Book Review (Mighty Thor Jr) Midnight Tides by Steven Erikson: “Where to start on a review for this book/series? I mean with something on the epic scale and imagination as this story, characters, and world building. The Mythology of the world alone is on such a epic scale. So much to comprehend.  All I have been hearing since I started reading Fantasy again in 2011 is “you have to read Malazan!” So I finally listened and started. I think I have a new obsession. I can now see what everyone has been going on and on about for all this time. I am hooked and I now need more! So yes I will be continuing this series, and I can’t wait! I know more greatness awaits and I am highly anticipating the journey to come.”

Book Publishing (Tolkien and Fantasy) MagicQuest: The First Juvenile Fantasy Series: “While “Magic Kingdoms”—Lin Carter’s proposed circa 1972 series of juvenile fantasies—never got off the ground, the first published series of such books was the MagicQuest series, edited by Terri Windling (b. 1958) and published by Tempo Books, an imprint of Ace Books. MagicQuest officially published sixteen books, between December 1983 and March of 1985, with three further titles announced as part of the series but published in the “Ace Fantasy” series without the MagicQuest name. And there are a goodly number of associated titles that appeared after the series officially ended, again as part of the “Ace Fantasy” series, that if they were not at one time planned for the series itself, they are certainly among the same type of juvenile fantasy that the series did publish, and of undoubted interest to the fans of the MagicQuest series itself. Also, the ‘Ace Fantasy’ series was edited by Windling, the same editor as the MagicQuest series.”

Fiction (A Shiver in the Archives) James Branch Cabell and E. R. Eddison: “When Ballantine reprinted James Branch Cabell’s Domnei in the Adult Fantasy series in March 1972, the rear cover sported a new blurb by E.R. Eddison, who had died in 1945. Where did the blurb come from? It turns out that it came from a letter Eddison wrote to Cabell in 1926, and it related not to Domnei but to Jurgen.

When Albert & Charles Boni published the first American edition of The Worm Ouroboros in May 1926, they included in the front matter of the book a facsimile letter dated 21 November 1925 from James Branch Cabell to the publishers.”

Fiction (Shadowridge Press) Roads by Seabury Quinn: “Seabury Quinn’s ROADS is a classic re-imagining of the Santa Claus fable, first appearing in the Yuletide season of 1937. It’s the story of Claus, a Nordic barbarian making his way from Judea to his frozen Northland home…and the chance encounter that changes the course of his life forever.
This large format edition features the original Virgil Finlay illustrations, beautifully restored with a level of detail and clarity never before seen.”

Fiction (Altus Press) The Best of Thrilling Adventures: “This collection assembles—for the first time—the best adventure stories from the pages of this classic pulp fiction title. Over 600 pages in length and covering adventure, mystery, science fiction, and Foreign Legion stories. Plus: get every story of pulp adventure hero Larry Weston: a forgotten series from the pages of Thrilling Adventures.”

 Authors (On an Underwood #5) The Two Bobs: “By the time Robert Hayward Barlow first wrote to H. P. Lovecraft in June 1931, Lovecraft had already been corresponding with Robert E. Howard for a year. Barlow was 13, the precocious younger son of a retired army lieutenant colonel who lived with his family at Fort Benning, Georgia. A devoted fan of Weird Tales, Barlow had written to Lovecraft looking for an autograph and more of his stories (OFF 3)—a correspondence which soon brought the young fan into contact with Robert E. Howard.”

RPG (Zenopus Archives) Gygax’s Dungeon Level from Hall of Many Panes: “I recently found a cheap second-hand copy of the Hall of Many Panes boxed set, a mega-adventure written by Gary Gygax and published by Troll Lord Games in 2005, with dual stats for 3.5E D&D and the Lejendary Adventures (LA) RPG. The Hall was playtested by Gary back in 2002 using LA, his preferred system in his last decade. I was subscribed to his Gygax-Games email list back then and remember his regular play-test reports.”

Book Publishing (Jon del Arroz): “SFWA President Cat Rambo made a vile attempt to downplay Moira’s Greyland’s story of the abuse she suffered at the hands of Marion Zimmer Bradley. To someone like Rambo, MZB’s identity as a feminist and gay icon is far more important than the real human who was hurt. In her capacity at SFWA, Rambo should be championing Moira, a  best seller with a related work in the field — instead, she downplays the relevance in order to make more politically charged and wholly irrelevant attacks on the president. She’ll go so far as to protect the pedophiles in sci-fi that she’ll label anyone concerned over what happened to a real human being “alt-right” in order to dismiss them.”

RPG (Tabletopgamingnews.com): “I love to use minis when doing my RPGs. It gives everyone a sense of where people are in the encounters, as well as can help make things feel a bit more “real.” What I hate is when I have to use the wrong mini for something because I don’t have the right one. Or you’ve got several that all look the same and you mix up which is which. Well, WizKids is here to help, as they’ve released their D&D Icons of the Realms: Classic Creaturesset. This brings a bunch of baddies to your tabletops with new sculpts to help them stand out from previous iterations.”

Board Games (Boardgamegeek.com): “In a December 2017 newsletter, Alderac Entertainment Group highlighted how it had scaled back its game releases in 2017 — with only a dozen new titles being released, three of them exclusively in the Big Game Night package at Gen Con 50 — compared to sixteen new games appearing in 2016. (These totals do not include Smash Up expansions and other game line extensions.) It’s not clear right now where 2018 will fall in the rankings of “number of new titles released” for AEG, but the publisher has revealed some of what’s coming.”

Board Games (dicetowernews.com): “Fantasy Flight Games have announced The Wilds of Rhovanion, the next Deluxe Expansion for The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game. The Lord of the Rings Living Card Game continues to provide adventurers of Middle-Earth with new lands to explore and greater threats to face. 1 to 4 players use heroes from J.R.R Tolkien’s fantasy universe to embark on journeys similar to those found in the novels. As the shadow of Mordor extends its reach, ever more people are torn from their homes and left without safety or refuge. When you are met with one such band of wanderers, you find yourself honor-bound to deliver them to a new setting where they may finally find peace. But the road is treacherous and fraught with dangers. Will you be able to keep them safe? Who knows what you may encounter over the Edge of the Wild?”