Blog Archives

The Walking Drum/ Louis Lamour (Bantam, 1984): I decided on rereading this novel, which I originally read in 1987. I remember not being overwhelmed with it back then and came back even less now. This was Louis Lamour’s further entry into historical fiction. He had pushed at the boundaries with some of his Sackett novels. […]

We completed the AVID Assistant Kickstarter on Sunday, and more than tripled our funding goal.  I’m more than a bit exhausted and asocial at the moment, having been pushing this through my social media contacts for a month. It’s been a very long – and very fruitful – ride.  Final tally was $15,942– over triple […]

“Around April every year, the nominees for the Hugo Awards are released. Anticipation about what might be (or should be) nominated builds throughout the spring, stoked by various Hugo recommendation sites. The two most popular online rec lists are at Emerald City and NESFA. How predictive are these lists? How much overlap is there between […]

In light of the controversy swirling around the Hugo Nominations, I thought it would be worthwhile to define one of the leading causes of puppy related sadness:  boring message fiction. The modifier ‘boring’ is an important one.  Message fiction does not have to be boring, pretentious literary dreck; nor is boring, pretentious literary dreck necessarily message fiction. […]

IT is a truth universally acknowledged, that a skill system in an RPG with any credence for reality shall suck.  Some game engines, such as Classic Traveller and GURPS started out with a number of skills that accrued with every release. Some skills are more useful in game utility than others. Other skill checks result in “plot plugs.” […]

In a somewhat quiet year for the Hugo Awards, a number of records have been smashed: Most Ballots Cast, Ever: 2,122 Most nominations for a single individual in a single year (John C. Wright): 6 First year since the class of 1988 that every Best Novel nominee carries a minimum of a 4-star rating. Highest […]

To say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it is not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance. ~Terry Pratchett   …Good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding. ~Albert Camus   War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. ~George Orwell   The term […]

We’re very pleased to be informed that so many of our authors received Hugo nominations in a variety of categories yesterday. And we’re particularly pleased that not one, but two Castalia House bloggers were nominated for awards: Jeffro Johnson for Best Fan Writer and Ken Burnside for Best Related Work for his excellent piece that […]

In the same issue (which appeared in 1939), the Batman strikes an iconic and oft-repeated pose: that of a terrifying night creature shocking petty thugs in some secluded urban recess. Finally, it is in this first appearance that The Batman establishes that the use of violence – even if it kills a crook – can

I went to GaryCon VII this weekend, demo’d Squadron Strike for about a dozen people, picked up a case of convention-crud, and sat down and played some Old School Revolution gaming. I tried to run some Dungeon World, but got tired. I think, having designed a few RPGs in my time, that I don’t have the […]

In this sweeping survey of the history of equality (to my knowledge, the only such down-through-the-ages look at equality in print), Dr. Martin van Creveld has thrown down the gauntlet for any subsequent work on the subject.  That is, if there are any other scholars or demogogues out there willing to accept the challenge.  One of the lingering questions proposed in […]