Ken Lizzi's Blog, page 52

A Weekend at the Cabin Means a Snippet Day.

I spent the weekend at a forested cabin on a riverbank. A cabin weekend means relaxation. I did get some work done on the third Karl Throson novel, but otherwise the time was dedicated to playing board and card games, reading, strolling about a bit, and relaxing. That means the Sunday afternoon at home is full of chores, limiting time to write a post. So, instead, here are some pictures and a bonus snippet from my hybrid Sword-and-Sorcery/crime novel Thick As Thieves. Enjoy.

Glum Arent greeted the sun climbing near to noon. He woke in his cubby hole of a room in the cloisters of the Fullers Brotherhood. The Brotherhood had begun as a monastic order devoted to solitary contemplation, so the structures within their walled grounds held numerous private cells, more than the Brothers knew what to do with after the sect’s conversion to a proselytizing faith premised upon achieving unity through shared meals. Fellowship through Feasting, the Brothers called it, and the members of the order now spent most of their time catering. That freed up a lot of space and the Fullers’ abbot allowed Glum a room in exchange for the odd bit of copying, mostly recipes.

Glum snagged a bread roll and a cold slice of ham from one of the refectory kitchens. Breakfast leftovers. Food never presented a problem in the cloisters of the Fullers Brotherhood. Meals weren’t part of his arrangement with the abbot, but no one seemed to mind if he helped himself to leftovers now and again.

He’d endured worse hangovers. Cutting out of Shib’s early and the long walk home seemed to have forestalled the more typical aftermath. The food and a pottery mug of cloister-brewed ale took the edge off. Glum felt ready to face the day.

He dug the purse from its concealment beneath his tunic, counted out the take from last night’s rounds. He’d done well. The tale of the Battle of Shib’s Tavern proved popular, Cester Bailick Faren’s personal involvement and evident culpability intrigued a few night owls.

Glum figured he’d wrung what he could from the raw information. He began compiling mental notes for a poetic depiction, an epic in verse commemorating the battle. Something to occupy his pen that evening at Shib’s tavern. Maybe talk Shib into sponsoring a recitation, or at least standing him a few free rounds for the publicity.

The letdown was his description of the necklace Trader Vawn wore, the Panaegic Periapt. His tale met mostly with inscrutable masks. Glum figured his auditors did not want to let on how intrigued they were. A few—young, low ranking priests of some of the charity oriented religions—had listened with skepticism or outright derision. Probably too junior to have heard rumors of the Periapt’s power. In all, disappointing.

Glum made his way out on to the street. The paving fronting the cloister of the Fullers consisted of worn cobbles decades past due for maintenance. Glum wasn’t sure what was more dangerous: the cobbles slick with rain or the ankle catching gaps where a potentially rain slick cobble ought to be. At least it was still dry out. The rains weren’t due for at least a month.

Priests’ Promenade bustled with midday worshippers and the usual assortment of ecclesiastics, proselytizers, beadles, and deacons. The Clackmat Confederacy could not boast the sheer number of gods the Leyvans possessed, but the Confederacy’s indigenous faiths, sects, cults, and nascent enthusiasms counted in the dozens, almost all of which claimed places of worship in Kalapo lining the Boulevard of the Heavens. In fact, the Leyvan pantheon itself had begun making recent inroads, the clergy of one of the myriad Leyvan gods taking possession of an abandoned shrine and beginning construction on a new temple. The colorful garb of the Leyvans added to the chaotic rainbow of surplices, robes, cassocks, and other religious attire livening up Priests’ Promenade.

Glum wormed into the crowd. It was about time to make his way to Shib’s Tavern, pick up a more substantial meal, maybe a spot of wine to help inspire his composition.

He saw a familiar figure approaching, tall but slightly stooped, with the eagerness of a bird dog on a scent. Harribol Gravin, Apostolic Truthseeker of the Verians. A decent sort, earnest. Glum could tolerate him. Harribol had once purchased an epigrammatic verse from him as well as the odd bit of gossip.

“Harribol,” Glum said, meeting the Truthseeker where the cobbles of the Fullers met the pitted limestone pavers of the Pontifical Henotics.

“Glum, have you heard the news?” Harribol Gravin grinned as he spoke, the expression incongruous on the man, his long face normally so earnestly serious. “Funny, me asking you if you’ve heard the news.”

“That is funny. Positively droll. What have you got, Harribol? I can’t pay you.”

“The Truth is a gift to all, Glum. I’ve told you that many times.”

“And since that would put me out of business, Harribol, I’ve ignored you many times.”

“Well, you won’t ignore this. The Panaegic Periapt is in Kalapo. One of the Sharks is wearing it. They say it allows safe communion with the very gods themselves. How’s that for an eye opener?”

Anthologies: Warlocks and Warriors, Emphasis on the Warlocks.

This one is a gem. And take a look at that cover. Interestingly, it promises cover-to-cover hand-to-hand combat, but while there is plenty of sword-swinging in this Sword-and-Sorcery anthology, the emphasis is on the sorcery. Perhaps that theme is hinted at in the title Warlocks and Warriors, giving precedence to the Warlocks. The supernatural takes center stage in this collection, from sorcerers, to the undead, from demi-gods to druids.

L. Sprague de Camp compiled this one. Unlike his sidekick and serial anthologizer, Lin Carter, he did not take the opportunity to include one of his own stories. I rather regret that, but the talent lineup herein is compensation enough. Heavy hitters. Rock stars. Pick your analogy, it’s probably apt. I’m not going to hide my verdict until the end. If you don’t already have a copy of this on your shelves, snag one at the first opportunity.

You’d expect a big name to lead off the anthology. You’d be wrong. A writer by the name of Ray Capella gets the honors. I’m not familiar with him beyond his story here, Turutal. Capella apparently wrote a series of stories set in Robert E. Howard’s Hyborian Age, featuring his own hero, Arquel. I rather doubt you could get away with that now, without a license from the owners of the Conan franchise. The 1960s were another time. Anyhow, this is a solid, Howardesque story, featuring a band of mercenaries and Arquel facing off against a Stygian sorcerer and a tribe of undead pygmies. The sorcerer is sufficiently potent. He’s not what you might expect, he’s more of a direct action spell-slinger, a D&D style magic user rather than the sort of thaumaturge who requires hours of chanting and a blood sacrifice. He presents enough of a threat and an obstacle to keep the action going. It was nice to find an enjoyable story from an unfamiliar name.

De Camp did not include himself in the anthology, but he made room for Lin Carter. Carter’s story is admittedly styled after the stories of Lord Dunsany. And you’ll get a chance later on to make a direct comparison. The Gods of Niom Parma is actually a charming, well-written fable featuring a squabbling pantheon of gods, and the results of one their number taking on human form to settle the argument. No sword swinging at all, in this one. It is instead a whimsical tale of the supernatural experiencing the natural. I liked it.

The action picks up dramatically in the next of the stories, one of REH’s Solomon Kane stories, The Hills of the Dead. One of my favorites. Here you have our stalwart hero facing off against waves of vampires, aided by his blood brother, the shaman/witch doctor N’Longa. It is always a pleasure to revisit that bloody-handed, dour puritan. I doubt I need say any more on the subject.

Henry Kuttner’s Elak is featured in the next story, Thunder in the Dawn. This is a novella, that keeps the action going from the first scene all the way through. Kuttner is sometimes regarded as rather a lightweight in the field. It is true that the prose flags at times, or lacks the scintillation of, say, Vance, and the combination of Druids, Vikings, and Atlantis might seem a trifle odd. But it works. The prose might flag but the story never does. This is adventure fiction after all, and Kuttner offers it in spades. There is magic galore, moving the plot along, threatening and rescuing our heroes. We have a Druid’s magic squared off against that of an Elf. We have some sort of pan-dimensional death god, scrying, magical gales at sea, lighting bolts and fireballs. (Tell me someone, is Dalan the archetype of the D&D Druid?) The point is, the story is rip-roaring fun.

Somewhat unfortunately for Kuttner, he is followed by Fritz Leiber. I mean to speak no ill of Kuttner’s talent. Most anyone’s prose would be diminished in comparison with Leiber’s. Thieve’s House is one of the iconic tales of Fafhrd and The Gray Mouser. I’ve always been partial to the stories set in the city of Lankhmar, and this one never disappoints. It is somewhat of a ghost story, if you swap out ghosts for animate skeletons. Leiber keeps the tension high, the dialog witty, and the prose sparkling. But, you know all that.

Back to back classics. C.L. Moore (Henry Kuttner’s wife, if you didn’t already know) is next with the first Jirel of Joiry story, Black God’s Kiss. To appreciate this story, it helps to put yourself in the same frame of mind as you would to read an H.P. Lovecraft tale. The work is rather a mood piece, with impressions and psychic revelations taking the place of visual description. Nothing is fully explained. Much of the yarn feels dreamlike, unreal. If you want to know exactly what it is that the extra-dimensional tunnel beneath Jirel’s castle actually leads to, who those beings are who exist in that space, and how they interact with our world, then you’re on your own. Moore isn’t interested in those questions. Much of the story exists in what isn’t written. I suppose there is some Post-graduate paper to be written on the psychology of Jirel of Joiry, but frankly, I wouldn’t want to read it. I’d rather read the story, and let myself be moved about by the weird imagery.

Remember the Lin Carter story? Next up is Lord Dunsany’s whimsical fable Chu-Bu and Sheemish. Consider it a sort of palate cleanser, an amusing sorbet before getting on to a meatier story. It is a brief, charmingly written tale of ineffectual, petty gods. I’ve always liked this one.

The great ones keep rolling in this. I mentioned it is a gem of an anthology, didn’t I? Next up is Clark Ashton Smith with one of his Zothique stories, The Master of the Crabs. If you are fond of Vance’s Dying Earth stories, you’ll feel right at home here with this story told by an apprentice wizard of his journey accompanying his master across the sea in pursuit of a rival wizard. Smith, Vance, and Leiber are the three great stylists of the genre. This story is a bit more straightforward than many of Smith’s other stories, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t written with his characteristic elegance and expert use of the archaic and sesquipedalian. A good story. One of those in which the Sorcerers are also the Swordsmen.

H.G. Wells is rather the odd man out in this collection. He isn’t known for S&S, and you may quibble as to whether or not The Valley of the Spiders qualifies as such. I’d hazard that it does, as swords do appear and the threat faced does seem to have some sort of supernatural origin. Everything about the story is kept deliberately vague, from the three main characters, who go nameless, to the location of the setting. It is, I think, mostly a brief character study, considering bravery, class, and status. It is fine, but probably the weakest of the stories.

Last comes Roger Zelazny. His Dilvish the Damned is one of those S&S characters, like Elric, who is both a swordsman and a sorcerer, which fits in with the apparent theme of the anthology. The Bells of Shoredan follows Dilvish on a quest to summon a supernatural army to come to the aid of a besieged city (think the scrubbing bubbles from the film version of Return of the King.) Dilvish faces supernatural perils, and fights them both with his own demonic magic and with the sword. I liked the story, but I found the mannered style a bit off-putting, with the “and then did he” phrasing. But it works, once you allow yourself to grow accustomed to it.

An excellent anthology. It would be hard to top this one.

Shifting to another topic, the cover artist of my novel Under Strange Suns is selling t-shirts based on the art.

They look pretty good, don’t you think? If you liked the book, or just want a cool looking shirt, contact him at his website and pick one up.

The Dresden Files: Sword-and-Sorcery?

I had intended to write another post on anthologies. However, I was about three and a half stories through a collection when Peace Talks arrived. So much for that plan. I’m about halfway through the latest of Harry Dresden’s series of unfortunate events. Once I’m done, I’ll get back to revisiting Fafhrd and Gray Mouser’s shenanigans.

Reading Peace Talks, however, raised in my mind the question of whether or not the Dresden Files are sword-and-sorcery. Superficially, why not? The main character is a wizard. One of his buddies is a sort of holy warrior, often armored up and swinging a sword. So we’ve got both swords and sorcery right there. I recently wrote a post in which I enumerated what I thought were the essential components of sword-and-sorcery fiction. Why not run through those with an eye to Jim Butcher’s tales of Harry Dresden and a Chicago infested with the supernatural.

But, I’m going to do it in reverse order.

Number five was magic. Check. Plenty of magic. Chock full of magic. Brimming, stuffed, breaded with, deep-fried in, and fortified with a dozen essential magic vitamins and minerals. That one is easy. Moving on.

Number four on my list was excitement. Check. Butcher keeps the action fast and intense, with the ability to keep ratcheting up the suspense during extended fight sequences. Which occasionally feature sword battles. Decidedly weighing in favor of pro. I can practically see the scale moving.

Number three was horror. Again, check. There are horrific beasties, nightmare creatures, blood-sacrifices, dark gods, etc. Even a book centered around a horror convention. This factor might, in fact, be overplayed, militating against the books being S&S and instead being borderline horror. But, that’s a limb that I don’t think would hold weight, so I’m not going out on it.

Number two was immediacy, requiring a hero who instigates action and consequences, and isn’t merely a helpless pawn. Check. While Harry can find himself an unwitting dupe in someone else’s plot, he is never without agency. Turning the tables on those who think they are manipulating him is often part of the plot. Looking pretty good so far. Four down, bringing us to number one.

Number one was scale, the stakes cannot be too high. Uh-oh. Push the alarm button, we’ve got a problem. While some of the earlier books, and most of the short stories, keep the stakes relatively low, as the series has gone on the consequences have ramped up. To cataclysmic levels. The books have moved — first incrementally, then, full-steam ahead — into Epic Fantasy territory.

With that, I’m afraid I have to conclude that the Dresden Files are not S&S. Not even what I call Semi-autos and Sorcery, which is what I consider the equivalent, but set in our reality (more or less) rather than some secondary world or imagined past. I think the Monster Hunter International books might be considered Semi-autos and Sorcery, did they not run into the same problem as the Dresden Files. There is nothing wrong with playing for world-changing stakes in your fiction. It is merely a classification issue, moving into Epic Fantasy. But, since what I’m doing here is the equivalent of sorting the wing dandruff of the Angels dancing on the head of a pin, the verdict I have to hand down is negative, despite there being no crime or affront of any kind.

Where does that leave Urban Fantasy in general? I’m afraid I cannot opine. I’m rather ignorant of the genre. I think my Karl Thorson series (of which more anon) might qualify as Semi-autos and Sorcery. But I may have to leave that to some future hair-splitting pundit to determine.

What do you think?

Let me leave you with a link to my Amazon Author page, since I’m pushy that way.

The Family Road Trip

Last Monday, I packed up MBW and the HA for a road trip. I pointed the vehicle east and we headed for Yellowstone. We decided to take the journey in two stages. I’ve done eighteen and twenty hour stretches, and we could have made the trip in, perhaps, fourteen hours. But I doubted the HA would tolerate it well. So we stopped Monday night at a hotel on the Oregon/Idaho border. The HA played in the pool. Next day, bright and early, we trekked on, reaching West Yellowstone in the afternoon.

That arrival time allowed us plenty of daylight to begin our exploration of the park. It is, as doubtless you know, a big place. We had three and a half days. Time enough for the highlights and a few of the lesser known attractions, but I can certainly see spending a week or two there, with an RV, bikes, and fishing poles, for those inclined toward camping and outdoor recreation.

It is an inspiring place. I’m already plotting scenes for an upcoming book. But enough with the words. How about some pictures? (And if you want to watch Old Faithful, I uploaded the video here.)

Flashing Swords #3. Pack Your Bags.

I have a number of well-worn anthologies on my shelves. It has been said that shorter fiction is the proper length for Swords-and-Sorcery. Maybe so. At least in an anthology the reader has access to multiple imagined worlds in a single volume instead of the single world of a novel. I thought I’d investigate this somewhat, revisiting these collections. And what better volume to start with than Flashing Swords #3?

The title of this volume is Warriors and Wizards, but I think a more accurate descriptor would be Fantastic Travelogues. Not a one of the authors herein limits the story to a single location. There are five authors herein, each providing a novella, apparently commissioned just for this collection. And it is a solid line up: L. Sprague de Camp, Fritz Leiber, Andre NOrton, Avram Davidson, and the editor himself, Lin Carter.

De Camp is first, and he sets the trend with a story that sees the protagonist crossing leagues, counties, duchies, and principalities in quest of the titular Two Yards of Dragon. Two yards of dragon hide, that is. It is de Camp, so you know what you’re getting. That may displease some. Not me. I’ve always enjoyed his style, like a droll professor sharing a beer with a favorite student, waxing loquacious upon a familiar topic. The topic may be important, but the professor’s first goal is to be an agreeable drinking companion. He’s never entirely serious. Even when de Camp is describing a harrowing action sequence, you know his tongue is stabbed deeply into his cheek. The travelogue style works well for de Camp, as he gets to establish and mock customs and laws of the various locales the protagonist and his Sancho Panza travel through. The protagonist is a knight, but this being de Camp, we don’t get a Quixote. Instead he is de Camp’s standard cynical, observant, wry, intelligent, and calculating hero. I, for one, was amused.

Fritz Leiber is next, with The Frost Monstreme. With this story, Leiber commences the coda to the Fafhrd and Gray Mouser tales. The two are on the verge of middle age, beginning to consider — or argue about — settling down. Becoming husbands, land owners, responsible citizens, etc. Now, there may be good S&S tales to be told about — well, about the life I’m leading now. But it may be that the subject matter is partly responsible for the fact that I find the Fafhrd and Gray Mouser stories from here on to be rather a let down. Not that this one is too bad. Again we have travel, but in truth, while many miles and sea-leagues are crossed, a description of  cold, icy seas is less than fantastic, though it does provide a good setting for the two heroes in their separate ships to clash, mislead by an old enemy and attacked by a new one. The new enemy, the ancient wizard/demi-god/alien, Khahkht, provides us with more capsule travelogue than do Fafhrd and Mouser. He travels about in a globe, within which sphere is a sort of inverted map of Nehwon. With this device, Leiber is able to remind us of the layout and cosmography of his world, in his glorious, arch style. It is a good story, but for me, it marks the end of an era, so re-reading it was somewhat bittersweet.

Andre Norton is next with a Witch World story. As I’ve written previously, I have little love for Witch World. This story does nothing to change that. I found it a chore, slogging through this rather dull tale of a hysterical blindness, weaving, and vague psychic power. Spider Silk sees travel from a boring fishing village to a relatively nearby forbidden island. Nothing is clearly described, since our POV character is blind. And nothing much happens. There isn’t much point in offering a spoiler warning, since there really is nothing to spoil, nothing a reader won’t figure out early on, perhaps from the title alone. Spider Silk is the dud of the bunch.

Next, Lin Carter adds a story to his own anthology. And with The Curious Custom of the Turjan Seraad we’re back traveling. That’s pretty much all we’re doing, flying down to an oasis, then joining a nomad caravan passing through the desert to pasture lands. This is little more than a shaggy dog story. Nothing really happens. But that isn’t the point of this story. The point is to play with words, with descriptions, scenery, etc., to closely approximate other descriptions, scenery, etc. that Lin Carter has read before. And he largely succeeds. Why? Because in writing a light, breezy tale, he keeps things light and breezy. This is supposed to be humorous, and it generally is. After the turgid Spider Silk, Curious Custom provides a palette cleanser. 

Which brings us to the final course.

Avram Davidson provides the best of the stories. Caravan to Illiel is travelogue as story. It is a master class in condensed world building. From the opening that describes the city of Styr so well that I’d like to read a novel set there, the story follows the hero Corydon, in his new role as caravan guard, through one interesting location and adventure after another, all the while putting the pieces in place for the conclusion of a story the reader might not have noticed was occurring under his nose. The sheer variety and imagination displayed in the places Corydon passes through shows what Sword and Sorcery is capable of. Davidson is a vastly underrated writer. His style is reminiscent of both Clark Ashton Smith and Jack Vance. I’d recommend Flashing Swords #3 on the strength of this story alone, with the others as bonuses of varying value.What are your thoughts, readers, on this volume? Let me know. And, if all this traveling about has tired you, why not read a book set in one place? (I need to remember to mention my own stuff here. Thus that less than clever segue.) Check out Thick As Thieves.

A Snippet

I thought I’d offer a change of pace this week. Something different from my usual blathering. I’m offering a snippet from my novel Thick As Thieves. I hope you get a kick out of it.

If you’re intrigued enough to want to read the rest, Thick As Thieves is available in print and digital formats here and here, and I suppose pretty much any other online store from which you chose to purchase your books. So, enough with the sales pitch. Here you go.

The guildsmen charged. The muleskinners fell back, but only to take up defensive positions alongside the wagons or between yoked mule teams. It soon became apparent that the red tunic coalition did not have a monopoly on weapons. Trader Vawn’s men produced cudgels of their own along with staves, whips, and knives. Brick wasn’t surprised. A caravan didn’t cross the vast, half-civilized expanses between settled areas of the Confederacy with unarmed teamsters. Not even a guarded caravan like this one. At least, no successful caravan did.

Brick heard a piercing whistle from Dahlia’s pursed lips: three short bursts and one long trill. It sounded like a signal. Sure enough, a moment later the mounted caravan guards urged their steeds into formation, forming a line at the rear of the wagons. So, not riding into the fight to support the teamsters. What then? Dahlia stood, blades at the ready, by the tavern entrance. Trader Vawn’s well-being assured. That left the other priority—the cargo of imports—in need of looking after. The guards wouldn’t involve themselves in the brawl unless it threatened to damage the shipment. Interfering in labor disputes did not appear to be on their list of responsibilities.

Neatly contained violence, an evening’s entertainment for the Highmark Street locals—at least until the Kalapo Horse Guard could be roused from their barracks on Ash Way, just south of Leyvan Town, and ride to quell the disturbance.

It didn’t look neat or contained to Brick. Maybe none of the combatants wore armor, and he saw no long blades catching the last light of the westering sun, but the two sides went at it in earnest. The rutted, hard-packed surface of the street was gouged and turned by hard-soled boots pushing and straining for grip. Blood began to moisten the churned dirt, as if part of some primitive plowing ceremony, a sacrifice to ensure the following year’s yield.

Then a flung cudgel—about a two-foot length of stout oak—whipped past Brick’s ear and shattered the slats of one of the tavern’s shutters. He heard someone yell “the fucking Shark is in the tavern.” And a group of red tunics detached from the scrum and came his way.

“Brick,” said Shib, peeking out from the ruins of the shutter, “take care of this, please.”

Right. From his relaxed position Brick pushed himself off the wall and straightened up. He’d often found that simply breathing deeply, expanding to his full dimensions, and stretching a bit could curtail violence before it began. It required a brave man to tackle someone his size. A brave man or a drunk man.

Or, as in this case, simply a whole bunch of men. There had to be a half-dozen of them, all in red tunics. Well, a range from maroon to crimson, Brick noted as they drew nearer.

He wondered if there was any compelling reason to side with the guildsmen instead of the trader’s teamsters, but couldn’t see it. He’d spent too much time looking for work after the army dismissed him to have much sympathy for a group of men who’d begrudge other men a job simply because they didn’t wear spiffy red tunics. The Clackmat Drayage and Cartage Guild hadn’t offered Brick work when he’d been desperately searching. So fuck ’em. He had his own job to do now.

Brick took a step forward to meet them, placing himself before the door, and feeling a certain comfort knowing that the Leyvan woman stood at his back with her sharpened steel. He didn’t care for the twinge in his leg, but he figured it wouldn’t give out right away, and once he got warmed up it shouldn’t trouble him.

“That’s far enough, boys,” he said, stretching out both arms as if blocking the way and—once again—swelling up, flexing his arms and the muscles of his back. He could hear the leather of his stupid black vest squeaking in protest. He recognized the posturing as a simple exercise in intimidation, but it worked sometimes and maybe in the waning light they hadn’t caught a good look at him the first time. If he could keep anyone from getting hurt then he considered that worth the risk of someone scoffing at his display.

It still didn’t work.

“Get the fuck out of the way, freak.” The leading red tunic reached out and prodded Brick—rather scornfully, Brick thought—in the midsection with the tip of his cudgel.

“Don’t,” said Brick. He felt the advance hints of the Fury, a faint haze of red specks at the edge of his vision. The jab with the club was insulting. And the tavern, and the safety of the people within was his responsibility. His job. He tried to keep anger at bay, though not in great earnest. He recognized the dangers of surrendering to rage, but he liked the Fury. It is what had made him a good soldier. It is what had allowed him to ignore fear—not dismiss it, not conquer it, but ignore it. It is what let him tear gaps in enemy positions, be the tip of a human wedge driving into a shield wall. He recognized the disadvantages in civilian life. Slipping the leash from impulse control could be a problem outside a war zone. So, he kept the Fury tightly reined in. But he missed it. And if this punk ass guildsman jabbed him again . . .

The punk ass guildsman jabbed him again.

The Quintessence of S&S

If I were to distill the elements of Swords-and-Sorcery to their essence, what story would I find pooled at the bottom of the alembic?

To answer such a question, I’d first have to gather the elements. It requires a confident man or an arrogant fool to think he knows what those elements are. Let’s take a collective leap and pretend I’m not a fool. Moving forward, let’s see if we can glean the fundamental components of S&S.

One is scale. The stakes cannot be too high. If, within the fiction, the matter to be resolved by the protagonist is consequential to vast numbers, even world-shaking, then it is by definition epic. Epic Fantasy may be kin to S&S, but it is another creature. What the S&S hero hopes to accomplish should be personal, or at least the effects on the page must be largely limited to the hero, without dwelling on the outcome for those suffering any collateral impact.

Two is immediacy. The hero is directly involved in the action. Not merely a guiding hand. He may be a cat’s paw, but the results of the events will depend on his sword, his choices, his activity. If an S&S hero is a general, he’ll at some point lead from the front.

Three is horror. That ingredient might cause a raised eyebrow among some of you. But I believe horror is always an element in S&S, even if it is only subtle or inferential. Consider it baked into the very name given the genre. “Sorcery.” There is something elementary horrific within the supernatural. The unknown, the uncontrolled, the unnatural. A horripilation at the back of the neck that you may barely notice. This is distinct from “magical.” A narrow distinction, perhaps, but real.

Four is excitement. S&S is an action genre. Cozy Swords-and-Sorcery is a contradiction in terms. The reader expects fights, suspense, daring. Obvious enough, given the word “Swords” right there on the label.

Five is magic. There must be some element of the unreal, something to distinguish the tale from historical fiction, from the rousing tales of Dumas or Sabatini. It can be as simple as the McGuffin of the story, or be embodied in the antagonist.

Five is a good number. We’ll stop there, with Five elements of S&S. Set these over the fire and distill them down to a potent essence, what do we get?

The Tower of the Elephant gleams at us from the alembic, dangerous, fiery, and intoxicating, direct from Robert E. Howard’s alchemical Underwood.

Prove it? Well, I’ll try.

The scale remains small. This is a story that commences almost as a bar bet, though involving Conan, it is a bit more violent than that, and also concerns the clash of the “civilized” and the barbarian. If a story begins in a tavern, or drinking and feasting, that’s a clue you might be reading S&S. (Baldor, son of Brego swearing a drunken oath to take the Dimholt road, is the commencement of an S&S story we never got to read.) The point is, at its simplest, Elephant is the story of a burglary, undertaken by a man goaded into the act by pride and ego. There is nothing epic about that. But it is more than enough to get the wheels turning.

Conan is the instigator of all that follows. He is immediately involved in all that occurs. He decides to scale the wall, to link up with Taurus of Nemedia, to climb the tower. He chooses to accede to the request of Yara.

Yara is himself both a figure of pity and of horror. Not only of horror, but of horror harkening to the Lovecraftian branch of horror. A cosmic being from the depths of space, inhuman. Though Howard offers a creature we can comprehend, bringing a touch of humanity that Lovecraft might have disdained.

The story up to the introduction of Yara is a feast of action, one moment of suspense, combat, and daring-do after another, starting with a tavern fight, then going to include a lion-attack, scaling a jeweled tower, and fighting a giant, poisonous arachnid. 

The culmination of the story employs the McGuffin directly, the Elephant’s Heart, providing a memorable and satisfying magical conclusion.

There. I’ve laid forth my proof. Is The Tower of the Elephant the quintessence of Swords-and-Sorcery? What say you?

If you enjoy two-fisted fabulism, check out my work. You can find much of it here, as well as from other vendors. 

Belly Up to the Bar

What are the best taverns in fantasy? Where do you imagine yourself sipping a pint in rather unusual company? The genre is full of these joints, though most, sadly, go nameless. Of course, some of these you’d probably just as soon avoid, like a den of merriment in Arenjun’s Maul, in Zamora.

Some spring immediately to mind: Gavagans and Callahan’s, for example. Why limit ourselves to secondary worlds? What’s wrong with our own, shifted a degree or two in some unfathomable dimension? I wouldn’t mind stopping by McAnally’s pub for a glass or two.

Perhaps the popular choice (and for good reason) is the Prancing Pony, Barliman Butterbur, Prop. This is a place you’d be likely to hang out simply because it is pleasant and welcoming. I imagine it would take at least one visit to get used to the hobbits, constantly having to remind yourself that they are all, in fact, old enough to drink.

The Vulgar Unicorn is likely another popular choice, but I believe that’s mostly due to name recognition. Would you really want to drink there? Some of the patrons seem all right, but others, including the bartender missing a digit, are as likely to slit your throat as sit down and swap stories.

The Silver Eel might be a better bet, though I’d recommend sitting close to an exit, prepared to leave if events show sign of getting too interesting. But if danger doesn’t threaten, you might be in for an entertaining evening.

Morley Dote’s Joy House (or whatever name it’s doing business as at the moment) is another possibility. The neighborhood might be a bit iffy at times, but inside you’re relatively safe. You might want to eat first, however, unless you’re content with vegetarian cuisine.

The list goes on. Giacomo’s Wine Shop is one of my contributions, playing a role in the Cesar the Bravo stories (and novel in progress.) Not that I’d want to go there. The place is a dingy dive. The point is, fictional taverns could make up a sizable town of their own. (Wouldn’t that be a sight?) What’s your favorite fantasy watering hole?

A (Un)Real American Hero

Who is the most American of fantasy heroes? I ignited enough fireworks yesterday in the course of Independence Day festivities to get me feeling good and patriotic. And as a patriotic writer of fabulism, it should come as little surprise that the opening question occurred to me.

The British Isles have produced abundant fantasy heroes, but this is a search for the red-blooded American hero. So no Aragorns. No haughty Elrics. Who have we got in the running?

Conan is not himself an American, of course. But he displays the individualistic rebelliousness that marks the character of the true American. He’s been a frontiersman, a soldier. He’s turned his hand to unsavory work from time to time, as have any number of America’s early heroes. But then, there’s that whole kingship business. That might put him out of the running.

John Carter is a candidate. A Virginian gentleman, a prospector, a soldier. The narrowness of his geographic and class background might not make him an excellent fit as a nationwide exemplar, however. And he seems more than content to leave his old country, not to mention planet, behind. Call him a maybe.

Turning the clock back about a half-century, we’ve got Hank Morgan, from Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. He’s got that Yankee ingenuity, work ethic, entrepreneurial spirit, and holds fast to American values even while working for a monarchy. Unfortunately, Hank Morgan may not be that well known. After all, he only got one book.

I’d like to offer up Karl Thorson, from my Karl Thorson and the Jade Dagger. But, if Hank Morgan is unknown, at this point Karl Thorson is a nonentity. He needs to get more eyeballs on the page before he can throw his hat in the ring. Besides, at this point there remains only one book. So, let’s move along.

Karl Cullinane from the Guardians of the Flame series is a candidate. But that is more of an ensemble work, and I don’t like to remember what Joel Rosenberg did to Karl. Moving along, then.

Garrett, from Glen Cook’s Garrett Files is a possibility. He is, after all, somewhat of a portmanteau character, combining aspects of many of the greats of America’s hardboiled detectives. A strong contender.

But I think, after due consideration, that the most American of fantasy heroes has to be Harry Dresden, Jim Butcher’s wizard and detective. He’s an entrepreneur, running his own detective business. (There’s that detective angle again. Very American and distinct from the British variety.) He consumes Coca-cola and fast food. He’s got a rebellious streak as wide as the Mississippi. He’s quite comfortable deploying a shotgun or bigass hand cannon when the situation requires it. He exhibits that characteristic American egalitarianism when confronting those who feel themselves to be superior by right of birth. And he is, after all, an American.

I think we have a winner. But what do you think?

A Trip to The Dalles

Only a fence and the Columbia River separate me from the State of Washington

I took MBW and the HA for an excursion yesterday. We needed to shake the rust off and see new horizons. So, skirting south of Mt. Hood, then along its eastern flanks for a while, until we cut due east through a national forest, winding along a narrow road, then north to the Columbia River at The Dalles.

We put in an hour and a half at the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center & Museum. The HA was engaged, wanting desperately to show us everything that she was looking at, and involved in finding all the items pictured on the list she was given. We had the place mostly to ourselves. The establishment is partly a Natural History Museum and partly a traditional Historical Museum. I always like to pick up more bits and pieces of the past. One of my favorite exhibits was simply a list of all the saloons extant in Wasco County at a certain period. There’s some illustrative detail for you.

Among other things, I learned that during the Oregon gold rush days, the US intended to build a Mint in the Dalles. But the US Civil War put an end to the project.

After the museum, it was time for lunch. At a brewpub, naturally. Walking into Freebridge Brewing, I noticed a plaque indicating that the building was originally intended as a US Mint. How about that? The beer was solid, though — most unusually for me — I recommend the lager.

Proof positive that masks don’t work.



I recommend the lager.

After lunch, we drove out to visit the dam and fish ladders. Closed. Sigh. At least we got to enjoy the east-of-the-Cascades sun, as well as the justly famous Gorge wind. Somehow I did not lose my hat.

Government.