Monthly Archives:
sA week ago, Tanith Lee passed from this mortal coil at age 67. It is a shock as 67 does not seem old in this day where hitting 90 is almost commonplace. Tanith Lee has been a fixture of fantasy and horror as long as I have been reading those genres. She was part of […]
FUTURETROSPECTIVE: Minority Report, We Can Remember It For You Wholesale, and PKD’s Missing Sister
Thursday , 28, May 2015 Book Review, Uncategorized 4 CommentsPhilip K. Dick’s twin sister Jane Charlotte died when the six weeks’ premature pair had survived to their originally anticipated birth date. I normally don’t consider much biography of an author when I’m reading his stories; for example, C.S. Lewis’ long bachelorhood means nothing to me in his fictional works, Lovecraft’s failed marriage or even the […]
An announcement by Jerry Pournelle, author of The Strategy of Technology: We are bringing out, in both electronic and print production, The Strategy of Technology, a 1970 book that was once a text in some of the Service Academies and still is in use at two of the War Colleges. This is not a new […]
RETROSPECTIVE: The Complete Cthulhu Mythos Tales by H. P. Lovecraft
Monday , 25, May 2015 Appendix N 4 CommentsSPOILER WARNING: Before we start this one, let me say that if you have not read Lovecraft’s Mythos stories, you need to stop reading me and start reading him. I was irked at first by the fact that this particular volume did not put the tales in the order in which they were published. However reading […]
May 18 was the beginning of the 450th anniversary of the Siege of Malta (1565). The Siege was one of the great clashes of civilization between Christian Europe and Moslem Asia. The Ottoman Turks had set Islam on the road of conquest again pushing into the Balkans and then into the central Mediterranean Sea. Standing […]
REVIEW: Christian Horror, by Mike Duran
Thursday , 21, May 2015 Book Review, Uncategorized 8 CommentsMuch has been written here about the decline since the early 1990s of Science Fiction, and the evaporation of certain subgenres, such as Sword & Sorcery and Sword & Planet, and the co-option of others by dopplegangers, such as hard science fiction. However, if the Nielsen bookscan figures are to be believed, the popularity of […]
I’ve resigned myself to the fact that there’s only so many writers in the same league as H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, and Jack Vance. And it’s tough sometimes. I mean… what am I going to do when I finally finish their last books…? Coming across Fritz Leiber as part of this series though, […]
One of my favorite recurring character series in the pulp magazines is the Tizzo the Firebrand by Frederick Faust. Faust (1892-1944) is better known under his pseudonym “Max Brand.” He was one of those high production pulp magazine writers who produced something like 25 million words of prose. He is remembered today as a western […]
Finally, a superhero for the modern age. As Moses lifted up the bronze serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Man of Bronze be lifted up as a salve for an age of gritty, dark superhero flicks. Clark “Doc” Savage, Jr. is an unapologetically unironic pulp fiction superhero. Raised from birth to be the […]
A reader calls for playtesters: About 6 playtesters needed to help us test an expanding card game for a July kickstarter. Format is a “build a deck from your collection of cards and play.” We’re looking for players go give us feedback on 1) how fun the game is, 2) how understandable the rules are, […]