous storm… a very dense work of fiction that requires careful reading. At first, it is difficult to tell what’s happening or what this future world is like, but patient readers will be rewarded with a vivid and imaginative tale with appealing characters.

The novelette “Rejuve Blues” by John Shirley features an elderly couple who win a lottery that offers them the chance to be young again. The man runs into trouble with criminals, while the woman, thinking he has left her, returns to her former activity as a fighter against the Taliban. The author creates a complex and convincing future that is neither utopian nor dystopian… a suspenseful crime story and psychological study.

The main character in “Go Your Own Way” by Chris Barnham accidentally discovers a way to travel into alternate versions of London, some very similar to the familiar one and others wildly different. He falls in love in one of these parallel worlds, but the arrival of an alternate version of himself causes complications. The plot is that of the eternal triangle, in which two of the people involved are the same person. (One might call it an isosceles triangle.) The various parallel Londons are described only briefly, and are far more interesting than the love story…

In the novelette “Prince of Spirals” by Sean McMullen, conspirators kidnap a forensic anthropologist and force him to study samples from the skeletons of two bodies thought to be the so-called Princes in the Tower, heirs to King Edward IV of England… The motive is to determine if either Prince survived to have descendants, giving members of the conspiracy a claim to the throne… This is a suspenseful crime story, with intriguing speculative technology and an interesting look at the techniques used by forensic anthropologists.

At first, “Quest of the Sette Comuni” by Paul Di Filippo seems like pure fantasy, as a female satyr and a golem set out to rescue a princess from a wizard, in order to free their master from his imprisonment by a sea-dwelling queen. It soon becomes clear that the golem is actually a machine and the other characters are the result of advanced biotechnology. The setting is richly imagined, from an underwater Venice inhabited by amphibious humans to an antagonist who has made himself resemble the Jabberwock from Lewis Carroll’s famous nonsense poem. Although not a comedy, the story has sufficient amount of subtle wit to draw the reader into its colorful world.

The magazine concludes with the novella “Apartment Wars” by Vera Brook. The setting is Poland in 1979. The widow of a scientist faces the possibility that she will be forced out of her relatively large apartment by the government because she lives alone. She expects her daughter and son-in-law to arrive soon as permanent guests, justifying her need for the place, but time is running out. Meanwhile, the abusive boyfriend of a neighbor threatens to expose her situation to the authorities… The situation takes a dramatic turn when the widow discovers an extraordinary device built by her husband.

Read Victoria’s complete review here.

The new Asimov’s is thoughtfully reviewed by Mina at Tangent Online. Here’s a sample.

“In the Splinterlands the Crows Fly Blind” by Siobhan Carroll takes patience to read. The world building is complex and initially confusing. The protagonist, Charlie, sets off to find his missing brother, Gabe, as well as Gabe’s girlfriend. There are some groovy invented words like Universe-shard, atmotech, Crowmind, Crowdogs and Vestigium — along with words from what seems to be a Cree dialect — they do eventually all make sense. Charlie finds himself a hero as he saves his fragment of world from destruction by the carelessness of “some rich guy stepping on butterflies.” Worth persisting.

“Five Hundred KPH Toward Heaven” by Matthew Kressel is set just after the heyday of lifts into space, reminiscent of train travel. They are being replaced by much faster, cheaper ships. In a final ascent party, Terese reminisces with other lift pilots and ponders on what is being lost — a sense of wonder and a sense of connection — “sometimes there’s benefits to going slow.”

“Shadow of Shadows” by Frank Ward is a pleasure to read because, once you reach the end, the title hits you with its full poignancy. This reader appreciates when an author does this so well. A washed-up research physicist stands at the threshold of finally finding proof for his theory of a “Many Worlds Interpretation.” The proof of alternate universes is, however, not without pain. A tale that explores not just quantum theory but also its emotional repercussions. I would read this twice.

The tension build-up in “What the Frog’s Eye Tells the Frog’s Brain” by Beston Barnett is incredible. One can only say: bravo! In this story, a desperate scientist, being interrogated and tortured by an AI courageously sets out to trick it into shutting down. The references to Linux, Hexspeak and ASCII are very satisfying for this linguist, for AI does indeed have its own language.

“My Biggest Fan” by Faith Merino is a creepy and ultimately sad tale. The narrator grows up seeing the same woman and hearing the same tune at regular intervals; but she is always a different age. She leaves him notes signed “your biggest fan.” When he finally understands why their trajectories keep overlapping, it’s tool late: they have become each other’s hell, as Sartre would say. Quantum particles meet stalker meet Greek tragedy.

In “Moon and Mars” by James Patrick Kelly, Moon-settler Mariska is part of the crew on the Natividad, a colonists’ ship she has joined to be with her Martian boyfriend, Elan. It soon becomes apparent that those with vested interests in the anti-matter that will power the ship through a wormhole to the Destination planet on the other side are trying to stop the mission. Mariska, her mother and Elan are all part of a group determined to take off early before the mission can be stopped. The race against time is gripping…. A great read.

Read Mina’s full review here.

Here’s all the details on the latest SF print mags.

[Click the images for bigger versions.]

Contents of the January-February 2025 issue of Analog Science Fiction

Analog Science Fiction & Science Fact

Editor Trevor Quachri gives us a tantalizing summary of the current issue online, as usual. Sadly, I didn’t think to grab a copy before the latest issues dropped. Next time.

Here’s the full TOC.

Novella

“Apartment Wars” by Vera Brook

Novelettes

“Strange Events at Fletcher and Front!” by Tom R. Pike
“Rejuve Blues” by John Shirley
“Prince of Spirals” by Sean McMullen
“Gut Check” by Robert E. Hampson

Short Stories

“Our Lady of the Gyre” by Doug Franklin
“Second Chance” by Sakinah Hofler
“Upgrade” by Mark W. Teidemann
“Fixative” by Jonathan Olfert
“The Only God is Us” by Sarah Day
“As Ordinary Things Often Do” by Kelly Lagor
“Go Your Own Way” by Chris Barnham
“Flight 454” by Virgo Kevonté
“Battle Buddy” by Stephen Raab
“Prime Purpose” by Steve Rasnic Tem
“Quest of the Sette Comuni” by Paul Di Filippo

Flash Fiction

“Notes From Your Descendants” by Lorraine Alden
“Vigil” by James Van Pelt
“The Spill” by M.T. Reiten

Science Fact

Saving the Skies: How One Small City in Arizona is Pointing the Way to a Better (Darker) Way, by Richard A. Lovett

Poetry

Beyond the Standard Model by Ursula Whitcher
‘Oumuamua by Geoffrey A. Landis

Reader’s Departments

Guest Editorial: Information is Power by John J. Vester
Biolog: Tom R. Pike by Richard A. Lovett
Unknowns, edited by Alec Nevala-Lee:
Hidden Figures by Scott Kim
Robotic Shifting Procedure by Patrick Berry
The Alternate View by John G. Cramer
In Times to Come
The Reference Library by Sean C.W. Korsgaard
Brass Tacks
2024 Index
Upcoming Events by Anthony Lewis

Contents of the January-February 2025 issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction Asimov’s Science Fiction

Sheila Williams provides a handy summary of the latest issue of Asimov’s at the website. But I missed it this month. Next time I’ll remember before it’s gone.

Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

Novella

“Moon and Mars” by James Patrick Kelly

Novelettes

“In the Splinterlands, the Crows Fly Blind” by Siobhan Carroll
“Shadow of Shadows” by Frank Ward
“A Girl from Hong Kong” by Robert Reed
“My Biggest Fan” by Faith Merino

Short Stories

“Five Hundred KPH Toward Heaven” by Matthew Kressel
“What the Frog’s Eye Tells the Frog’s Brain” by Beston Barnett
“Through the Pinhole, Or, the Origin of a Holostory” by Nikki Braziel
“Jilly in Right: A Thought Experiment” by Rick Wilber
“Completely Normal” by Jendayi Brooks-Flemister

Poetry

Your Clone Can Always Look Herselves Up by Robert Frazier
Einstein to Newton by Gary Sterling
When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer by Kenton K. Yee
Fantastic! by Jane Yolen
Too Far Away by Jenny Blackford
Unfolding Origami by Kendall Evans

Departments

Editorial: An Evening in SoHo by Sheila Williams
Reflections: Uintatherium, I Dream of Thee by Robert Silverberg
On the Net: The Zoo Hypothesis by James Patrick Kelly
Thought Experiment: The Impossible Spectacle of 2001: A Space Odyssey by Kelly Lagor
On Books by Peter Heck
Asimov’s Readers’ Award Ballot
2024 Index
Next Issue

Analog, Asimov’s Science Fiction and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction are available wherever magazines are sold, and at various online outlets. Buy single issues and subscriptions at the links below.

Asimov’s Science Fiction (208 pages, $8.99 per issue, one year sub $47.97 in the US) — edited by Sheila Williams
Analog Science Fiction and Fact (208 pages, $8.99 per issue, one year sub $47.97 in the US) — edited by Trevor Quachri
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (256 pages, $10.99 per issue, one year sub $65.94  in the US) — edited by Sheree Renée Thomas

The January-February issues of Asimov’s and Analog were on sale until February 11. See our coverage of the November-December issues here, and all our recent magazine coverage here.

Black Water: Abyss (Altitude Film Entertainment, July 10, 2020)

My next watch-a-thon is a favorite genre: crocs and gators. Unfortunately, this means the pickings are a bit slim, as I’ve already seen most of them, but I’ve managed to dig up 15 so far (supplemented with a Gila Monster and a couple of Komodos), and I’m sure the intended list of 20 will materialize as streaming services start suggesting titles.

What a Croc #14: Black Water: Abyss (2020) Crackle

Croc or gator? Crocodile!

Real or faker? Some pretty great CG.

Any good? I do like me an Aussie croc flick, and this is one of them. The premise is simple: stick some folks in a cave, flood it, trap them, let loose a big croc. The spaces are tight, the tension is taut, and the croc has the good sense to eat the cast in order of character development.*

There’s a bit of relationship drama in the mix between meals, but at the end of the day it’s just a murky cocktail of Rogue and The Decent, but doesn’t come close to being as good as either. Still, I didn’t hate it, and it was well produced, so I’ll grade it a little higher.

7/10

*Now where have I seen that poster design before…?

Lake Placid: The Final Chapter (Syfy, September 29, 2012) and Rollergator (RiffTrax, 1996)

What a Croc #15: Lake Placid: The Final Chapter (2012) YouTube

Croc or gator? Alligator(s)!

Real or faker? All terrible CG.

Any good? I still have fond memories of the first time I watched Lake Placid — I was totally unprepared for the all round brilliance of it, from the writing and the cast to the effects and direction. Sadly, each successive sequel has been horrendous, and this one, the incorrectly named ‘Final Chapter’ is the penultimate nail in the coffin.*

As you can tell from the ‘quality’ poster, the story is trite, the characters uninteresting and the effects garbage — the only redeeming features might be Robert England (hamming it up in another gator flick), and Yancy Butler (wasted here as she reprises her role as a two-pack-a-day-voiced rogue ranger). The most egregious aspect of this one though, is the directing and editing. There’s only one director who can get away with that many crash zooms, and his name is Sam Raimi.

Raimi did not direct this.

4/10

*I just discovered there are actually TWO more Lake Placid films after this one. Not that it makes this any easier.

What a Croc #16: Rollergator (1996) Tubi

Croc or gator? Gator. Small. Purple.

Real or faker? A hand puppet.

Any good? I tried to find the original version of this, but had to settle for the Rifftrax version. Shocking admission: I don’t find Rifftrax particularly funny (not a huge fan of MST3K either) and they just paved the way for stuff like CinemaSins and every other armchair critic who thinks they’re funny. I am fully aware of the staggering hypocrisy of this statement, but there you go.

Anyway, in this film a roller skating woman meets a small, jive talking gator and tries to get him out of the carnival and back to the swamp. Presumably written by a third-grader, it’s utter crap. Not even funny or surreal enough to be a guilty pleasure — just a miserable, miserable slog.

1/10

Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus (The Asylum, December 21, 2010) What a Croc #17: Mega Shark vs. Crocosaurus (2010) YouTube

Croc or gator? Croc. Osaurus.

Real or faker? Rubbish CG.

Any good? You know what the answer is going to be, so let’s just cut to the chase. Robert Picardo is a fine actor, he voiced the male, culturally-obsessed alien in Joe Dante’s Explorers and I love him for that. He’s also good in everything else, but I guess he needed a new deck, because he’s in this.

Gary Stretch is also in this. British boxing fans may remember the name, the rest of you will just know him as a punching bag-faced enigma with the looks of a leading man and the mystery of a Swiffer. Sarah Lieving stars opposite him as a potentially badass special investigator who is relegated to scowling boobily at the rest of the cast while flying a pretend helicopter.

The story is rote, the direction and editing are dull and the effects are tragic. The titular creatures (especially the giant croc) are rendered in spectacular blur-o-vision, unhindered by weight or physics. I feel neither joy nor despair at having watched this film, I’m just languishing in a limbo populated by cookie cutters, tight vests and pixels.

4/10

Croczilla (Beijing Enlight Pictures, 2012) and Crocodile (Lions Gate, August 26, 2000)

What a Croc #18: Croczilla (AKA Million Dollar Crocodile) (2012) YouTube

Croc or gator? Crocodile. Big boi.

Real or faker? Fairly decent CG (in parts).

Any good? I started watching this one quite early on in the watch-a-thon, and thought it had promise, so saved it to end on a high note. It is indeed fun, however, I would sorely love to see a subtitled version, as the English dubbing on this Chinese movie is horrendous.

Promoted as China’s ‘first monster movie’, a claim that has been made on several of the films I’ve watched from China, Croczilla is meant to be a tongue-in-cheek flick. For this reason, the actors ham it up to the level of cartoon characters, and the English V.O. artists were apparently told to do the same, because the dubbing is ear-splittingly intolerable, especially the voice of Barbie Hsu’s character, which threatened to shatter every window in the house.

Aside from the audio hell, it’s a jolly romp, with a 36 ft croc on the rampage in Hangzhou, its belly full of Yuan (about a million worth, or 100,000 Euros as the shrill dubbing informs us). The cast is likeable (although the gangsters are a trifle over the top), and the croc itself is a nice bit of CG. It’s a great model, and for the most part animated well, but some of the interactions with its environment weren’t great. Overall, I enjoyed it, and that’s what matters, so there.

7/10

What a Croc #19: Crocodile (2000) Crackle

Croc or gator? Crocodile.

Real or faker? Some OK animatronics and rubbish CG.

Any good? Apparently, when I said Eaten Alive was the only Tobe Hooper film I hadn’t seen, I had forgotten about this one — and I wish it had remained forgotten. I was initially excited when I saw Hooper’s name, doubly so when I saw the effects were done by Nicotero and Berger, but it seems there was no budget for effects and Hooper couldn’t give two shits about the film.

Nobody brings anything fresh to the production, it’s the same tired old story of unlikeable frat kids getting drunk and horny in a swamp, and the only reason to watch is to see how they get dispatched. Unfortunately, save for a couple of fun shots of folks sliding down a gullet, it’s all a bit ham-fisted, and the CG croc suffers from the same weightlessness as all the other low-budget beasts of the era. A shame.

5/10

Crocodile 2: Death Swamp (Nu Image Films, August 1, 2002) What a Croc #20: Crocodile 2: Death Swamp (2002) Crackle

Croc or gator? Crocodile. Again.

Real or faker? Some pretty great animatronics.

Any good? Hot on the heels of the disappointment of Crocodile comes Crocodile 2, which chose to ignore sequel conventions and be titled Crocodiles. Also surprisingly, it is that rare breed, the superior sequel, and I had a lot of fun with it.

No hackneyed ‘hot kids in a swamp’ plot, this one is full of bank robberies, plane crashes and helicopter hijinks. The bad guys are extremely potty-mouthed and awful enough to cheer when they get eaten, and the plucky protagonists put up a fair fight. The effects are actually pretty gruesome, and the croc itself is one of the better ones I’ve seen. Good heavens, I do believe I’ve ended on a high note!

8/10

That’s the crocs and gators done. Next up, werewolves!

Previous Murkey Movie surveys from Neil Baker include:

What a Croc, Part I
What a Croc, Part II
Prehistrionics
Jumping the Shark
Alien Overlords
Biggus Footus
I Like Big Bugs and I Cannot Lie
The Weird, Weird West
Warrior Women Watch-a-thon

Neil Baker’s last article for us was What a Croc, Part II. Neil spends his days watching dodgy movies, most of them terrible, in the hope that you might be inspired to watch them too. He is often asked why he doesn’t watch ‘proper’ films, and he honestly doesn’t have a good answer. He is an author, illustrator, outdoor educator and owner of April Moon Books (AprilMoonBooks.com).

Westerns by Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Bandit of Hell’s Bend and The Deputy Sheriff of Commanche County (Ace Books); Apache Devil and The War Chief (Ballantine Books). Covers by Boris Vallejo, the Brothers Hildebrandt, and Frank McCarthy.

Like many pulp writers of his day, ERB dipped his toes into the western genre. He wrote four: two pretty standard ones and two that incorporate the Native American experience. He knew something of what he wrote, having worked on his brother’s ranch in Idaho at age 16, and having served with the 7th cavalry in Arizona in the late 1890s.

His first standard western was The Bandit of Hell’s Bend (1924), followed by The Deputy Sheriff of Commanche County in 1940. Both of my copies are later printings from Ace with very cool Boris illustrations. I like these better than many of Boris’s paintings because they seem less static. He does a good job of portraying action here.

In Bandit, we have a disgraced ranch foreman and a young woman who has inherited the ranch, and various villains who want to steal the ranch from her because they know there’s silver on it. The foreman, Bull, has to rise to the occasion. There’s great action and pretty good plotting, although you’ll probably figure it out pretty soon. And, as always, ERB creates sympathetic heroes and dastardly villains.

In Deputy Sheriff, a cowboy named Buck Mason is suspected of a murder he didn’t commit, and he has to run and hide until he has a chance to prove his innocence. This plot is not as good as Bandit but it gets the job done to showcase ERB’s lightning paced tale.

ERB’s other two westerns are connected and center very strongly on the Native American experience. The hero, though, is a white boy who is taken captive by Apaches and raised as Geronimo’s adopted son. He is given the Apache name of Shoz-Dijiji (Black Bear), for having killed one at a young age, and he grows up hating whites.

These books are The War Chief (1927), and Apache Devil (1933). Although there are some stereotypical elements to these books, they show that ERB had very strong sympathies for the Apache and disapproved of the way they had been treated by whites.

I found all of these books well worth reading, though the Apache books have stayed with me the longest. The cover art for The War Chief is magnificent and is by Frank McCarthy. The Apache Devil cover looks to be signed by Hildebrandt.

The Rider, The Oakdale Affair, The Mucker, and Return of the Mucker (Ace Books). Covers by Frank Frazetta.

ERB wrote a three book series generally called The Mucker. They were first published in magazines in the mid to late 1910s, but I have much later reprints, of course, from the 1970s. All of mine, shown here, are from Ace books with Frazetta covers. I particularly like the first book cover, although all are cool.

The Mucker (1914). Billy Byrne is born on the mean streets of Chicago and grows up a criminal. After being accused of murder, he flees to San Francisco and ends up shanghaied. A shipwreck leaves him and a beautiful high society girl stranded in an east Asian jungle and she needs rescuing. I really liked the development of the character here. Through love, Billy learns how to be a decent human being and becomes quite a hero.

The Return of the Mucker (1916). This book finds Billy trying to clear himself of his previous murder charges and failing. He ends up in Mexico in the midst of a revolution. And it so happens that his love interest from the first book, Barbara, is also there. The Mucker was a very fine novel but the sequel is pretty weak. Coincidences pile upon coincidences until it’s pretty hard to suspend belief. But it still has the action rolling. This one could easily be counted as one of his westerns given the setting.

The Oakdale Affair (1918). I’m not sure what ERB was striving for with this book. It’s got mystery elements, gothic elements, horror elements, western type elements. He put everything and the kitchen sink into this one. But it worked and I enjoyed it. It is only peripherally related to the Mucker stories in that it features a hobo character that appeared in The Return of the Mucker.

I included ERB’s The Rider here because of the Frazetta cover and because it was at one point published in a double with The Oakdale Affair. But it’s not part of the Mucker series. It involves a bandit called “The Rider” who exchanges places with a prince (Boris) who is about to be married to the princess of another European duchy (neither of whom want to marry the other). Chaos ensues. ERB crammed a lot of action and plot twists into this short work.

The Efficiency Expert (Charter, 1979) and The Girl From Hollywood (Ace Books, 1977). Covers by John Rush and Boris Vallejo

My favorite genres are Fantasy, SF, Westerns, Horror, and Thrillers. I don’t read a lot of straight mysteries and read relatively little “mundane” fiction. By mundane, I mean fiction set in a modern world where the happenings are portrayed as realistic. After reading ERB’s westerns and everything he wrote with fantastic elements, I was left with three books: The Girl from Hollywood, The Efficiency Expert, and The Girl From Farris’s.

They were also among the more difficult ERB books to find and were expensive, but I wanted them because they were… well, ERB. I got both Girl and Efficiency in 1970’s paperback form but couldn’t get Farris and finally ordered it in a modern paperback printed from public domain materials. Here are my capsule reviews.

The Girl from Hollywood (ACE, 1977, Boris Cover) is not quite a western. It takes place in the 1920s, but much is set in a western landscape and involves many western tropes. The plot involves a fine western family whose lives become entangled with Hollywood types. Some of these are basically good and recover from their evil natures while others never do.

As is typical of ERB’s work, there are coincidences that help the plot along, and there’s actually very little action compared to his typical story. However, the sheer narrative drive that ERB was able to bring to his tales keeps you reading. I finished it in one day, if not quite one sitting. Not my favorite work by him by far, but still enjoyable.

The Girl from Farris’s (CreateSpace edition, 2017). Cover by Frank Frazetta

The Girl from Farris’s (Public Domain, from CreateSpace, 2017). The cover is by Frank Frazetta. An editorial note names Taylor Anderson as editor, and claims the publisher is Odin’s Library Classics. The text appears to be intact but the print is small and there are no indented paragraphs. I actually read this in ebook version, though, so I’ll just stick it on my shelves. I rather like the cover but don’t know where it came from.

“Farris’s” is a house of ill repute and June Lathrop a lady of the evening who is trying to escape it. She meets a young man — Ogden Secor — who wants to help her and fate keeps throwing them together. It’s a tale of redemption, which is an element in all three of these novels. One particularly interesting point is that Ogden is a failed Chicago businessman who tries to make a new life for himself in Idaho. ERB himself fled the business world of Chicago for his brother’s Idaho ranch. They say, “write what you know.”

The Efficiency Expert (Charter, 1979, cover by John Rush) is the last Burroughs book I’ve read, and very nearly the last one to exist that I hadn’t read. I left these three to last thinking they weren’t much up my alley. None of them have any fantastic elements. Efficiency Expert is a straightforward and realistically based story of a young man of quality who is down on his luck but never succumbs to corruption and wins out in the end. I was engrossed throughout. There’s certainly plenty of coincidence featured in the plot but I didn’t mind it much and even without a lot of action happening, it had narrative drive and kept my attention.

I’d rate Efficiency the best of the three, followed by Hollywood and Farris’s.

We’ll wrap up Burroughs next time with a look at his Hollow Earth tales.

Previous installments in this series include:

The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part I: Sword and Planet
The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part II: Tarzan and The Land That Time Forgot

Charles Gramlich administers The Swords & Planet League group on Facebook, where this post first appeared. His last article for Black Gate was The Fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Part II: Tarzan and The Land That Time Forgot.