Tag Archives: DAW books

James McGlothlin Reads Through DAW’s The Year’s Best Horror Stories

It’s been one of those weeks, so I missed this when it was posted on Tuesday over at Black Gate, but James McGlothlin will be reading through The Year’s Best Horror Stories, the series of annual anthologies published by DAW books from 1972-1994. They were successively edited by Richard Davis, Gerald W. Page, and Karl Edward Wagner. The series ended with Wagner’s death.

I met James McGlothlin at Howard Days a few years ago. He’s very knowledgeable about the fields of the fantastic and always has something interesting to say.

James recently finished up a series at Black Gate looking at Del Rey’s Best of series, one of my personal favorites. He did an outstanding job with those posts, even if he didn’t much like Eric Frank Russell, another one of my personal favorites. *sticks tongue out at James*.

The post linked to above is an introduction, so if you want to read along with him, there’s still plenty of time. Provided, of course, you either already have the first volume or can find a copy of it (that you can afford).

Here’s the picture James posted to <s>make your mouth water</s> encourage you to read along. (No, these aren’t my copies. I wish. I don’t this many although I’ve got over half of them.)

Of Editorial Greatness

Earlier today I was reading a post on a site I don’t normally read these days (I was lured by the temptation of a free ebook).  The post made the argument that John Campbell was the greatest editor the science fiction and fantasy fields have seen.

That got me to thinking, which usually gets me in trouble.  I began wondering who would be the greatest editor, greater being defined as having the most impact over time.  The original post didn’t include fantasy other than a passing reference to Unknown.  So I thought I’d throw the question open to anyone who wanted to voice an opinion.  Below is a list I compiled off the top of my head.  I didn’t include any living editors.  If I had, Ellen Datlow would be on it.  My rationale is that the impact of living editors on the can’t be accurately assessed because they are still having an influence and their greatest influences may still be to come.

 

So in alphabetical order are ten editors.  I’ll provide a brief explanation as to why they have been included.  Some will be quickly eliminated.  Others, not so much. Continue reading

I’ve Been a Baaad Boy

My son and I went to Scarborough Renaissance Faire a couple of weeks ago.  It’s in Waxahatchie, which is south of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.  (Lou Antonelli assures me that “Waxahatchie” means “where the buffalo poop”.)  Since we came in from the west, I stopped at a couple of Half Price Books, one in Burleson and one in Fort Worth.

This past weekend my son was competing at the State Solo and Ensemble contest in Austin.  Austin has five Half Price Books.  I managed to hit four of them, two on the way in and two when I left.  (I didn’t ride on the bus this year and went to visit family when I left, so I went out a different way than I came in.)

I bought more than you see here, a lot more.  (Don’t tell my wife.)  There were plenty of DAW paperbacks with the yellow covers to be had. Unfortunately none were the Lin Carter The Year’s Best Fantasy Stories or the Karl Edward Wagner The Year’s Best Horror Stories.  That was probably a bit too much to hope for.  I’ve got all of Carter’s volumes, but I’m missing some of Wagner’s.  Although speaking of Wagner…

Looky what I found.

Paperbacks weren’t the only things I looked at.  While I was primarily looking for pulpy paperbacks, especially DAW titles, I did peruse the hardcovers and trade paperbacks at all the stores.  There were a few nice finds there, as well, the best of which you can see in the photo on the right.  The title on the lower right is an anthology containing stories by Wagner, Joseph Payne Brennan, and David Morrell.  I have a mass market paperback of this one, but they don’t show up often, so I grabbed the trade paper edition.  The silver book at the upper right is Masques II.  The book in the middle on the left is The Soft Whisper of the Dead by Charles L. Grant.  Next to it is The Definitive Best of the Horror Show.

I’m not going to be buying many books for the next few months, at least not once Howard Days is over.  My son is going to a trumpet camp where he’ll be staying in a hotel in Dallas later in the summer.  I’ll be staying with him and driving him to camp.  During the day, I’ll be at the hotel working on revising lab manuals.  Dallas and the surrounding suburbs have plenty of good used book stores.  I promise to be good.

Now to figure out where I’m going to put all of these…

Return to Sharakhai

Of Sand and Malice MadeOf Sand and Malice Made
Bradley P. Beaulieu
Daw Books
hardcover, 240 pages $18.00
ebook $9.99

I’d like to thank Bradley P. Beaulieu for providing me with the review copy.  I found reading the book to be rather frustrating, not because of any flaw in the story or writing.  Just the opposite.  Life has been chaotic for a number of reasons which are worth getting into.  I’ve been reading the book in snatches, with many interruptions.  I’ve wanted to simply dive in.  Unfortunately, that’s not what’s happened.

But I did manage to carve out some time to read most of the second half over the weekend and finished the last twenty pages tonight.  Of Sand and Malice Made is an excellent fantasy adventure.

It’s also a great introduction to the world of Shattered Sands, which we saw in the first volume of the series, Twelve Kings in Sharakhai (reviewed here).  You don’t have to have read that volume to enjoy this one.  Of Sand and Malice Made is a prequel, telling an adventure of Ceda before the tale of her quest for vengeance against the kings begins.  In fact the kings are hardly mentioned. Continue reading

Bradley Beaulieu Knocks it Out of the Park

Twelve Kings in SharakhaiTwelve Kings in Sharakhai
Bradley P. Beaulieu
DAW Books
Hardcover $24.95, ebook $9.99, audiobook $14.68
Available September 1, 2015

If you’ve read this blog for a while, you’ll know I’m a big fan of Bradley P. Beaulieu.  So when he asked me if I would be interested in an advance ebook for review purposes, there was only one answer.  (Many thanks, sir.)

Twelve Kings in Sharakhai is the first volume in The Song of Shattered Sands.  It’s an ambitious book, and it’s clear that the series is going to be ambitious.

Now, I’ve long said that writers, in an ideal world at least, should continue to improve and get better as time goes on.  If the quality of the first book is any indication, this is going to be a major series.  I loved The Lays of Anaskaya, but The Song of Shattered Sands looks to be even better.

I’ll explain why after I give you a brief description of the setup. Continue reading

Transiting to Scorpio

Transit to ScorpioTransit to Scorpio
Dray Prescott #1
Alan Burt Akers (Kenneth Bulmer)
ebook $2.99 Kindle $0.00 (free as of this writing) Nook

Sword and Planet is one of the more neglected subgenres of science fiction.  Or fantasy if you prefer.  It tends to be a blend of both, with examples that tend more towards one or the other.

The Dray Prescott series is one of the longest running, with a total of 53.  Of these, DAW books published the first 37.  The remaining titles were published in German, although a few more have been released electronically in English.   According to the Dray Prescott site, all of the remaining volumes are being reprinted in English this year.

The stories concern an English sailor, the titular Dray Prescott, who through means that are not well explained, is transported instantaneously to the planet Kregen.  Kregen orbits the star Antares in the constellations Scorpio. Continue reading

Recent Acquisitions

There are a few used book stores here in town.  Two are pretty good, one is so-so, and I’m not sure the fourth isn’t a front for something else.

Anyway, the one I consider the best is closing.  The owner doesn’t have a lease but owns the storefront.  As a result, he’s not in any hurry to shut his doors.  This is good, because he’s got a pretty thorough inventory.  It’s one of the great second hand stores where there are stacks of books in all the aisles, and a few minutes to see if a particular title is to be had turns into the better part of an afternoon.

Acquisitions 1I passed through the other day and picked up a few things.  At the moment everything is half off.  That percentage will increase as times goes on and the day the store shuts its doors for good draws nigh.  You know I’ll be going back. Continue reading