Blog Archives
sBy Chris L. Adams I love movie props; it seems like I have always had a fascination with the bits and bobs utilized by film crews to create that aura of reality on the business end of a camera. There’s something about the things worn or carried or held by the actors that is almost […]
I grew up reading a lot of Edgar Rice Burroughs. If you are age fifty or more, chances are you did too. When you are thirteen, Edgar Rice Burroughs is the man. A trip to the local Waldenbooks or B. Dalton Bookseller in the 1970s up through the middle 1980s would generally have a shelf […]
Fiction (Bleeding Fool): ‘Red Nails’ is a novella first serialized in 1936 in the July through October issues of Weird Tales, and the last of the tales of Conan the Barbarian penned by Robert E Howard, as well as one of the best. Some of the appeal of this yarn may be lost on any […]
Sensor Sweep: Joe Jusko, Witch World, Battlefleet
Monday , 10, September 2018 Sensor Sweep 3 CommentsIllustration (Scoop): Beginning in September, Joe Jusko, in conjunction with ERB, Inc. will be creating brand new cover art and frontispieces for every Edgar Rice Burroughs novel (over 80, in total), forming the first completely unified Burroughs library by one artist. The pantheon of incredible talent who have loaned their vision to cover ERB’s works […]
Sensor Sweep: ERB fonts, Robert Bloch Vampires, Mouse Wars, and The Punisher
Monday , 7, May 2018 Sensor Sweep Leave a commentPublishing (Recoverings): “It’s the nature of fandom. Every fan wants to hold his or her hobby close, be part of it, and contribute to it in some way. Writing, drawing, researching about action, the exotic worlds, the beautiful women and heroic men, the incredible beasts and unknown races are the life’s blood of many an Edgar […]
An Important Predecessor to Pulp, Fantasy, and Science Fiction: The Ruritanian Romance
Saturday , 3, February 2018 Before the Big Three, Book Review, Fiction 12 CommentsI first came across the Ruritanian romance, a genre featuring adventure in a small, fictional, usually European kingdom, in Nabokov’s Pale Fire. While that version was decidedly un-heroic, as Nabokov’s tragicomic works tend to be, it still impressed me as a promising setting for a story. Later, in Philip Jose Farmer’s Tarzan Alive: A Definitive Biography of […]
Sensor Sweep: Conan pastiches, Crashing Suns, and lots of Star Wars
Monday , 25, December 2017 Sensor Sweep 5 CommentsWriters (Williamette Week): You may have heard that Portland’s famous goth bar, The Lovecraft, is under new ownership after the previous owner, Jon Horrid was accused of assault. Now that the bar has changed hands, questions arose whether the new owner planned on continuing to call the bar after an author known for racism and anti-semitism, […]
Son of the Pulps Part 2: Farmer’s Tarzans
Saturday , 10, June 2017 Appendix N, Authors, Book Review, Fiction 6 CommentsTarzan as imagined by Edgar Rice Burroughs is a vivid hero that epitomizes full-blooded adventure and influenced generations of writers. The Tarzan of Jose Philip Farmer is better; the ultimate, indomitable hero and my favorite fictional character. As we noted in last week’s column, Farmer was utterly fascinated with Tarzan and wrote several different pastiches […]
John Carter of Pellucidar
Saturday , 15, April 2017 Appendix N, Authors, Book Review, Fiction 18 CommentsNot too long ago, HP of Throwback Thursday fame and I decided to both read the same book and write up our reactions. This wouldn’t be the first time for us, though this time we agreed on a book mutually and well ahead of time. Because he is a gentleman, he also offered to let […]
I’ve nearly finished with the Solomon Kane stories, but there’s still a lot of chew on. My most recent Howard-inspired musing flows from a line in “The Blue Flame of Vengeance.” Please excuse me as I meander a bit; of course I welcome you to join me. “While evil flourishes and wrongs grow rank, while […]