Monthly Archives: January 2026

Ruminations on Private Eyes

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I’ve got a membership in the Stark House Press Crime Club. This is a small press based in California. Their primary focus is vintage crime and noir, but they published more than that. Science fiction, fantasy, supernatural, and stragiht-up adventure.

The way the Crime Club works is like a book club. Each month, I get a newsletter in my inbox describing the main selection and several ohters. There’s also the monthly Black Gat imprint. These are small paperbacks that reprint vintage crime novels. Think the early days of Hard Case Crime, and you’ll have a pretty good idea of what they’re like except that the authors tend to be a little more obscure. I have a subscription to the Black Gat imprint and get a nicde dose of noir each month, whether I have time to read it or not.

This month’s lead title arrived the other day. It’s a collection of Marcia Muller’s Sharon McCone short stories, The Lost Coast.

I read the first two stories the other night while beeing snowed in.

And that got me thinking. Continue reading →

“Heir Apparent” by C. L. Moore

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Today is January 24, as I write this, and it’s the birthday of C. L. Moore (1911-1987). She’s a favorite around here.

Being cooped up in the house most of the day due tot eh weather, I was able read one of her stories. I chose “Heit Apparent” from the collection Judg,ment Night. That’s the cover of the original Gnome Press edition there on the left with a great cover by Kelly Freas.

It’s one of two stories in this volume that the ISFDB calls the Threshholders. The other is “Promised Land”.

Judgment Night was published in 1952.It contains five novellas that Moore was  the primary author on. Her husband Henry Kuttner didn’t collaborate much if at all on these stories. They were all published under the pen name of Lawrence O’Donnell.

I read this book in the DCell paperback edition when I was in high school. I remember very little about it, which is why I chose a story from it for this post I wanted to look at some of her work that doesn’t get a lot of attention. There’s a slight C. L. Moore reviavl going on at the moment. At least it looks like it to me. While Northwest Smith and Jirel of Joiry are her best known works and my favorites of her stories, there’s more to the work of C. L. Moore than jsut those two characters. Continue reading →

Robert E. Howard at 120

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So today, January 6. is the one hundred and twentieth birthday of Robert E. Howard. The day is nearly over as write this. I’ve been occupied by work and winterizing before the temperatures drop into the single digits.

But I didn’t want the day to get away without some sort of post.

I doubt there’s much I could say that I either haven’t said before or that someone else has said better.

But when have I ever let that stop me? Continue reading →

Robert E. Howard Birthday Video

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John Bullard has put together a birthday tribute video for Robert E. Howard. He kiindly invited me to participate. Thank you, John. It was a lot of fun.

Here’s the link: Happy 120th Birthday, Robert E. Howard!

The video will go live tonight (Wednesday, January 21) at 7:00 PM CST. Bob’s birthday, of courses, is tomorrow, the 22nd.

The tirbute consists of a number of Howard fans and scholars reading selections of his work. I chose the poem “A Song of the Naked Lands.”

I’ve not seen the video, but I’m looking forward to it. Check it out.

Ruminations on Merritt

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Today, January 20, is the birthday of Abraham Merritt (1884-1943). At one time, Merritt was arguably the priemere writer of fantastic fiction in the United States, if not the world. For a while there was a fantasy magazine named after him. Sadly, outside of a small number of aficianados of fantasy, he pretty much forgtotten today.

Not entirely, though. Centipede Press as reprinted some of his novels in nice hardcover editions. Paperback copies of his works are available on the secondary market. Continue reading →

Back to Brackett

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On Leigh Brackett’s birthday (yikes! over a month ago now)  I said I was reading The Starmen of Llyrdis but wasn’t gong to be able to finiish it by her birthday.  I said I would finish it, and I finally did last week. Classes started last week, I had a writing assignment due over the weekend, and I’m just now getting to the review.

That’s the cover of the ebook, which is how I read it this time. The picture is a little misleading. There is a female character who serves as the love interest, but she is absent from much of the book.

This was one of the last stories Brackett wrote for the pulps. It was published in Startling Stories in 1951. Byu this time, she was working as a screenwriter in Hollywood. I’m not sure if she wrote this between assignments or if there was a writer’s strike or what.  Perhaps the death of the pulps and changing tastes in science fictoin had something to do with it. Continue reading →

An Appreciation of Clark Ashton Smith

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As I mentioned in my previous post, today (January 13) is the birthday of Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961).

I’m not sure what I can say about Smith that hasn’t been said, and said better, by someone else. This isn’t the first post I’ve made about Smith.

I havne’t read anything by him in a while, so I’m not going to try and review any of his stories. But I do want to acknowledge his birthday

So here goes. Continue reading →

Well, Well, Well, What Have We Here? It’s not Dead After All

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I had a surpise in my mailbox on Friday. A very unexpected and pleasant surprise.

That’s it on the left, the latest issue of F&SF. Someone had commented in a previous post that they had gotten an electronic copy of this issue.

I’m glad to see it isn’t dead. I’ve had a subscription since I graduated college. I’m going to try to work this issue into the reading schedule as soon as I can. *looks at TBR pile and sighs*

At least it’s not dead yet. I’m not optimistic about any of the digests at the moment. I’ll explain further down.

Not unexpectedly, there are some changes. Now that F&SF is in the stable of the (formerly) Penny Press digests, it has the same format as they do. Same dimensions, same cheap paper, and the same flimsy cover. The heavier cover stock and the thicker paper is gone.

Not surpprising, like I said. But not a welcome change as far as I’m concerned. F&SF went to a heavier cover stock some years ago. As a print subscriber, I appreciated that. I would still get issues with torn covers, but not as many. Hopefully, I won’t get too many damaged copies. Continue reading →