Howard Andrew Jones's Blog, page 78

Scary Book Moments

Ramses the Great alive. I can’t bring myself to post a pic of his dead face…

Two events stand out as the scariest book moments I ever experienced. I wish I could tell you the works that frightened me were by famous horror writers, but one of them was a children’s book. The other was a history text, and the scare was unintended.

Runner-up for the scariest moment I ever experienced while reading a book comes from grade school, when I was fascinated with ancient Egypt. I  was sitting down with a big 8″ by 11″ tome. I turned the page and suddenly discovered a life-sized image of the shriveled-up face of Ramses the Great.

I recoiled in fear and dropped the book. It was a helluva creepy thing to come upon. I know, I know, you’re probably thinking ancient Egypt is sure to have pictures of mummies, right? Well, maybe, but I’d never seen a picture of one unwrapped before, and I wasn’t even reading about mummies. I was reading about the conquests of Ramses the Great. One minute I was thinking about chariot battles, then, suddenly I was eye to empty eye socket with his long-dead face.

But that was just the runner-up to my scariest book moment. First place and grand prize goes to those scary green pants with nobody inside them. Thanks, Dr. Seuss. I know you fully intended that story to be about overcoming fear and prejudice, but your story scared the bejeezus out of me. Those ghostly pants freaked me out so bad that I was actually afraid to touch the Sneeches book in which the story was found. I loved that Sneeches story, though, and I thought the one after the Sneeches, about the Zaxx, was pretty good, so I’d read those two, but I was always afraid I’d accidentally turn the page too far and see those damned pants. I wasn’t one of those kids who got a secret thrill from being scared. I never “accidentally” took a glimpse to get my blood racing. I HATED those things. The funny thing is, most people I’ve talked to didn’t have any problems with them, including my own son. When I realized my wife had been reading him that traumatizing story, I nearly tore out my hair. But it never phased him at all, as he mentioned over breakfast this morning.

Wish I could say the scariest thing I ever read was “Pigeons from Hell,” or The Shining, but nothing tops those moments. I hope nothing else ever does.  How about you? What’s the scariest book moment? And what did YOU think of those pale green pants?

 

Music to Waar By

My friend Nathan Long has a new book out, Swords of Waar, a real blast of a sword-and-planet romp. I got to read it and its predecessor in rough draft, and they were a helluva lot of fun, and hard to put down. But I’d expect nothing less from Nathan, who’s responsible for some excellent, excellent heroic fiction in the Warhammer universe. His Blackhearts omnibus really ought to be required reading for anyone who intends to write sword-and-sorcery, and I’m looking forward to reading his next two Ulrika books, because the first one knocked me out.

Swords of Waar is the second of Nathan’s take on Barsoomian style action adventure, with a tough biker chick cast in the role usually reserved for John Carter rip-offs. To celebrate its release, Nathan came up with a rock-and-roll playlist on his web site.

And that list was so inspiring, a couple of my other sword-and-sorcery writer friends came up with playlists of their own, for their own work. Here’s a list from John Fultz, creator of Seven Princes and fellow Black Gate author. And here’s a soundtrack for some of the works of Alex Bledsoe, best known for his Eddie LaCrosse books. Speaking of Alex Bledsoe, he’s got a new short story up at Apex magazine, so if you’ve been curious about his work, you can try a sample of it for free right here.

And, hey, as long as I’m providing links to free reading stuff, let me follow up on a link to a preview of a new Martha Wells novel coming out next year, the steam punkish Emilie and the Hollow World.

There’s a little less than 30 days between now and the release of The Bones of the Old Ones! I’ll be talking a lot more about that in the next few weeks, in all kinds of places. I suppose I should think about a playlist for my own work…

Hurricane Relief, Chance to Win Free Book

It sounds like a win/win to me, especially if you’re a fantasy book lover who doesn’t like to see people’s lives disrupted or devastated by hurricanes. And if you’re already a fan of writer Martha Wells, then count yourself lucky indeed.

Swing by Martha’s site for the FULL rules, but here they are in a nutshell, stolen from her web site. I personally think this is a great idea, and if I had author copies of my next one yet, I would be jumping on the bandwagon. Anyway, take it away, Martha:

To enter the drawing for an autographed trade paperback copy of The Siren Depths, the third Books of the Raksura novel:

1) Make a donation to an organization for hurricane Sandy relief, such as the Red Cross, or any of the organizations listed at the bottom of this post by TimeOut New York, or here on this post by Forgotten New York, or one of the organizations doing relief for Sandy’s damage in the Caribbean, like Global Giving. The Huffington Post also lists a bunch of organizations you can donate to, including some international ones.

2) The donation can be any amount, though a minimum of $5.00 would be nice. (This is on the honor system, but I will ask the winners to send me the e-receipt for their donation, with the address you want the book sent to, how you want it personalized, etc.)

3) To enter, make a comment on this post with the name of the organization you donated to. It would be good if you listed the amount, but if you really don’t want to you don’t have to.

4) On Wednesday morning I’ll draw a minimum of five winners (more if we have a lot of entries) randomly and announce them.

5) Please spread the word!

For further details, visit Martha’s site.

As for me, I have exciting news to reveal before the end of the week. Stay tuned!

Harold Lamb’s Adventure Fiction

In discussion of my influences I always mention the writer Harold Lamb, but it’s a sad truth that he’s still little known today. That wasn’t always true. A few generations ago he was one of the most popular writers in one of the best (and most respected) of all pulp magazines, Adventure. Later in life his biographies and histories were award winning and well-regarded, and he was considered such an expert on the Middle-East that the state department sometimes consulted with him.

Once I discovered just how consistently excellent Lamb’s adventure fiction was it was my dream that it would be brought properly  into print, and I am extremely proud to have been intimately involved in making that happen through the Bison Books imprint of the University of Nebraska Press.

There are several things that drew me to Lamb’s fiction. When I was young it was the headlong pace and the exotic settings, so exotic, as L.  Sprague de Camp once wrote, Lamb might as well have been writing of Burroughs’ Mars. But Lamb wasn’t inventing his setting, he was enmeshed in a great deal of research at a time when detailed research meant mastering other languages and journeying to distant lands and libraries.

Upon first discovering Lamb I thought I had discovered that lots of old fiction might be excellent, but years of my own research proved that mostly false. Occasional old adventure fiction is worth a read, but most of it is mired in its time. Lamb isn’t a standout with just one or two works, as might be expected, but with a large canon of fiction that is consistently good to excellent. His plotting and pacing feels surprisingly modern. His heroes are drawn from the east and west, and villainy can be found on either side of the cultural divide.

Sure, I fell in love with the Arabian Nights, but I’m not sure I would have thought about writing any kind of stories with eastern protagonists if I hadn’t been immersed in Lamb’s work. I particularly loved the friendship between the two protagonists in his short story, “The Long Sword” (collected in Swords from the West). One is Sir John, a poor knight who owns a tiny tower in Palestine. His best friend is Khalil, a quick-witted Muslim warrior.

Here’s Khalil in a brief snippet of a scene, pretending to be Sir John to fool the pair’s enemies. Note the short, sharp way that Lamb sketches the scene and reveals character.

Khalil peered down uneasily. He did not know how many men might be awake down there in the gloom under the trees, and besides, he could see almost nothing at all because he had Sir John’s heavy battle casque on his head. And his left arm was already weary with the weight of Sir John’s long kite shield. From side to side he turned his head like an uneasy wolf, seeing only the red glimmer of campfires and the yellow points of stars overhead.

“May Allah confound this steel pot!” he swore.

We celebrate writers of other sorts of fiction here in the United States. Why don’t we celebrate one of our most gifted writers of historical adventure fiction? Anyway, it’s good stuff. Go read it, and tell your friends.

The Queen of Thorns

First today I wanted to point everyone to Queen of Thorns, the new book from the pen of the talented Dave Gross.

If you’re already a Pathfinder Tales fan then Dave needs no introduction, because he is the real mainstay of the Paizo Pathfinder Tales novel line. That’s because Dave isn’t just a good writer who hits his deadlines, he also has a gift for bringing characters to life and providing atmospheric spark to every corner of the Pathfinder world (Golarion) where he shines his light.

Media tie-in fiction gets a bad rap from some people, but here and at Black Gate I’ve long said that some tie-in writers will defy your expectations. One of those is Dave Gross [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error] .

The Queen of Thorns is the third novel length adventure of his characters Radovan and Jeggare, although, as with the others, it stands alone. Don’t take my word on the quality of Dave’s writing. Right now you can check out every one of the first four chapter. I’m going to rip the rest of this information right from Dave’s site [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error] :Over at Black Gate  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error] you can read Chapter One, in which Count Varian Jeggare attends the Midsummer Masquerade in a city of mists and illusion.

Flames Rising [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  hosts Chapter Two, in which Radovan dances after an elven damsel only to find out that he wasn’t the one calling the tune.

SF Signal [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  has Chapter Three, in which Varian enjoys a bird’s-eye view of the Fierani Forest and meets an unusual gnome with a huge secret to reveal.

And Paizo  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error]  [image error] itself hosts Chapter Four, wherein the boys assemble a team to guide them through the deadly Fierani Forest. This chapter includes a fabulous illustration by Eric Belisle.

Apart from letting you know about my friend’s book, there is both too little and too much to report. Here at the Jones household we’re busily restructuring the home and our lives to bring my mother in to live with us, which means the end of my office as an office, as we know it. I’ve been accustoming myself to working in a comfy chair in the family room on my laptop.

My wife and I have been watching the BBC edition of Being Human, which I’ll report on next week. And a good friend called the other day wondering why I never talk much about Harold Lamb. Considering I spent about five or six (or ten, if you can’t the prep work) years getting the man’s work into print through the University of Nebraska Press (Bison Books) it’s a valid question. I love Lamb’s work, and champion it in person whenever I get the chance. Yet I haven’t talked much about him here. In the coming months I mean to rectify that. I saw that sword-and-sorcery scholar Morgan Holmes had listed one of the Lamb collections I edited (Swords from the West) as one of his desert island reads, which warmed the cockles of my cold, cold heart.

 

Trenches of Valor

The other day I mentioned a great solitaire war game I’d tried out from Victory Point Games [image error] , Empires in America. I ended up blogging about that over at Black Gate, so I thought I’d mention another fine Victory Point Games title, Trenches of Valor [image error] , which I picked up with its expansion while my son was studying about World War I.

One of the interesting things about the Victory Point Games titles is that they impart a great sense of history. They simulate historical events and then you honestly get a sense of what those events were like as they happened. Trenches of Valor isn’t as realistic as some of the other titles in that sense, because it emphasize cinematic bravery, but it does provide a snapshot of WWI trench warfare, and just how deadly it truly was.

But it’s more a game of out thinking and out maneuvering your opponent than it is any kind of anti-war testament. In that light, it’s fun, and it plays very quickly. In under a half hour, my son and I gamed out two different scenarios, one of which we played twice. It’s perfect for a quick war game.

If you’re in to playing grand strategy games where every counter represents a division or an entire cavalry unit, this game probably isn’t for you, because each cardboard square represents only one guy. As with all most board games, a counter comes supplied with information about weapons range and damages and any special features that sort of unit/soldier has.

Interestingly, while teaching myself the rules, prior to playing with my son, I discovered that Trenches of Valor worked pretty well as a solitaire simulation, so long as you don’t mind playing both sides against one another. I’ve learned that there’s a great used game market, where you can trade with other game players, or sell used games for discounts to try out newer ones. I’ve since traded a lot of games, but not Trenches of Valor. It’s a keeper.

Counting Down

In the next few weeks I’ll be receiving my copies of The Bones of the Old Ones. It’s one thing to hold the advanced reader’s copy. It’s another completely to be holding the actual book with the final cover, the corrected text, the corrected cover copy with blurbs and a few reviews that came in immediately before the book went to press, and I’m looking forward to that.

I wish that the covers didn’t head off for printing quite so early, because it would have been nice to have the starred review from Publisher’s Weekly on the cover, but if I could make things come true by snapping my fingers I guess that would be a little further down the list than, say, world peace or honest politicians.

Right now I’m hard at work on my next Paizo Pathfinder novel. Unfortunately, there are a lot of distractions. A number of you have sent me nice notes about my mother’s sudden illness, for which I thank you. She is recovering in a short term care facility and will shortly be moving in with us. She’s still weak, but in good spirits, and we’re thankful that she’s still with us. Therapy following on a triple bypass is hard work, but she’s a trooper.

A good chunk of my weekend was spent converting my office into her temporary bedroom — temporary until she’s strong enough for us to move forward with the plan of converting our unfinished walkout basement into an apartment for her. Meanwhile, our long planned (and saved for!) remodel of the upstairs bedroom/bathroom is still underway. It began just a week before my mom’s heart attack. (Yeah, we have a whole lot going on at once!) I work every day to the sound of pounding and sawing, which is a bit distracting, as are the occasional interruptions when something needs to be addressed.

In addition to all that, I am trying to get the basement cleaned out and organized so that we can start lining remodeling up for my mom’s future apartment down there. Oddly enough, I’m still managing to get work done on the Paizo book, maybe because it’s a good escape from the rest of this stress, or maybe because I follow an adage I learned from my friend E.E. Knight [image error]  [image error] , which is “fall down nine times, get up ten.” It’s apparently a Japanese proverb, but it’s just another great piece of writing and/or life advice I’ve received from Eric. In other words, when you face adversity, don’t curl up; stand up and face it.

A few years ago Eric also pointed me to this great quote from one of my favorite presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, and it’s one I’ve taken to heart ever since.

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

I got to play this 3 weeks ago, and hope to tell you about how much fun I had with it later this week.

Some of my promotional work for The Bones of the Old Ones is lagging a bit, with all of these other activities, but I should be making the rounds again soon. In other news, the third Dabir and Asim novel, still tentatively titled The Maiden’s Eye, is holding at just over halfway. I’ve given 50 k a onceover polish, and another 20 k has been roughed out. It’s a little more complex even than the second book and is thus will be a little longer, though it won’t be as big a jump in size as there was between, say, the third and fourth Harry Potter novels.

I had planned to spend some time this morning talking about a great Victory Point Games solitaire that I finally got to play a few weeks back, but I’ll have to get to that later in the week. Right now I’ve got to get to writing.

 

 

Music to Write of Arabia

I’ve held various career plans over the years, beginning with my ambition to be a double-nought spy, a starship captain, or another Beatle. I also wanted to be a writer from an early age, a goal that seemed just about as superheroically awesome as the others.

By the time I was in college I was still gigging around in local rock bands and writing, and I had it in my head I might be able to make a go of it as a composer. There’s only so much time in every day, and every life, though, and eventually writing won out over music, just as getting a film degree won out over a degree in music theory. These days I only sit down at the piano occasionally to amuse myself, but I do keep my hand in composing by drafting themes for my characters.Sometimes I sit down and play a character theme song before I start my writing day.

I’ve thought about subjecting the wider world to a recording of the Dabir and Asim theme song, but I think it would sound a lot better with all the orchestration I hear in my head rather than just having me pound it out on the piano, and besides, I’m busy, so it’s never been recorded.

But enough about me! Today I wanted to share the CD I listen to while driving around town and thinking about the ancient Middle-East.

A couple of years back I heard a review of a CD titled Eastern Wind, by Eliyahu and the Qadim Ensemble. Not only was it evocative and stirring, it was performed with passion and artistry. Usually I’m a pretty curious guy — it helps to be curious when you’re researching– but for some reason, much as I loved this CD, I never looked up the group to find out more about them or to see whether they had more recordings.

It turns out that they have a number of additional CDs, and, wonder of wonders, they’re still touring live. Usually if I discover a group I like, they’ve been broken up for a few years, because I’m often oblivious about new things.

Don’t take my word for it — here’s what the press said about them:

“Visionary . . . achingly beautiful . . .”

San Francisco Chronicle

“The Jewish and Arabic musicians who comprise this eclectic world-music ensemble show the power of unity.”

The Boston Globe

To find out more about these talented musicians, you can check out their web site, here. And if you want to hear the song that gets me thinking about heroic adventures, it’s track 6, “Maghrebi,” from the CD Eastern Wind. For some reason the online song sample of this tune starts at the bridging section, so you don’t hear much of the driving momentum and melody. Trust me, though. It’s grand stuff. I sincerely hope that you’ll purchase some of their CDs. I know I plan on buying more of their music. Wish I lived a little closer to one of the coasts so that I could see a live performance!

 

Manly Movie Week, Part 2

Last week, while my wife and daughter were out of town for seven days, my son and I sat down with a pile of movies I was pretty sure my wife would never be interested in. I already reported on the greatest number of them. After the weekend, our viewing slowed down quite a lot due to my son’s homework load. We just didn’t have time to watch all of those on my list, let alone all of those I managed to find at the library or via Netflix or Amazon Prime.

By the end of Friday night we’d managed five more, and some of them were very impressive.

The Dirty Dozen

I barely remembered most of this one, which, given its fame, kind of surprised me. There are a lot of great action sequences and a VERY high mortality rate among the dozen. I could have sworn a few more characters survived. My son was a little disappointed that his two favorite characters didn’t make it, and both of us felt like the end was a little abrupt, even when taking into account the movie was from an older time. Lee Marvin was still awesome, though.

To Hell And Back

Speaking of older movies with a different feel… we had a hard time with all the stagey moments in this one, although the bits where Audie Murphy was doing the impossible were still pretty thrilling. My son didn’t enjoy this one very much, although he now has an inkling of just how amazing Audie Murphy’s exploits truly were. John Hocking tells me that Murphy’s heroics were so unbelievable that Hollywood actually had to tone some of them down for the movie because they were afraid no one would believe them. For instance, the bit where Audie Murphy is holding off an entire squad of Germans after he sends the rest of his men out, then climbs in a burning tank destroyer to keep them out. In REAL life, not only did he do that, he did it while being shot, and, when things got really dicey, he called in an air strike ON HIS OWN POSITION. When asked later why he went to such extraordinary lengths, he simply answered, “they were killing my friends.” If you don’t know Audie Murphy’s story, you should really look it up.

Hell is For Heroes

This one was new to me, and my son and I both enjoyed it. Short and bleak, with a real noir feel, it took a while to get to its action, but once it began the moments were riveting because of the time the movie had put in introducing its characters. The gist: a platoon has to fool a German division into thinking that they have a LOT more men on their side of the line, or they’re going to get mowed down.

Seven Men From Now

This was new to me as well, a western from the famed collaborations between Bud Boetticher and Randolph Scott. I say famed, but I’d never heard of them, and apparently even among western fans they have only a cult following. Unfortunately, I had to watch this one solo because my son had too much homework. It ended up being one of my favorites from the entire week of viewing, and one of the best westerns I’ve ever seen. A tight script, a small cast, each with complex motivations and back stories, with spare and beautiful direction and wonderful pacing. Randolph Scott plays a man determined to hunt down the seven men who killed a woman in a robbery and got away with a chest of money. To say much more would be to spoil the unfolding surprises. Two thumbs way up on this one. I liked it so well I may actually track down a copy to keep. I almost never do that anymore.

Morituri

Wow, was this good. Marlon Brando plays a German demolition expert hiding (from his own government) in India, forced by the British to infiltrate a German freighter in the guise of an SS officer and arrange for the shipping to be safely transported to Allied hands. Opposing him is Yul Brynner, the freighter captain, and any number of other factors. Taut, tense, with rising tension, constant surprises, and terrible sacrifices, this one was a gem. Another I might want to add to my permanent collection.

The Train

A French resistance movie about a German attempt to move a trainload of valuable paintings from France as the Nazis evacuate Paris. Another great movie, though some might feel the opening segments a little slow. While the overall story is imaginary, many of the events depicted were actually performed by the French resistance as they strove to disrupt the German occupation. Anyone who watches this movie would be hard pressed to mock the French for their alleged lack of warrior skills.

In Conclusion

Out of all the movies we saw, my son thought Schindler’s List and Morituri were the very best, and he liked Morituri so well he thought it might even be as good as Schindler’s List. He thought The Train was just a fraction below, right on the level with Bridge on the River Kwai.

I felt that Schindler’s List, Morituri, and Seven Men from Now were the very strongest. The Train was my next favorite, followed by The Outlaw Josey Wales. Of the rest, I most enjoyed Kelly’s Heroes. My old friend Bruce dropped by for the final two movies, Morituri and The Train, and thought quite highly of them both as well, although he gave Morituri a slight edge.

Now I don’t look forward to having half of my family gone for a week any time soon, but I really enjoyed watching these movies with my son, and talking about WWII and heroism in general. I’m hoping we can start a tradition of watching some others from time to time, hopefully with my daughter joining in. Next up — Zulu!

 

 

Writing Sword and Sorcery

I spent so much time writing that gargantuan overanalysis yesterday of what manly movies I’d been watching with my son I’m going to keep things really short this morning so I can get back to writing books. But I logged on to point everyone to a pretty cool post over at my writer friend Violette Malan’s site. She spends some time thinking about why she writes sword-and-sorcery. I particularly enjoyed the strengths she finds in the genre, her discussion of how it’s one of the only places you can present heroism without irony, and her discussion of models she found in some of the work by genre founders.

Later in the week I’ll finally post about that great Arabianesque music I thought I’d lost, and, if I didn’t put everyone to sleep with my manly movie post, I’ll catch people up on the rest of our views and our reactions.

Right, back to work now.