Robert Adams’ Castaways in Time served a load bearing function in my youth. I must have been twelve or thirteen the first time I read it. Along with The Lord of the Rings, it was a book I went back to again and again. LOTR I continue to return to. Castaways, however, has remained untouched… Continue reading Castaways In Time. A Mood Piece.
Author: admin
Writer of two-fisted fabulism.
The Harp and The Blade. John Myers Myers Sparkling Heroic Historical Fiction.
I keep going back every decade or so to John Myers Myers. Usually it is to immerse myself fully in his magnum opus, Silverlock. But this most recent re-read was The Harp and The Blade. The cover art in my edition is nice, though the cover description is utterly misleading: “A fantasy of Druidic England.”… Continue reading The Harp and The Blade. John Myers Myers Sparkling Heroic Historical Fiction.
Beowulf: Part of a Healthy Root System.
I have read Beowulf a couple of times, but it has been some years since my last visit to Heorot. I picked up a copy of Seamus Heaney’s translation a week or so ago and plunged right back into the feasting and carnage and recounting of raids, counter raids, and giving of gifts. It remains… Continue reading Beowulf: Part of a Healthy Root System.
Leigh Brackett’s The Coming of the Terrans. Mars as God and ERB Intended.
Leight Brackett’s The Coming of the Terrans is a slim volume, packaging five thematically related stories. Slim, yes, but not light weight. Brackett takes what could be a frothy, fun topic of men on ancient, dusty Mars and instead gives us insightful tales in her own unique Martian setting: a grim intersection of Edgar Rice… Continue reading Leigh Brackett’s The Coming of the Terrans. Mars as God and ERB Intended.
Poul Anderson’s Rogue Sword.
I picked up Poul Anderson’s Rogue Sword in a batch that also contained Clark Ashton Smith’s The Last Incarnation and Leigh Brackett’s The Coming of the Terrans. So, good company all around. Insofar as the book is historical fiction marketed as fantasy, it reminds me of Edgar Rice Burrough’s I Am a Barbarian. However, whereas… Continue reading Poul Anderson’s Rogue Sword.
Clark Ashton Smith. The Last Incantation
I picked up a copy of Clark Ashton Smith’s The Last Incantation. I figured I’d probably read some of the stories before in collections or anthologies before, and such proved the case. But there were some I had the pleasure of reading for the first time, and re-reading CAS is never a chore. It was… Continue reading Clark Ashton Smith. The Last Incantation
Lawrence Watt-Evans’ “The Lords of Dûs.” Immanentizing the Eschaton.
It was the Darrell K. Sweet cover that lured me to the first book, The Lure of the Basilisk. This introduced me to the world of Lawrence Watt-Evans’ The Lords of Dûs tetralogy and his unique character, Garth the Overman. The overmen were, it seems, magically created genetic mutations of men, made larger, stronger, less… Continue reading Lawrence Watt-Evans’ “The Lords of Dûs.” Immanentizing the Eschaton.
Ursula Bruin
A couple of years ago I wrote a tale for the Heir Apparent. She was seven at the time and ardently fond of a number of things girls her age tend to be. So I attempted to incorporate several of her obsessions into the narrative. I believe I succeeded, as she was highly pleased with… Continue reading Ursula Bruin
Currently Reading.
Happily I will never run out of reading matter. There are five books waiting in the ever-replenishing to-be-read pile. Currently I am finishing up Glen Cook’s The Dragon Never Sleeps. This is an epic, sweeping, galaxy crossing space opera of improbably massive space ships clashing, power dynamics, and the pursuit of quasi-immortality. At over 400… Continue reading Currently Reading.