Archives: Reviews

Conan Re-Read: Conclusion

Bill Ward and I have just finished a re-read of every complete story of Conan the Cimmerian written by Robert E. Howard.

Howard: It’s hard to believe it’s been six months since we started this re-read. But then it’s hard to believe it’s over, and it’s hard to believe that there aren’t any more Conan stories. Such a fantastic character practically begs to have more adventures told about him, which is probably why the regrettable Conan pastiche industry popped up. Well, maybe not entirely regrettable, because I’ve read some I’ve really enjoyed. What’s regrettable is that for a long time they were packaged on equal footing with the real thing, or made available even when the real thing was out of print.

January Wrap-Up

February’s here. That’s hard for me to believe. One twelfth of the New Year is already over, and it was a blur. But looking back I suppose it’s been a good month. I have managed to not be nearly as pedal to the metal and have been taking time to relax on many evenings, something that didn’t happen much the whole back half of 2015.

Over the weekend I finished my friend Ian Tregillis’ new novel in manuscript and found it delightful, and later I finished a short Merle Constiner novel. He has only a handful more that I haven’t read (well, 8 may not normally be considered a handful, but they’re all quite short) so I’m going to read something completely different and pace myself.

Tregillis Triumphs Again

Remember how I said I’d held off reading the new IanTregillis books until I could have the second in my hand? He’s one of the few modern writers I find un-putdownable. And he did it to me again over the New Year holiday. I finished one and then reached for the other in short order. You like alternate history, intrigue, action, seasoned with a little of the fantastic? (In this case it’s mechanical men powered by alchemy).

Then Tregillis will please you. Mightily. Get thee forth and read them.

Here’s the cool thing, at least for me. Because I’m friends with Ian, I get to read the third book before it goes to press. As a matter of fact, I’m reading it THIS WEEK! Ha ha! Ah, the benefits of being a pro author. That, and all the sport cars and pirate gold. Oh, and the mansion.

The Fourth Gunman

I never read a western in my life until some time in my mid ’40s when I got pointed to the excellent adventure novels of Ben Haas writing as John Benteen (or, indeed, several other pseudonyms). He proved to be such an excellent author that I sought out nearly everything the man wrote, and I’ve since been on a hunt for other great westerns from others.

The problem is that there are thousands of westerns, and most of them seem to range only from okay to good, with the weight heavy on the okay end.

When you’re looking into fantasy or historical fiction it’s pretty easy to talk to some people in the know and get the lowdown on the recognized masters and the truly excellent. With westerns there’s less consensus. The trail usually ends with Louis L’amour or some other famous names that don’t really seem to be the most exciting. (L’amour is good, but in my experience he’s not great, no matter his popularity.)

So through the fall of 2015 and into the winter I’ve been exploring, based on some recommendations by John C. Hocking and Morgan Holmes, and working my way through some Harry Whittington, Donald Hamilton (better known for his Matt Helm books) and Merle Constiner.

Captain Nemo Sails Again

We’ve had a few too many adventures here at Jones central lately. My son had a spin out on the highway on the way back to college. He was alright, thank goodness, but the car was damaged enough that we had to take him up the rest of the way, stay the night in his college town, then stop in the college town where he’d had the wreck and see about getting the car fixed. Fortunately no permanent damage was done, although the price of new tires was nothing to sneeze at, and then we headed home.

Bill Ward and I are getting close to the end of our great Conan re-read and after having to write essays about so many tales we’re going to take a little breather, but we’ll be back to read more great adventure fiction.

Twilight Marathon

Over the New Year weekend we couldn’t help catching some of the Twilight Zone marathon on the SyFy network. As a matter of fact, because my wife and I are both fighting illness, we ended up watching more episodes than we might have, joined frequently by my son and occasionally my daughter.

None of us are strangers to the show; my wife and I in particular are fans from way back. Some we’ve seen multiple times. And yet there are others that were still new to us, and I bet if we had watched the whole thing we would have found a few more, especially those odd hour-long episodes from the 4th season.

Here, in no particular order, are some of the observations we made.

Leigh Brackett: “The Moon that Vanished”

The great Leigh Brackett was born 100 years ago today. She put Adventure into planetary adventure the way few others did before or since, painting her settings with astonishing color and details that never detracted from the story. I’ve written about this in detail here, if you’re after a few samples of her prose and a light discussion of her technique.

Today, though, hopefully you can join Bill Ward and me in celebrating Leigh Brackett by discussing one of her great stories, “The Moon that Vanished.” If you missed the announcement last week, you can still join in by grabbing a copy of the story inexpensively. You won’t regret it.

Link Day

I remain crazy busy doing writer and house dad things, so I have little that’s especially clever. I’ll still do my best to entertain you today.

First, giant-sized hounds. Beware!

Second, I want to take a train across the U.S. like this. Except I’d probably start from Chicago and go west. But you get the idea.

Two Cool Things

I’ve mentioned before that I really enjoy the Savage Worlds game system. I’ve loved every official release, although the only setting I’ve yet played for any length of time is the Savage Worlds of Solomon Kane. I talk about the game here, here, and here.

I ended up liking what Savage Worlds had done so much that I threw my hat in the ring to write some adventures for them. The first will be available in only a few months as part of a trilogy of new horror adventure books.

Volume 1 is out already, and features another Solomon Kane tale, as well as a bevy of terrifying adventures. Check it out here.

Justice League: Gods and Monsters

I don’t know that I’ve ever mentioned it on this blog, but I’m a huge fan of Batman: The Animated Series, Justice League, Justice League: Unlimited, and, to a lesser extent, Superman: The Animated Series, and Batman Beyond. I loved the animation style and (for the most part) the character designs, but most importantly — because a cool look matters not at all if the tales are poor — the storytelling. It was usually top-notch, head and shoulders above cartoons of the time and at least equal if not superior to the best modern cartoons as well.

That’s why, when I learned there was a new Justice League movie being released with one of the most important of the original crew overseeing it (i.e. Bruce Timm) I immediately put the movie in the Netflix queue. I didn’t know anything much about it, except that it was with some kind of alternate Justice League.