Blog Archives
sBack around 1997 or 1998, Howard A. Jones contacted me on the internet. I was the official editor of the Robert E. Howard United Press Association at the time. People would seek me out on how I could help them sell their Conan pastiche novel to Tor Books or get on the syndicated Conan T.V. […]
I like reading books about books. Paperbacks From Hell covered paperback horror from the sixities through the early nineties. Mike Ripley’s Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang cover British “thrillers” from the early 50s (Casino Royale) to the late 70s (The Eagle Has Landed). I picked up the trade paperback edition from 2019. The hardback was first […]
The rotating reading of genres is never ending. If I read a western, it is generally about the U.S. Army on the frontier. I will deviate to read about ranchers or gunfighters if by favorites like Gordon D. Shirreffs or T. V. Olsen. On the other hand I will read a western by an unknown […]
To my surprise, Rough Edges Press announced a new Sgt. Hawk book by Patrick Clay. I was very happy when the series was reprinted last year and the lost 5th novel was published. Sgt. Hawk and the Lost Temple is a brand new novel. The novel starts with Sgt. Hawk and Cpl. Conlon pulled off […]
XLZABK001 by Jon Zaremba is a brand new collection of stories in different genres. Jon has a description of himself at the end of this book: “I retired as a musician with dozens of albums in my catalog, most of which were self-released. The majority of this collection’s contents was crafted as text interpretations of […]
Swashbucklers: men fencing with epees wearing puffy shirts. D’Artagnan, Robin Hood, Captain Blood, Zorro. A genre that certainly has a cinematic past but before the movies there was the prose in books. The Big Book of Swashbuckling Adventure is a 475 page large paperback that I just read. Somehow I missed it when it came […]
The Earth is Flat by Tanith Lee is a new collection from DMR Books. This was just published in March. The book is 274 pages containing fourteen stories, five from her “Flat Earth” sequence. The other nine stories are in a section called “Tales from Elsewhere.” Contents: Story Original Appearance The Origin of Snow Tanith […]
HighNoon on Proxima B is a brand new anthology from Baen Books. It is the companion volume to Gunfight on Europa Station. David Boop is the editor, 241 pages, trade paperback format, $18.00. Cover by Dominic Harman. Contents: Foreword (High Noon on Proxima B) • essay by David Boop Justice and Prosperity • novelette by Milton J. Davis Five […]
Chuck Dixon’s Siege of the Black Citadel is a brand new novel from Castalia House. Dixon started writing King Kull stories for the comic Savage Sword of Conan in 1985. If I am correct his first Conan story was “Winter of the Wolf” in The Savage Sword of Conan #133 (February 1987). If my spread […]
I have a near love-hate relationship with Louis L’Amour. I took a sledge hammer to his historical novel The Walking Drum a few years back after a re-read. On the other hand, I like his pulp adventures featuring Turk Madden and Ponga Jim Mayo. I find L’Amour works better in slender paperbacks from the 1960s- […]
Black Mask magazine is considered to be one of the most influential of pulp magazine along with Weird Tales, Astounding Stories/Science Fiction, and Argosy. All had a profound impact on popular fiction and culture. Black Mask was the magazine that changed crime-mystery-detective fiction from the locked room to the mean streets. Dashiell Hammett and Carroll […]
Michael Z. Williamson’s That Was Now, This Was Then is just out in mass market paperback. It is the sequel to A Long Time Until Now (2015). A short description: SOLDIERS OUT OF TIME Then: First Lieutenant Sean Elliott and nine other mixed-service U.S. soldiers on a convoy in Afghanistan suddenly found themselves and their […]