Monthly Archives: June 2015

Howard Days 2015 is Almost Upon Us

Robert E. Howard fenceIt’s Tuesday evening as I write this and in 48 hours, I’ll be in Cross Plains for Howard Days 2015, which officially kicks off on Friday.  I’ll provide a report next week.  In the meantime, I thought I would inquire as to what any of you any of you might like me to pay particular attention to.  The theme this year is the relationship between Robert E. Howard and H. P. Lovecraft.

Anyway, if you can’t make it and like me to report on something in particular, please let me know.

Geez Lou-eez, Will the Stupidity Never Stop?

idiot klubSo there’s this idiot individual who wrote this piece for The Guardian calling for a year in which no new books by men be published, only books by women.  (If you read through the entire piece, I suggest you invest in a platter of cheese first.  It will go well with all the whine.)  And I thought the Tempest in a Chamberpot proposal was ridiculous.

Apparently she’s really serious.  Continue reading

It’s Time to Vote on the Awards Shortlist

The awards I’m talking about, of course, are the David Gemmell Awards.  As I’m sure you know, there are three.  The Legend Award for the best novel of the year.  The Morningstar Award for best fantasy debut novel.  And the Ravenheart Award for best fantasy book cover.

abercrombie-half-a-king-203x300I’ll post the short lists below after a few comments.  I’m going to read as many of these as I can, especially among the Morningstar candidates (with one exception, which I’m not going to touch).

The Legend Award is another matter.  The reason is that most of the Legend nominees are parts of series, and they’re not the first installment.  The exception is Joe Abercrombie’s Half a King, which I started reading last night.  I intend to read some of the others, but I may not make it by the deadline as I haven’t read the books that precede them.

And regarding the other award that’s generating some attention, I’ll try to read as many of the nominees for that one as possible.  I’ll read all of the short fiction nominees (that I haven’t already read) and will blog about some of them.  The same is true for Best Related Work.  Again, with one exception, I’ll try to get to as many of the novel nominees as I can, although as soon as my attention starts to drift, I’ll move on.

Here are the Gemmell nominees.  Voting closes on July 17. Continue reading

Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Q24

timthumb.phpAnd so we come to another issue of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly. This was one of the strongest (and grimmest) issues I’ve seen in a while. There are three pieces of fiction along with two poems and a great illustration by Serbian artist Vuc Kostic.  His dark style is a perfect fit for the stories contained herein. Continue reading