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

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

Steve -- Yes, I actually picked up both of those after they were mentioned in an article on www.blackgate.com but (story of my life) I haven't read them yet.

Howard -- Those were Jessica Amanda Salmonson anthologies, weren't they? She did a bunch, I think.

S.E. -- Happy to hear about the bookshelves; I'll just be patient and see what happens then.

Love those two Pitch-Black anthologies -- that was actually where I first read a Harold Lamb story and recognized what I've been missing. And I have the RBE anthologies, but sadly I haven't had a chance to read them yet.

I liked Swords & Dark Magic quite a bit, and also The Sword & Sorcery Anthology, although I think both of those generated a certain amount of ... discussion? ... regarding the stories & authors they included.

Swords of Fire is a new one to me -- I'll have to check it out.

(Unfortunately, I don't think most of us can add to the bookshelf because I think it's set to moderator only.)

This may be of interest:

http://news.discovery.com/history/how...

Several of us (myself included) have mentioned various S&S anthologies, either as gateway drugs into the genre, or just as a source of good reading, so I thought I'd start a thread where we could discuss them in more detail. To get things started, here's a very, very incomplete list of some of the ones I'm aware of:

Swords and Sorcery, The Spell of Seven, The Fantastic Swordsmen, Warlocks and Warriors, all edited by L. Sprague de Camp. I think these were some of the earliest attempts to collect (and, by collecting, define) sword & sorcery fiction in particular.

The Mighty Barbarians and The Mighty Swordsmen, edited by Hans Stefan Santesson. Another set of reprint anthologies, these from 1969-1970. I believe there's lots of overlap with the de Camp anthologies in included authors if not specific stories.

Flashing Swords! #1 (first of five), all edited by Lin Carter. A series of anthologies collecting brand new S&S stories, with a mix of established & new authors ranging from Michael Moorcock to C.J. Cherryh, amongst others. Generally longer stories, with only 4-5 per volume.

Swords Against Darkness (first of five). Another series of anthologies, these edited by Andrew J. Offutt. I admit I haven't read all of these, but they seem to contain shorter fiction than the Flashing Swords books; I believe they were primarily original, but may have included some reprints as well.

Heroic Fantasy, edited by Gerald W. Page. This is an interesting one, I think -- the stories are all original, it includes contributions by Tanith Lee, Charles Saunders and Darrell Schweitzer, amongst others, and also includes brief essays on swords, armor and heroism.

Echoes of Valor (first of three), edited by Karl Edward Wagner. Another reprint anthology, this time including 3-4 authors per volume, ranging from the Usual Suspects ( Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber) to some more obscure choices Henry Kuttner, Nictzin Dyalhis (my vote for the best S&S author name ever). Not strictly sword & sorcery stories, but aimed at preserving gems from the pulp era.

And that, of course, is just the tiniest tip of the iceberg. Which ones am I leaving out? Which ones should we all be trying to lay our hands on?

Periklis wrote: "I really liked the Kröd Mändoon pilot. Also, you might like Korgoth of Barbaria."

Thanks for pointing that out. I vaguely remember hearing about Korgoth back in, I suppose it would've been 2005 or thereabouts, but then it dropped off my radar. The episode was kind of amusing, but I'm also not too surprised it didn't get picked up.

I'm not saying it's a good sword & sorcery film, but I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Beastmaster yet. It was another of my formative films back in the day.

S.E. wrote: "Buying old books with awesome covers is therapeutic ... or so I tell myself... is there a mental-health/help section in the group yet?"

If you're looking for a group of people who will tell you not to buy another copy of Stormbringer just because of the Whelan cover, you may be in the wrong place. If you're looking for a group of people who will support your decision, however, I think we can probably help you there.

It's a total parody, but I have a great fondness for
Kröd Mändoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire .

And a great fondness for Thundarr the Barbarian, come to think of it.

I'm Joe. I'm a reader, not a writer, although I do find the writing process fascinating. I've been reading fantasy and SF in various incarnations pretty much since I pulled a copy of The White Mountains off the shelf in the elementary school library.

For me the gateway drug into S&S in particular (and a whole lot of other excellent stuff) was probably some of the Lin Carter-edited anthologies -- Kingdoms of Sorcery and Realms Of Wizardry in particular. Plus Burroughs' Barsoom books and lots of Moorcock's Eternal Champion books. And the "recommended reading" list at the back of the 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide.


Always looking for new (to me, at least) books and always happy to find people to talk about them with.

Although I had picked up some of his books over the years previously, everything I actually know about Lamb came from The Curved Saber put together by Howard Andrew Jones who is, I believe, a member here, when he was editing the Bison Press collections. I highly recommend the site. (And I highly recommend Lamb as well.)

Bill wrote: "And Joseph, you can never go wrong with Howard or Lamb!"

Nope! In fact, I just started Warriors of the Steppes: The Complete Cossack Adventures, Volume Two.

Phil wrote: "My first encounter with Elric (and sword & sorcery in general) was with Robert Gould's excellent cover artwork. They're not as dynamic as Whelan's or the work of Frazetta, but they have a cryptic i..."

My paperback Elrics are the Berkley editions with the Gould artwork, and I do like them quite a bit.

Another of my favorite S&S artists is Roy G. Krenkel -- I have his Cities & Scenes From The Ancient World and Swordsmen and Saurians. Nobody did ancient cities like him.

http://www.bpib.com/illustra2/krenkel...

I'd also add the Michael Whelan Elric covers:

Periklis wrote: "You'll definitely enjoy "Legend". I'm a bit intimidated by the lengthy Drenai series myself, but I'm planning to ignore continuity and read "White Wolf" next."

I did enjoy Legend but decided to go in a completely different direction afterwards --Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan. But after that I was thinking maybe it was time to move onto the next Del Rey Robert E. Howard volume, or maybe even Harold Lamb.

It might be stretching the definition of S&S a bit, but Morgaine and Vanye from C.J. Cherryh's The Morgaine Saga.

And (because it's a pick in the Fantasy Book Club this month) I just started David Gemmell's Legend, which has been sitting on my shelf for rather a long time. Not sure if I'll continue on with the series right away (there are a lot of books) but I'm enjoying it thus far.

(And Periklis, I'm officially jealous that you got the ARC for Bones of the Old Ones. As some consolation, though, I'm getting a free autographed copy of Knife Sworn from Mazarkis Williams thanks to a Facebook post.)

Michael wrote: "@Joseph - do you like Shadow Prowler - I have a copy of it here (received from World Fantasy iirc) but haven't started it."

I enjoyed it and am proceeding with the rest of the trilogy. The first-person narration is engaging and I think that you get enough of the Russian original leaking through that it doesn't feel completely generic.

Having said that, if you do eBooks and you want to check it out without making quite so much of a commitment, I'd recommend the first story in A Pehov Duet, which is a standalone although it's told by the trilogy's narrator, and will give you a good sense of Pehov's style (as interpreted by the translator).

All of these had really great discussions and did damage to my wallet.

I'm most of the way through Shadow Prowler by Alexey Pehov, which I'd say definitely has sword & sorcery influences (by way of D&D).