Sorry the blog’s been quiet! Not because nothing’s been going on… just that it’s been going on in other forums. One day I’ll get around to updating the bibliography and other pages, but in the meantime they’re like a peek back. Hard to believe the first posts are nearly 10 years old, moved here when I switched to WordPress all the way back in 2008!
RSS supporting our friends at Black Gate- The Brownstone of Nero Wolfe: Death of a Doxy – And Koufax or Mays?We haven’t been to the Brownstone since April of last year. Pfui! So here we have the forty-third Nero Wolfe post at Black Gate. The Wolfe stories are my favorite private eye series. Which, given my Solar Pons, and Sherlock Holmes, credentials, is saying something. I am pretty much always re-reading or listening yet again to Michael Prichard’s terrific audio […]
- Vintage Treasures: The Bantam John CrowleyFour John Crowley paperbacks published in rapid succession by Bantam: Little, Big, Beasts, Engine Summer, The Deep (October, November, December 1983, and January 1984). Covers by Yvonne Gilbert In 1981 Bantam Books published John Crowley’s masterwork Little, Big, which Matthew David Surridge calls “the best post-Tolkien novel of the fantastic.” It was an une […]
- New Treasures: Worlds Long Lost edited by Christopher Ruocchio and Sean CW KorsgaardWorlds Long Lost (Baen Books, December 6, 2022). Cover by Bob Eggleton Baen Books has published some terrific anthologies recently. Christopher Ruocchio (The Sun Eater series) has had a particularly fine run, with over half a dozen to his credit, most with Baen senior editor Hank Davis — including Space Pioneers, Cosmic Corsairs, and Time Troopers — or Tony […]
- NEW EDGE SWORD & SORCERY Magazine Launches!Last October, Michael Harrington hosted an interview with Oliver Brackenbury on Black Gate; Brackenbury is the editor and champion of the New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine. That post coincided with the release of the teaser Issue #0 including short fiction & non-fiction (free in digital format, or priced at cost on Amazon Print-on-Demand, through the […]
- Goth Chick News: “Crypt” Notes to Begin 2023Knock at the Cabin (Universal Pictures, February 3) We are a month into the new year and yet here I am writing my first post of 2023. This is the longest hiatus I have ever taken from Black Gate since beginning my tenure quite some time ago, but I have a good excuse. I recently returned from nearly a month on safari in Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Sout […]
- Future Treasures: High Noon on Proxima B edited by David BoopHigh Noon on Proxima B (Baen, February 7, 2023). Cover by Dominic Harman Nobody out there is doing anthologies like David Boop. He started in 2017 with the Weird Western Straight Outta Tombstone (2017), which proved popular enough that he followed up with two more, Straight Outta Deadwood (2019) and Straight Outta Dodge City (2020). Last year he packed up hi […]
- The Compelling Narratives of Video GamesMy love of gaming is well known amongst my friends and friendly acquaintances, and has since before I could afford my first console. In news that would surprise absolutely no one, my preference has always been for narrative games; where the story plays as much a role in the gaming experience as any tests of skill or intellect. The best games for me strike a […]
- The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes – Shelfies (#2)If you saw this post, you know that I found a kinda cool group over on Reddit. And it wasn’t LotR_on_Prime – yeesh. R/bookshelf is a subreddit where people post their shelfies. With over 2,000 books on 90-ish shelves/cubes, that appealed to me! I started with my Jack Higgins shelf, and then my Clive Cussler one. I’ve done a couple fantasy shelves, but mostly […]
- Galactic Real Estate, Revolutions, and an Uplifted Moose: The Terraformers by Annalee NewitzThe Terraformers by Annalee Newitz (Tor Books, January 31, 2023) On the one hand, The Terraformers is full of great characters, solid science, and socio-political conflict, with enough action to move things along and keep you turning pages to the end. On the other, it’s not actually about terraforming and it’s told in 3 novellas set hundreds of years apart w […]
- Vintage Treasures: The New Hugo Winners, Volume III and IV, presented by Connie Willis and Gregory BenfordThe New Hugo Winners, Volume III and Volume IV (Baen, and May 1994 and November 1997). Covers by Bob Eggleton The Hugo Winners, Volume I and Volume II, edited by Isaac Asimov and collected in one big omnibus by the Science Fiction Book Club in 1972, was one of the top-selling science fiction books of the 70s, and Volume III (1977) was gladly received by read […]
- The Brownstone of Nero Wolfe: Death of a Doxy – And Koufax or Mays?
SC Bryce 