David A. Riley's Blog, page 26
September 27, 2022
Welgar the Cursed to be published in Swords & Heroes edited by Lyndon Perry
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I can now reveal that my story Welgar the Cursed will appear in Swords & Heroes edited by Lyndon Perry, probably in January next year.
September 25, 2022
An Interview and a reprint of my story Hanuman are now available on Meghan's Haunted House of Books
I am very pleased that a brand new author interview and a reprint of my story Hanuman (first published in Phantasmagoria Magazine) are live now on Meghan's Haunted House of Books. Just click on the links posted below to access them:
September 12, 2022
New sword and sorcery story accepted for publication
The good news today is that I have had another sword and sorcery story accepted for publication in an anthology to be published early next year.
The story is called Welgar the Cursed and I'll be releasing more information about the anthology in the near future.
September 10, 2022
Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy
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With eleven great swords and sorcery tales, and interior and cover art by award-winning artist Jim Pitts, this series is going from strength to strength. amazon.com
"The Sword & Sorcery renaissance continues with the release of volume four of David A. Riley's ongoing anthology series Swords and Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy. Eleven total stories. Out of the eleven authors, five are returning. Many with recurring characters. Most notably, Adrian Cole returns with another new Voidal story. As if that wasn't enough, the book boasts another striking cover by the esteemed Jim Pitts. Pitts artwork also graces many of the pages within too!" Richard Fisher, reviewing Volume 4 on amazon.
Greyscale version
Full colour versionSeptember 4, 2022
Review: Robert Aickman: An Attempted Biography by R. B. Russell
This review was published in Phantasmagoria magazine #21 August 2022
ROBERT AICKMAN: AN ATTEMPTED BIOGRAPHY By R. B. Russell
Tartarus Press 2022 Hardcover
Ray Russell’s highly readable biography of Robert Aickman gives an unparalleled glimpse into a life that contained more psychological complications than is usual even amongst authors of “strange stories”. It is a life full of contradictions, not least being the unreliability of his own version of events, to the extent of omitting any mention of his wife of fourteen years in his two autobiographies. And his dislike of technology, “experts” and our modern age was so strong that he never owned a radio, television or a car. Instead, living in London he frequently attended theatres, opera and the ballet, and for quite some time wrote Opera reviews.
Robert Aickman: An Attempted Biography is a warts and all biography, which is not, I must confess, what I expected from Tartarus Press, which has published Aickman’s entire opus over recent years. All credit to them and to Ray Russell for being unflinchingly objective in the biography of a writer whose writings he and Tartarus Press obviously value immensely.
It is a fact that throughout his life Aickman’s uncompromising views on so many things caused him to have some bitter enemies, such as L.T. C Rolt, with whom he co-founded the Inland Waterways Association in 1946, and who Aickman successfully worked with for many years until an intractable divergence of views on what the objectives of the IWA should be caused a lasting rift. Indeed, it was so bad that at a dinner party in 1974, shortly before his death, Rolt claimed Aickman was “the most evil man I have ever known.” Which is a sad reflection on how their long-time collaboration had descended into such acrimony.
Alas for Aickman, Rolt was not the only enemy he made, and it’s suggested this was why, despite all the work he put into the IWA, Aickman never received any official recognition in the form of some kind of honour, whether an OBE or a knighthood.
Of course, for most of us, Aickman is mainly known for his stories. Significantly, although he wrote extensively for the IWA, it was only when he developed a relationship with the writer Elizabeth Jane Howard the first of the stories he became famous for saw publication, when they co-authored the collection We Are for the Dark. Even then books of short stories by little or unknown writers were rare and it saw publication by Jonathan Cape only because of Elizabeth Jane Howard’s earlier success with her novel The Beautiful Visit, which Cape had published. The collection was made up of six stories, three by both contributors, though who wrote which was not revealed at the time.
Since then, of course, numerous collections of stories by Aickman have been published over the years, and for quite some time he was the highly respected editor of the Fontana Book of Great Ghost Stories. He also went on to receive recognition within the genre and was awarded the prize for Best Short Story for Pages from a Young Girl’s Journal in 1975 at the First World Fantasy Awards in Providence, Rhode Island, though unfortunately he was unable to attend. For some reason his visa was declined by the United States. The following year he was Guest of Honour at the British Fantasy Society’s annual convention, FantasyCon.
Unfortunately, Aickman’s distrust of experts and modern technology led him to refuse chemotherapy when he was diagnosed with cancer in 1980, preferring instead to take homeopathic remedies. He died the following year aged 66.
Phantasmagoria magazine
Review: Pariah by Sam Dawson
This review was published in Phantasmagoria magazine #21 August 2022
PARIAH & OTHER STORIES by Sam Dawson Published by Supernatural Tales, 188 pages
Not only does Pariah contain sixteen excellent stories by Sam Dawson, it also includes some really well drawn line illustrations by the author too. Plus he created its distinctive cover.
Pariah and Other Storiesis an entertainingly varied collection. While some of the tales are darkly disturbing, others are satisfyingly horrific. All share an air of authenticity.
Sixteen stories are too many to itemise here, especially as some are only a few pages long, so I will mention two that impressed me the most.
Field Tripis also one of the longest. In it we encounter two close friends who have had a long, ongoing passion for camping in unusual places, especially those with a ghostly reputation, as a sort of daring do. Perhaps inevitably, they finally chance on somewhere that not only lives up to its reputation but does so in ways the two of them least expect – somewhere that proves far more dangerous than either of them is prepared. For them it was just supposed to be a long lost, deserted village, isolated since the sixteenth century due to plague. No longer even shown on any maps, they are surprised to discover it is far from deserted and going there will change their lives forever. A well-conceived and gripping story with some unexpected twists.
The other that especially caught my attention is the title story itself: Pariah. Set during the second world war at a time when the allied armies are still fighting their way across Europe, Pariah is the nickname bestowed on a specially converted Churchill tank. It has had its main gun removed to be replaced with a massive flame thrower. Needing a new command after having lost the crew of his previous tank when it was hit by a shell while he was temporarily away from it, Sergeant Freddie Brown is offered the Pariah. Few tankmen want anything to do with flame throwers as they are regarded by most as a barbaric weapon. In fact, they are hated so much by the Germans they are known to shoot any of their crews who fall into their hands – which is why Brown’s new command comes with a brand-new crew. Its previous one were executed when the tank was briefly captured. As events unfold, it isn’t long before it becomes obvious to Brown that the tank’s reputation goes further than the detestation felt by everyone towards its function, a reputation that continues long past the end of the war up until the present day in a well-researched tale full of authentic-sounding anecdotes and facts.
One of the things that impressed me most about all of these stories, besides their variety, is the author’s research into what he is writing, without ever becoming pedantic about it.
All in all, an excellent collection which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Pariah & Other Stories is published by Supernatural Tales and is available to
purchase from Lulu and other outlets.
Phantasmagoria magazine
August 30, 2022
At Drake's Command by David Wesley Hill
Many thanks to fantasy and sci-fi writer David Wesley Hill for sending me a copy of his historical novel At Drake's Command. I recently reviewed his swords and sorcery story in the July issue of Savage Realms Monthly.
August 18, 2022
My short story collections
Below are details of all my short story collections, what stories are in them, and where they are published, plus links to ordering copies online.
The Lurkers in the Abyss and Other Tales of Terror - Shadow Publishing 2013
The Lurkers in the Abyss, After Nightfall, Terror on the Moors, The Shade of Apollyon, Prickly, Writer's Cramp, Winter on Aubarch 6, The Shadow by the Altar, Out of Corruption, A New Lease, Help-Plants, Inside the Labyrinth, A Sense of Movement, Soft Little Fingers, His Pale Blue Eyes, Fish Eye, Lurkers.
His Own Mad Demons: Dark Tales from David A. Riley - Originally Hazardous Press, now Parallel Universe Publications 2012 and 2015
Their Own Mad Demons, Lock-In, The Fragile Mask on his Face,The True Spirit, The Worst of All Possible Places.
Their Cramped Dark World & Other Tales - Originally published by Hazardous Press, now Parallel Universe Publications 2015
Hoody, A Bottle of Spirits, No Sense in Being Hungry, She Thought, Now and Forever More, Romero's Children, Swan Song, The Farmhouse, The Last Coach Trip, The Satyr's Head, Their Cramped Dark World
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After Nightfall & Other Weird Tales - Parallel Universe Publications 2020
Three Eyed Jack, The Fragile Mask on His Face, Terror on the Moors, The Shade of Apollyon, Writer's Cramp, Fish Eye, Boat Trip, Prickly, After Nightfall
Illustrated throughout by Jim Pitts
A Grim God's Revenge: Dark Tales of Fantasy & Horror - Parallel Universe Publications 2021
Lem, Scrap, The Urn, Hanuman, Gwargens, Retribution, The Bequest, Corpse-Maker, Old Grudge Ender, Dead Ronnie and I, Grudge End Cloggers, A Grim God's Revenge, They Pissed on My Sofa, A Girl, a Toad and a Cask
August 5, 2022
Review: Savage Realms Monthly July 2022
SAVAGE REALMS MONTHLY July 2022 Issue 13 Literary Rebel, LLC, edited by William Miller
Savage Realms Monthlyhas been running for just over a year now, published as a paperback and a kindle e-book, showcasing three new swords and sorcery stories in each issue.
This issue is slightly different as the second story, Good for the Gander by David Wesley Hill, is not strictly speaking a swords and sorcery tale, involving as it does a cowboy magically transported to a weird realm of magic and supernatural horror, but its bizarre setting is if anything even more outlandish than most S&S tales and I doubt it will disappoint anyone. It is also filled with some of the quirkiest humour I have come across for quite some time. Transported against his will from the banks of the Rio Grande in 1879 by a sorcerer who wanted his help in a previous story, Charles Duke is struggling to find some way to return to his homeland. To his advantage he has two six-guns and a shotgun, weapons unknown in this world. But to his disadvantage, this world contains a vast array of fiendish creatures, including gods and demons. In this the third adventure about Charles Duke, he has to venture into Hell, which is even more gross than possibly anyone has ever described it before. In this magical world Hell is a real place, accessible for those crazy, foolhardy or desperate enough to enter it. Few, of course, manage to survive their encounters with its grotesque inhabitants. But that’s just part of the job if Duke is to find some way to return home. And, being the pragmatist he is, this is what he sets out to do. It’s a great, rip-roaring tale, with plenty of colourful characters, bloody conflicts and even bloodier twists and turns.
Opening this issue is A Place of Followship by Matt Spencer, which is possibly even bloodier, with conflicts aplenty, made all the more numerous by the betrayals and double-dealings of so many of the people Severin Gris comes into contact with in a grim world ruled by a viciously totalitarian religious movement called the Theocracy.
Closing this issue is Blood Vengeance by Zach Effenberger. Set in a world anyone who has watched the excellent Viking series on TV will recognise, the bloody feuds have been notched up quite a bit as our protagonist Magnus sets out to exact revenge on the murderer of his kin, the warlord Orm Stonefist. Norse folklore plays a big part in this tale, steeped as it is in the mindset of those who follow the gods of Valhalla. Another dark, grimly-envisaged setting filled with violent action.
Although the three tales in this issue are filled with blood and violence, they are varied too, with well imagined settings. All in all, a bloody good read.
Reviewed by David A. Riley
amazon.co.uk At the moment this link only connects to the ebook version but a print version will be available there soon.
July 25, 2022
New Sword & Sorcery story finished: Mask of a Mad God
I have finally finished a new sword and sorcery story: Mask of a Mad God, which continues the saga of Welgar the Northerner, who first appeared in Ossani the Healer and the Beautiful Homunculus and then in The Dark Priestdom, neither of which have as yet been published, though they are out there awaiting a decision. Fingers crossed!
