Sword & Sorcery: "An earthier sort of fantasy" discussion
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Free Kindle Books in the Sword & Sorcery category on Amazon
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Amazon Sword and Sorcery results are extremely inaccurate and not commonly understood as verbatim. Not even close. Sword and Sorcery is not Fantasy. It's also certainly not Paranormal Fantasy. Or Urban Fantasy.
A better defintion though I personally don't like the name itself would best be described as Heroic Fantasy. Stuff like Conan, Elric, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, are the best examples.
It's not just some guy or gal waving a sword on the cover.
Many modern incarnations of S&S that have carried the torch also fit the bill. These exceptions clearly have many of the trademark elements of Sword and Sorcery but are not considered 'true' Sword and Sorcery: Sword and Planet fiction, Grimdark, Sword & Soul (decidedly the first example being Imaro by Charles R. Saunders), Dungeons & Dragons' Forgotten Realms, World of Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Eberron, Pathfinder, etc., of which btw a vast number of these titles are written by the same authors known for true S&S and the close sub-genres I listed. Even Historical-fiction without apparent fantastical or supernatural elements like Harold Lamb's work fits perfectly under the umbrella of S&S due to the work of the original master of Sword and Sorcery, Robert E. Howard, who wrote heroic Historical-fiction throughout his entire career which exemplified most of the exact elements, principles, style and essence of his Sword and Sorcery.
It is a promotion. Your posts go to a blog for readers who want free or discounted books trafficking lots of views and downloads; Books not catered to the specific defined readership of members signed up for the Sword & Sorcery group. The tag after the group name, "An earthier sort of Fantasy", helps further define the meaning of Sword & Sorcery right in the topical title name itself.
Further, this particular page has the word Promotions right in the beginning of the title. What else would you call posts going to your blog (or maybe it's a friends? or maybe it's a job given to you by Amazon?) anything other than a promotion? I have been to the blog dozens of times. If you were catering it towards Sword & Sorcery dozens and dozens of 'true' S&S books I have seen fall under the genre and relatable subgenres available on Amazon for $0.00 were never posted or even mentioned on your site. And obviously the 4 days between posts were clearly because the Fantasy books listed are usually only available for free for a 2 or 3 day period of time. That was never misunderstood or in question.
I'm not hating on you, Randy. There are many Fantasy discussion boards on Goodreads where these free and discounted books could be posted appropriately. And cater to the readership of said boards.
And why it bothers me in the first place is because there are not that many members in the first place and even less posts by participating members and when 1 out of 7 posts on the entire discussion board is you and your topically unrelated promotional blog postings it gets annoying after awhile. That doesn't make sense to you?
S.E. wrote: "No worries folks. Even though the free listing isnt perfect, there was a handful of members who enjoy it. So Randy is welcome to keep sharing. I think the headline even says Fantasy now instead od ..."Well I don't like it. And I'm right and I'm entitled to my own opinion on the matter. You're too nice, Seth. These posts have never had any S&S titles. And it's not under Fantasy. There are plenty of boards for that. If you had a Paranormal Fantasy board and somebody every 4 days was posting S&S only on the board and almost no other input otherwise it would be immediately removed. But you're the moderator so I will bite my lip from here on out. 'scool. 'Nuff said.
S.E. wrote: " I think the headline even says Fantasy now instead od S&S"Actually, the reason it's there is that I do the "Fantasy" category on one of my days, and Amazon lists "Sword and Sorcery" as a sub-category of "Fantasy". The exact Amazon hierarchy is:
Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Sword & Sorcery
Richard wrote: "@The Joy of EruditionWhat a
..."
Thanks, Richard. That's why I responded to Randy and to 'Joy' as I did. Otherwise I would have just left it alone. As I said in the first place to Randy I'm not hating on him and as I said to Seth I have a right to my opinion. We aren't being run by commies or socialists just yet, are we? And further, I voiced my reasons for bringing it up in the first place. I shouldn't be scared like so many others are to point out or bring attention to things out-of-place, and am direct only when I need to be (which is not very often as many of you already know regardless of my last name) and held my tongue for months already being aware of the controversy any voicing of my thoughts would surely entail. It would probably still have gone unmentioned if it weren't for the fact that more often than 1 out of every 10 times the posts I was seeing were unrelated to this cool board. My favorite board btw and the only one I occasionally make comments on or participate in. I have been on GR for 13 years (2 longer than my profile states) and I am an active goodreads librarian who has added thousands of books including hundreds of S&S/S&P books, entered & updated thousands of books relating to the genre including even ones over a handful of readers in this very group are reading as we speak, that weren't there even a day, a week, or a month ago. And still treated like a monkey's uncle when bringing up something I find tiresome and annoying but inevitably necessary as far as I am concerned. A quarter of the books this group are reading wouldn't even be there or have half the meta data info to reference to if it weren't for my input. So the message should have been clear from the get-go: If anyone knows what they're talking about on an S&S discussion board or on GR in general it would certainly be me. None of you know S&S like I do though I never display this because I enjoy reading what everyone else has to say about the books they're reading and the genre itself or books related. And this will be the last time I brag about it.
Mod
This list/thread was never meant to define the S&S genre
It is okayed by the moderators since it:
(a) uses S&S search terms via Amazon
(b) some folks find it useful
(c) it is easy to ignore if someone is not interested
Also, anyone who has a better solution (ie searching Amazon for potentially-relevant, free books), you are welcome to share.
I've started deleting posts that did not contribute to a healthy discussion, which I hate to do.
There is no reason, ever, to get personal.
Be civil (per our group's mantra).
Contact a moderator if necessary.
Randy wrote: "All I'm doing is extracting search results from the various categories. It's the authors that decide which categories their books get listed under. The Amazon "Sword and Sorcery" category search re..."I actually really enjoy you posting this list and I've found many fantasy books I wouldn't have discovered with my own searches. I don't read Paranormal or Urban fantasy so I skip right over those but I always go through the rest and pick out the ones which pique my interest. So, thanks for posting this every week!
Newly Free Fantasy Kindle Book Listings for 2022-03-14:http://ogres-crypt.com/Kindle/Free-Fa...
Happy Pi day!
Randy wrote: "Newly Free Fantasy Kindle Book Listings for 2022-03-14:
http://ogres-crypt.com/Kindle/Free-Fa...
Happy Pi day!"
I found 5 books today, thanks for your hard work. Also happy nap day.
http://ogres-crypt.com/Kindle/Free-Fa...
Happy Pi day!"
I found 5 books today, thanks for your hard work. Also happy nap day.
A must-have for any true Sword & Sorcery/Sword and Planet fan FREE on Kindle (& Kindle Unlimited) right now:Black Dust and other stories by Steve Dilks
*btw I uncharacteristically probably annoyed the shi† outta Steve when I contacted him a few years ago noticing the (preview) Paperback I had wanted since first released was no longer being sold on Amazon nor by Steve direct, all but holding him at swordpoint to obtain a copy -- yeah, Steve, that was me! sorry swordbrother!
🙇🗡️🙋
**Good news is it's back in better print and full of gold, jewels, gems and diamond dust!
Would any of you knaves here like a free copy of Savage Realms Monthly? Tap the magically glowing runes to be instantly transported to our lair to find out how. Be warned, once you begin reading you may not be able to stop!https://m.facebook.com/story.php?stor...
Sword & Sorcery: "An earthier sort of fantasy"
Books mentioned in this topic
Black Dust and other stories (other topics)Imaro I: The Epic Novel of a Jungle Hero (other topics)
Jungle Tales of Tarzan (other topics)
Fen and the Every Path (other topics)
Fen and the Every Path (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Steve Dilks (other topics)Charles R. Saunders (other topics)
Harold Lamb (other topics)
https://www.amazon.com/s?rh=n%3A68094...
It's easy enough for me to take this board off my posting list if no one is interested. I'm just sharing something I create for my own use. Not sure how that qualifies as a promotion or waving my flag...?
BTW, one reason for the 4-day posting schedule is that many books are only free for 2 or 3 days at a time.