Sword & Planet Thread

[Periklis, Fafhrd (Emeritus)]

From a discussion started in the Introductions thread, regarding Sword & Planet books:



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[Charles]

Book six of Lin Carter's "Callisto" series is called Lankar of Callisto. In it, Carter himself becomes a character who is drawn to Callisto.

[[deleted user]]

Is it as hilarious as it sounds? :P

[Charles]

Unfortunately, not.

[Joseph, Master Ultan]

For my money, Sword & Planet was never done better than Barsoom, especially The Gods of Mars, The Chessmen of Mars and A Fighting Man of Mars. (I linked to the editions I first read them in.)

Although I say that with the Haffner Press Leigh Brackett collections sitting unread on my shelf ...

[J.W.]

I will second Barsoom.....

[Charles]

Barsoom, of course. But I have liked a lot of the Dray Prescot series of books as well. The Llarn books by Gardner Fox were good. Swordsmen in the Sky is an anthology of great S & P short stories. I grew up reading this stuff and it was a major influence on my Talera series of books.

[Randy]

I really liked the first 3 Barsoom books, but when the writer's perspective changed, I wasn't nearly as fond of the series.

Love Dray Prescot.

I did like the first few Gor novels, but they got unreadable later on. I'd find myself skimming whole sections of the book just to get back to some S&S action (instead of S&M).

Also enjoyed Mike Sirota's Reglathium series.

And, of course, Fritz Leiber, Michael Moorcock, Karl Edward Wagner, Jose Farmer, and anything Conan.

[Charles]

Farmer did a really good series, the World of Tiers series.

[J.W.]

I agree about the Gor novels..... started off so good... and degenerated

[Joseph, Master Ultan]

I do have a bunch of Prescot books sitting on the shelf also ... I tried Gor once, but even the first book just didn't grab me.

Hmmm ... As I'm thinking about it now, I'm also wondering if some of Tanith Lee's early novels might be classified as S&P -- I'm thinking specifically of The Birthgrave (which ends with (view spoiler)[our heroine actually psychically summoning a spacecraft down from orbit (hide spoiler)] or The Storm Lord.

And also maybe some C.J. Cherryh -- the Morgaine books most obviously, but also some of her early SF like Brothers of Earth and Hunter of Worlds (Human Rebellion, #2).

[S.wagenaar]

Any thoughts on the Richard Blade series by Jeffery Lord? I have not read any, but it was a long running series, sort of S&P/S&S.

[Charles]

Quite a few of the Richard Blade series is S & P. I've read probably a dozen or so and enjoyed them. None of them really stand out in my mind, though. And the endings to that series often seem rather rushed to me. Many of the Blade books are also much more SF than S & P.

[Charles]

As for the Gor books, the first one, Tarnsman of Gor, is not the best. My favorites were Nomads of Gor and Marauders of Gor. Most of the first ten, outside of Hunters of Gor, were readable.

[Randy]

Charles wrote: "Quite a few of the Richard Blade series is S & P."

I enjoyed those...

[Sean]

I read the first Gor book and thought it was good. I've been meaning to check out the next one.

[Aaron]

Made it through the first three Gor books so far and they are ok. Nothing to jump up and down about. But I am determined to finish the whole series so hopefully by next year ...

[Charles]

You know there's like 25 books plus in that series by now eh?

[Aaron]

LOL yeah I know. I am determined though. Considering all the variances of opinions about the series, I just got to read it for myself. And with all the new authors and stacks of books already at hand it will be difficult no doubt.

[Jsnows]

Barsoom is a must however I'm surprised nobody mentioned the Darkover books.

[Charles]

The Darkover series seems pretty mixed. Some are really pretty much SF. Many have a more Sword & sorcery feel to me than Sword and Planet, even though the setting would suggest S & P.

[Joseph, Master Ultan]

Charles wrote: "The Darkover series seems pretty mixed. Some are really pretty much SF. Many have a more Sword & sorcery feel to me than Sword and Planet, even though the setting would suggest S & P."

It's interesting that we had three distinct series (Darkover, Witch World and, to a lesser degree, Pern) that were all going at the same time and that were all kind of playing in that intersection between fantasy, sword & planet and SF.

[Charles]

I read Darkover and Especially Witch World, although only one of the Pern books. Witch world was definitely a n interesting series. I enjoyed it a lot. The first one seemed very close to S & P, but with something of a different feel.

[S.wagenaar]

I just picked-up a copy of Witch World at a used book sale on a whim, as I have never read any. I look forward to giving it a go, and it looks right on my S&S/fantasy shelf!

[Thomas]

I think I read most of the Gor books...picked them up at the swap meet when I was a teen. They do kind of went downhill once John Norman established his formula.

I never could get into the Darkover books. Pern knocked things out of the park for me. I have yet to try Witch World.

[Randy]

Thomas wrote: "They do kind of went downhill once John Norman established his formula."

I heard the issue was that his editor finally stopped reining him in.

Loved the first 3 books. Liked the next 3 or 4. Then started disliking the series. I finally gave up around #11 or so. Too much skimming of the BDSM content to get to the smaller and smaller amount of S&S content.