Joseph’s Comments (group member since Oct 24, 2012)

Joseph’s comments from the Sword & Sorcery: "An earthier sort of fantasy" group.

Yeah, Children of Huron is Tolkien at his grimdarkest.

Have we done Leiber yet?

Over the weekend I reread D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths for the first time in probably 30+ years -- not actually sword & sorcery, but my first introduction to some of the myths that underlay sword & sorcery.

And now I've started Scott Lynch's The Lies of Locke Lamora, which bids fair to be kind of a sword & sorcery caper book. Only partway through the first chapter, but enjoying it immensely.

I'm currently about a third of the way through Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures by Robert E. Howard, which is unsurprisingly excellent. I might try to get to something by Gemmel in the near future, but I have so very, very, very many other books in my queue ...

I'm not reading it currently. I did read it a few years back (my first and, thus far only, Gemmel) and enjoyed it well enough; then I got distracted before continuing on with the series.

Decided it was time for a drop o' the pure, so I just started Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures by Robert E. Howard.

Lansdale is great -- I highly recommend the Hap & Leonard series of books, and the TV series.

Starting another anthology which I think will be more S&S -- Women in Practical Armor.

(Relatedly, am I the only one who keeps backing books & magazines & anthologies on Kickstarter and almost never gets around to actually reading them?)

Nope, no sorcery (unless you count Zatoichi's fighting ability). It's a lengthy series of historical samurai (or maybe ronin?) films set in 1840s Japan. Zatoichi is a blind wanderer, once a fighter who now makes his living as a masseuse, but just because he's blind doesn't mean he can't cut up a whole passel of bandits if the occasion requires ...

Just got done watching Zatoichi and the Chest of Gold (number 6 in the series, I think?), and this seems like another very S&S-feeling series of movies -- Zatoichi is a kind of down-on-his-luck wanderer and in every episode he shows up someplace and gets caught up in events. In Chest of Gold, there's a complicated plot involving a village, a group of bandits, and some local officials, and a big chest containing the village's tax payment, which everybody is trying to lay hands on.

Definite inspirational viewing ...

Phil wrote: "I'll definitely follow up! I'm not sure I've ever seen an editor include his own stories in an anthology before, that does seem a bit odd."

I call it the Lin Carter effect.

Well, the boundaries are always fuzzy. But I'd say this is sword & planet:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmlSN...

And this is sword & sorcery:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_5F1...

Post-apocalyptic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhAob...

And portal fantasy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JjhQ...

My TBR list is every book ever written that looks interesting, whether I've read them before or not ...

But to focus in a bit, I have one more of the Del Rey Robert E. Howard books to read (Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures), several Bison Harold Lamb collections (Swords of the Steppes: The Complete Cossack Adventures, Volume Four is up next), and I also need to revisit all of the Kane books sooner rather than later.

Howie wrote: "Well,I am new here and still trying to figure all of this out. I was talking with a couple of guys (Jack and Joseph I think) about discussing Swordsmen in the Sky. Is anyone reading this?"

Sadly, I'm not reading it at the moment -- I'm pretty sure I read it, but it was some years ago. Having said that, don't let that stop you! Even for the more focused group reads, most (all?) of us just kind of pick something that strikes our fancy, then throw out comments which often lead to some great discussion (and may convince other folks to pick up the same book).

Howie wrote: "Jack wrote: "Starting to read Swordsmen in the Sky, which, based on the title, should be a good Sword & Planet collection. Stories by Poul Anderson, Edmond Hamilton, Leigh Brackett, ..."

I know I have that one and am pretty sure I read it at some point.

Has there ever been a collection of Poul Anderson's old sword & sorcery/sword & planet stuff? I keep finding it in these anthologies, but that's about it.

S.E. wrote: "Joseph, I admit to failing to finish the The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath three times. Part of me is driven to learn more about Pickman's ghouls (Pickman's Model) who appear again.... but this is the only Lovecraft work I can't finish. I didn't know about the "missing women" perspective until your post here. I will look into The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe . Thx for sharing. ..."

TBH, I didn't know about the "missing women" problem either, until I started seeing some articles when Vellitt Boe was coming out. And now at some point I want to go back and reread Kadath, just to confirm.

FWIW, I think Vellitt Boe would work perfectly well as a standalone story even if you're not familiar with the original.

Michael wrote: "Yes he did a Tarzan novel that is part of the canon and authorized by Burroughs heirs. I have it but have not read it yet. It is named Tarzan's Lost Adventure and was based on an incomplete fragmen..."

And I think Hap & Leonard are definitely spiritual kin to Fafrhd & the Gray Mouser.

Michael wrote: "Check out other books by Joe R Lansdale as well if you haven't read any yet. The Bottoms, Edge of Dark Water, The Thicket are all 5 star books in my opinion. I watched the first season of Hap and Leonard and bought "Savage Season" as well but haven't started it yet."

I read a bunch of Lansdale (including the first four or five Hap & Leonard books) about 15-20 years ago when I first discovered him. Yeah, he's great. Mostly he's more what I'd call genre-adjacent, writing crime & suspense stuff, but he's done some straight-up horror and at least a few books that kind of straddle the line between horror & fantasy -- The Drive-In series, for example, or Zeppelins West. And didn't he do a Tarzan novel?

And I finished The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe (Kij Johnson's response to Lovecraft's Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath) and saw the trailer for the second season of Hap & Leonard, which led me to Joe R. Lansdale's Savage Season, and probably several of its sequels.

Finished Fearsome Magics, which was really good but not very S&S (with the arguable exception of the Garth Nix story, "Home is the Haunter").

I might try a different one, but first I need to read some 2016-published novellas for my Hugo voting.