Michael Moorcock (b. 1939) is the Grand Master for sword & sorcery fiction today. To put it in perspective, it would be like having Robert E. Howard around in 1996. What started it all is Elric of Melnibone.
Moorcock went into the genesis of the character in the essay “The Secret Life of Elric of Melnibone.” He first was thinking of new Conan stories for the magazine Fantastic Universe but that magazine ended. He had run into editor Ted Carnell of Science-Fantasy who mentioned wanting some Robert E. Howard type fiction in the magazine. Moorcock sent in 10,000 words of Conan. Carnell made it known he did not want Conan but something on the lines of Conan.
Moorcock came up with Elric. There was a series of ten stories in Science-Fantasy 1961 to 1964. Elric was not a barbarian but then end product of thousands of years of civilization. Moorcock inverted Robert E. Howard’s creation. Elric is an albino weakling needing drugs for strength. He obtains the sword Stormbringer which sucks the soul and energy out of its victims and passing that energy onto Elric. The series starts with Elric destroying his home nation in a quest to regain his throne from his usurper cousin, Yrkoon. The following stories have Elric as a wandering adventurer. The series came to an end in 1964 where Moorcock destroyed the universe. Read More
The New Releases feature will return next week. In the mean time, let’s take a look back.
Pulp fiction is full of Big Threes, from the top magazines every author wanted to write for, to the top three science fiction writers, the top three science fiction magazines, and the top three Weird Tales writers. But there were three magazines deemed so culturally important that these were the only pulps to go straight from the presses into the archives of the Library of Congress. And while Argosy was the father of the pulps, these three magazines represented the best of the genre pulps, from which countless subgenres of literature, film, and comics originated:
Black Mask
Weird Tales
Amazing Stories.
In April 1920, journalist H. L. Mencken created Black Mask as one of many money ventures to support his literary journal. While starting as a general fiction magazine, after Mencken cashed out, Black Mask grew more sensationalistic, bloodier, and more obsessed with crime. And then, in 1923, Black Mask picked a fight with the Klu Klux Klan in a special edition devoted to detectives fighting against the Klan. Foremost among these was Race Williams, the first breakout hard-boiled detective, in “Knights of the Open Palm”. Written by Carrol John Daily, Race Williams was
“…what you might call a middleman – just a halfway house between the cops and the crooks. I do a little honest shooting once in a while – just in the way of business, but I never bumped off a guy who didn’t need it…”
A couple months later, Dashiell Hammet followed up with “Arson Plus”, the first case of the Continental Op. Soon after, under the editorial eye of Philip C. Cody and legendary editor Joseph Shaw, the magazine’s stable would include Raymond Chandler (creator of Philip Marlowe), Erle Stanley Gardner (creator of Perry Mason), Frederick Nebel, Paul Cain (writer of The Fast One), Theodore Tinsley (co-writer for The Shadow), and more. In the process, these writers helped create the masculine and stripped-down writing style mistakenly called the Hemingway style, moved detective stories from the clean puzzles of the Golden Age to something more two-fisted, and inspired the film noir genre, which would employ many of these writers to adapt screenplays of their own works. Weird menace, hero pulps, and comics trace their lineage to these stories as well.
But those wanting something a little bit…unique…would turn to another magazine. Read More
Sensor Sweep: Ubisoft, James Bond, Matt Helm, Elfquest
Monday , 30, September 2024 Sensor Sweep Leave a commentOld Radio (Purple Girasol): Presenting, for your listening pleasure, “Murder by a Corpse“. A Halloween episode a month early.
New (With Both Hands): There are now a number of contemporary short
fiction magazines publishing sci fi, fantasy, and weird tales, and Cirsova may be pre-eminent among them. While sales of these little magazines are far below what similar publications managed in the pulp heyday, I love them for keeping great storytelling alive.
Fiction (Vintage Pop Fictions): The Ambushers, published in 1963, was the sixth of Donald Hamilton’s Matt Helm spy thrillers. Donald Hamilton (1916-2006) was an American writer who worked in various genres but is best known for his spy novels. The Matt Helm books bear no resemblance to the Matt Helm movies (which are great fun in their own way). Matt Helm is a US Government assassin. Read More
Gardner F. Fox (1911-1986) was a writer whose history that went back to the pulp magazines in the 1940s. He started in comic books in 1937, had his first pulp magazine story in Weird Tales in 1944. He had three stories in Weird Tales, ten in Planet Stories, one in Amazing Stories. Some of his stories in Planet show the influence of Edmond Hamilton and Robert E. Howard. Fox had mentioned in an interview on reading Robert E. Howard, H. P. Lovecraft, and Clark Ashton Smith in Weird Tales in the 1930s.
He also had a good number of stories in the sports fiction pulp magazines and western fiction pulp magazines.
He was the first to create a sword & sorcery character for the comic books – Crom the Barbarian in 1950. Fox transitioned to writing paperback novels in the 1950s. He wrote mostly historicals, often set in the Italian Reniassance but also Roman and Old Testament eras. The novels as by “Jefferson Cooper” were the longer, more serious novels. The historicals under his own name, especially for Avon Books were shorter and more pulpy in execution.
Read More
There’s a rare lull in the breakneck world of independent science fiction, so while the New Release feature is catching its breath for a couple weeks, let’s look back at the pulps.
What is pulp fiction?
That is a loaded question, as pulp fiction encompasses many different genres. Science fiction, hard-boiled detective stories, heroic crime fighters that would inspire today’s superheroes, sword and sorcery, and the awful menace of the weird lurking around every corner. And those are just the genres created in pulp’s golden age. Pulp fiction also featured detective cozies, romance tales, westerns, historical adventures, war stories, horror, and more all served up by the dozen for a dime or a quarter per customer. Because of this stunning variety in genre and style, many critics shrug their shoulders and say that pulp fiction is fiction that was published on pulp paper.
In other words, a medium, not a genre.
The name comes from the paper these stories were written on. Cheap, rough, low quality. Pulpy. Completely different from, and some atop their ivory towers would say inferior to, the slick quality of the magazines used for proper literature and proper stories. Such elitist still drips from pulp’s critics today. But when H. L Mencken needed money to support his high-brow literary magazine, he turned to the pulps and founded Black Mask. Mencken’s literary journal was saved, and Black Mask went on to found literary genres, writing styles, and even film noir.
Pulp publishers could be fly-by-night as they chased success. The average pulp imprint lasted little over a year. Some, no longer than an issue. This volatility forced pulp writers into writing self-contained short stories. And if a character was popular enough to warrant a return, the following stories were episodic. Gone were the serials, as unless a writer was fortunate enough to write for stable and successful magazines like Argosy, there was no guarantee a magazine would survive to the serial’s conclusion.
But 1940s wartime shortages moved many pulp magazines away from pulp paper and into the digest format. The paper might have changed, but the stories did not. So something essential to these stories continued to survive in this new medium. And, indeed, continues to do so, as German science fiction serials, American men’s adventure, African photonovels, and Japanese light novels all contain elements of their pulp fiction forebears. Even today, many look back to the golden age of pulp fiction for inspiration in storytelling, style, and milieu. Call it neopulp, dieselpunk, Pulp Revival, or Pulp Revolution, if you wish. The spirit of pulp fiction still lives on. Read More
Greyhawk (Greykawkery): Leading off of course is the mad antics of the CULTISTS. Those who aren’t familiar with them from my first run of comics (2007-2011) can find them in the links above or even in the most recent issues of Oerth Journal. What trouble will this duo cause this time? I will feature the other three comic series in the coming weeks. For now, enjoy!
Review (Silver Key): Neither Beg Nor Yield is an ass-kicking sword-and-sorcery anthology that you should read. This thing is a beast, an obvious labor of love. 456 pages. 20 stories. Illustrated throughout. An incredible lineup of authors. How the hell did editor Jason Waltz manage to land this group, a who’s-who of fantasy writers? Each story gets an outro penned by Waltz, a smattering of biographical info coupled with his insights on what makes each story fit the prescribed “sword-and-sorcery attitude” that unites each of the stories.
Comic Books (Hyborian Reviews): I know I’m late to the party here but I
just had the opportunity to finish up Titan Comics wrap up on their first year of Conan the Barbarian, namely #12, and what an amazing year it has been. This last issue wraps up a lot of stuff that started back in the first 4 issues last year and now that story arc truly feels complete. And how did it all go down? With a hell of a bang that can only be descriped as E.P.I.C! Read More
The first new barbarian fantasy hero of the 1960s was John Jakes’ Brak. John Jakes (1932-2023) got his start in the science fiction pulp magazines in 1950. He was in lower tier titles including Amazing Stories, Fantastic Adventures, Planet Stories, Imagination, If etc. He branched out into western fiction and crime fiction magazines through the 1950s. His first book (The Texans Ride North) was in 1953.
He got in the historical novel craze, what L. Sprague de Camp called “Chariot Opera”, as “Jay Scotland” starting in 1959 with I, Barbarian (Avon Books). He had a total of six historicals, generally with Ace Books 1959-1963. Then the historical novel trend wound down.
He became part of Cele Goldsmith’ stable, editor of Amazing and Fantastic in the early 1960s. Science fiction was not so dominant as it was in the 1950s. There was a shift in popular culture towards horror and the supernatural. You also had the Italian peplum movies with Hercules, Maciste, Goliath, Ursus etc at the time. Sword & sorcery was ready to return.
The first Brak story was “Devils in the Walls” in the May, 1963 issue of Fantastic Stories of Imagination. Brak is a barbarian exile from the steppes looking to make his way to the fabulous Khurdisan to make his fortune. He is big, tall, blond haired with a long braid. The first scene in which he appears, he is on the slave auction block, captured while sick. A lady buys him for the task of dealing with a supernatural infestation.
Science Fiction and Fantasy New Releases: 21 September 2024
Sunday , 22, September 2024 Uncategorized Leave a commentEvery week, the Castalia House Blog spotlights some of the many new releases in independent, pulp, and web novel-influenced science fiction and fantasy.
Cirsova #20/Fall 2024 – edited by P. Alexander
Thirteen tales of heroic adventure and daring suspense, including:
An ancient vampire has plotted his long revenge against the family that has warred with him and hunted his kind for years and found a new ally in a small-time thug!
Clock, the mystic warden of Coney Island, is on the trail of two killers… who have been recently brought back to life by the dark powers they serve: the Isaloge!
Thomas Nolan, “Saint” Tommy, has been called in on a strange murder: a teenage girl has been murdered and seemingly dragged under the earth… by plants!
Psychic agent Lorena has fallen captive to French and Indian raiders… As the orgy of violence begins, she realizes her powers of suggestion have failed her!
…and more!
Killing Stroke (Backyard Starship #23) – J. N. Chaney and Terry Maggert
The stars have come to Iowa, and the earth will never be the same.
With the Nexus up and running, Van and crew become interstellar players in the fight for earth, but their enemies aren’t just from out in the black. Sensing massive profits, the scramble to exploit humanity pits Van against his own people—and Yotov, whose plans have finally come to fruition.
With political warfare, the Equal Grasp seeks to do what missiles cannot—remove Van from the picture. But he’s a lot tougher than that, and Icky’s hammer is swinging freely, and the crew are international stars, portrayed as the heroes of a world that reaches beyond the sky—into deepest space and beyond.
With one last throw of the dice, Yotov will unleash the hidden reserve of power she’s been hiding. If it works, Van will be dead. Or worse.
Because Yotov and the Equal Grasp don’t just want power. They want control of life itself, and they’ll stop at nothing to get it.
Shield of Conquest (The Shield War #3) – Johnathan Moeller
Battle and dark magic await!
Ridmark Arban has led the army of Andomhaim to the Isle of Kordain, ready to wage war upon the sinister Exarch of the Seven Temples and her fanatical soldiers.
But powers older than either Andomhaim and the Seven Temples have fought over the Isle, and a lord of the dark elves sees the chance to seize the Isle for himself.
And if he is not stopped, first the Isle and all the world will burn…
Taming the Raging Storm (Dragon’s Dawn #4) – Dan Michaelson and D. K. Holmberg
Laric discovers there are places even dragons can’t reach. The Dragon Dawn series continues.
Pursuing the Grand Mage forces Laric Mason to make a choice—stay and protect his home, or chase a threat that poses a danger to all of the remaining dragons.
As Laric learns the truth of his grandmother’s quest for glyph knowledge, he uncovers even greater dangers than he could have imagined.
And his uncle had not told him the truth of what Korthal faced. The Grand Mage may be a part of something much larger than Laric had imagined.
If he can’t find the answers his grandmother sought, his home might not be the only land destroyed. Read More
Magazines (Pulp Super-Fan): I recently obtained Pulp Adventures #44 from
Bold Venture Press, dated Winter 2024. A delay from the prior issue, but it looks like they are working to get back on schedule. We get science fiction, detective, crime, and horror, along with reviews and non-fiction this time.
Conan (Sprague de Camp Fan): Chapters 15 through 19 of Robert E. Howard’s only Conan novel, The Hour of the Dragon were published in the March 1936 issue of Weird Tales. Akivasha was introduced in Chapter 18. Conan is in Stygia, the city of Khemi, looking to confront Thutothmes and regain his Aquilonian throne.
Tolkien (Notion Club Papers): When the Lord of the Rings begins, we see almost everything from Frodo’s perspective, through Frodo’s eyes. But after as Frodo and Sam leave the Fellowship, and their separate journey with the One Ring proceeds, the point of view shifts from Frodo to Sam. Read More
Sword & sorcery as a fictional genre had its origin in the weird fiction pulp magazines of the late 1920s into the 1930s. There was a forgotten variation in Planet Stories in the 1940s. Then it disappeared from the magazines for the most part in the 1950s.
There was a renascence in the digest magazines in the early 1960s. A new interest in Edgar Rice Burroughs and Doc Savage prompted first reprints of sword & planet fiction. Mass market paperbacks by Ralph Milne Farley and Otis Adelbert Kline and then new fiction from Gardner Fox and Michael Moorcock (as Edward Bradbury) brought swashbuckling with a sword back in fashion.
Sword & planet opened the door for sword & sorcery in a new format: the mass market paperback. The writer who was first was Lin Carter. The Wizard of Lemuria was the first sword & sorcery novel by a writer who did not start in the pulp magazines. The Wizard of Lemuria (Ace Books, 1965) was not Carter’s first novel, but it was the first to be published. Wizard introduced Thongor of Lemuria as the hero center stage and offered much of what readers would come to recognize as the Lin Carter style. Edgar Rice Burroughs was the most readily apparent influence on Lin Carter’s plotting and prose in this and subsequent books.
Science Fiction and Fantasy New Releases: 14 September 2024
Sunday , 15, September 2024 Uncategorized Leave a commentEvery week, the Castalia House Blog spotlights some of the many new releases in independent, pulp, and web novel-influenced science fiction and fantasy.
Lance (Conscript #3) – Scott Bartlett
Planet Nibiru wants them dead. All of them.
Trapped by the destruction of their own satellites, the Marines on Nibiru suddenly find themselves without orbital or air superiority.
With help months away, Po and his brothers must quickly figure out how to stabilize and survive against an exploding alien insurgency.
Po learned young to rely on no one but himself. Now, he’s slowly realizing that nothing from bootcamp, or from his trials on Earth’s moon, could have prepared him for this.
If he can’t rip up some deep-rooted beliefs about his place in the universe, and fast, it may cost him his life.
Shadow Contract (The Hunter #1) – David Beers
The galaxy’s deadliest man never planned to be a savior…
Meet Vesuvius: the galaxy’s most feared bounty hunter with a blood-soaked past.
His mission? Protect a kid.
But he’s not just any kid—Adam is the prophesied savior. Vesuvius’s contract mandates safe delivery to the religious sect that believes this, navigating a perilous universe where every faction seeks to exploit the boy.
There are enemies at each corner and a betrayal from within his own order.
Vesuvius must outwit foes. Ensure Adam’s survival. All while wrestling with a past that he thought he’d killed.
Stakes have never been higher.
If he fails in delivering Adam, the universe is sure to plunge into chaos. If he succeeds, perhaps he can find redemption.
Shadow Wired – Gustavo Bondoni
He’s a man of a thousand names. They call him Brown. They call him Sked. But they never truly know who he is.
He is more than just a hacker. He is a man trained to infiltrate the most secure facilities on Earth and fight his way back out if necessary. And he is the best at what he does.
Sked works in the shadows, a few steps on the wrong side of legality, for whichever party can pay his fees, in a world where people are wired to the net and everything is under surveillance. When Akane, the love of his life goes missing, Sked tracks her from the dives of Bangkok to the mountains of Peru.
In the process he finds himself embroiled with a criminal group who vows to hunt him down and kill him, and even space might not be far enough to escape their clutches.
That is what life looks like as one of the Shadow Wired.
When Wizards Follow Fools (Arcane Ascension #5) – Andrew Rowe
Corin Cadence has been summoned to meet with the Emerald Council, a political summit including the most powerful of all attuned and their closest political allies. His summons came with a dire warning — that war was coming to the nation of Valia. But while Valia is no stranger to warfare, the circumstances of this invasion are dire.
Valia’s visage, Tenjin, remains missing. Many of the nation’s leaders were slain during Mizuchi’s attack, and others killed or injured through Saffron’s machinations. With a critical power vacuum in Valia’s leadership, few can be trusted.
Surrounded by old enemies, tenuous allies, and strangers with their own agendas, Corin will need to leverage every skill he’s learned to help salvage his nation’s fate.
Adrian Cole’s Dream Lords 50th Anniversary Collection
Saturday , 14, September 2024 Uncategorized 1 CommentThe Castalia House Blog is pleased to spotlight exciting new projects in independent, pulp, and web novel-influenced science fiction and fantasy.
Cirsova Publishing is excited to announce that it will be publishing Adrian Cole’s Dream Lords saga in a collected edition for its 50th Anniversary.
The Dream Lords represented Adrian Cole’s debut in his long and incredibly prolific career in science fiction and fantasy. The Dream Lords was originally published in single volume format through Zebra Books, with A Plague of Nightmares and Lord of Nightmares appearing in 1975 and the finale, Bane of Nightmares, released in 1976.
This new edition collects all three Dream Lords novels in omnibus for the first time, revised and with new foreword to the series.
Cirsova Publishing has been publishing Adrian Cole’s new Dream Lords in its flagship magazine since 2016, and this anniversary omnibus will precede Dream Lords: Legacy, a first-ever collection of this new material.
The Dream Lords 50th Anniversary Omnibus will be available through Kickstarter, launching 10/1/24, in both hardcover and paperback. [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cirsova/the-dream-lords-50th-anniversary-omnibus]
About the Author
Adrian Cole has had some thirty novels and numerous shorts published, including ebooks and audio books, for nearly fifty years, writing sf, fantasy and horror. NICK NIGHTMARE INVESTIGATES won the prestigious British Fantasy Society Award for Best Collection (2015).
His fantasy quartet, THE OMARAN SAGA was well-received in both the UK and US. His most recent work, an alternative Romano/Celtic trilogy, WAR ON ROME, is currently being printed in the US.
About the Publisher
Cirsova Publishing began in 2016, launching its flagship quarterly fantasy magazine, which has published over 30 issues. They are also known for publishing Michael Tierney’s Wild Stars science fantasy saga, Mongoose and Meerkat and other works by Jim Breyfogle, and the strange fiction of Misha Burnett. Earlier in 2024, Cirsova Publishing released JD Cowan’s Star Wanderers and Jim Breyfogle’s A Bad Case of Dead.