2001: A Space Odyssey, a review

Warning: Spoilers

Our species has come a long way in what amounts to a relative eyeblink of history. From apes quarreling in the dirt over scraps of food we’ve progressed to feudal monarchies to our present democracies. From bone tools we invented firearms and the printing press, and now enjoy incredible computing power and life-saving drugs and surgical equipment.

But some things haven’t changed a lot. Humanity continues to remain stagnant physically. Our houses of flesh still chain us to the earth. Although our life spans have increased and we’ve eradicated many diseases, bright minds old and young are snuffed out every day by untimely heart attacks and strokes. We’re also limited by many of our old prejudices and warlike tendencies. While the threat of the cold war and mutual nuclear annihilation has passed, national security is still a grave concern, as the threat of international terrorism and the proliferation of nuclear weapons and dirty bombs into the hands of volatile countries are existential threats to our survival.

Dystopias like Blade Runner and 1984 argue that things may get much worse, not better, for humanity. But not according to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Stanley Kubrick’s film expresses the hope that one day we will evolve beyond our physical and societal handicaps, and will either come face to face with God or achieve a form of technological singularity (depending on your beliefs).

Enjoying the Unique Character of Karl Edward Wagner’s Dark Crusade

Why has swords and sorcery languished while epic fantasy enjoys a wide readership? In an age of diminished attention spans and the proliferation of Twitter and video games, it’s hard to explain why ponderous five and seven and 12 book series dominate fantasy fiction while lean and mean sword-and-sorcery short stories and novels struggle to find markets (Black Gate and a few other outlets excepted).

During a recent reading of the late Karl Edward Wagner’s Dark Crusade (1976) a potential answer coalesced: Many readers want and expect deep characterization in their fiction, and it’s simply not a particularly strong suit of the sword-and-sorcery genre (or at least of classic sword-and-sorcery, circa 1930 through the early 1980s). Wagner is one of a handful of classic sword-and-sorcery authors to whom history has not been particularly kind*. His dark, God-accursed hero-villain Kane deserves a place alongside Conan or Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser in the roll of great genre heroes, but is sadly left off many “best of” sword-and-sorcery lists. Relegated to the status of cult figure, Kane is the darling of heroic fantasy connoisseurs but unread of by many casual genre fans, and unheard of by most of the larger fantasy fan base.

Kane and many of his sword-and-sorcery ilk are not what most modern readers would consider fully realized characters. You just don’t get anything close to the same level of introspection and cradle to the grave development of Kane in Dark Crusade as you do of, say, Kvothe in Patrick Rothfuss’ The Name of the Wind.

To read the rest of this post, visit The Black Gate website.

What I've read so far this year

As I stated before I set out to read a book a week in 2011. It's a pretty modest goal, but I'm not the fastest reader ever and have many competing interests for my time. But I'm happy to say that I'm on pace to meet that goal, with 49 titles read through 48 weeks. Here's the list (including my ratings):

1. Roots and Branches, Tom Shippey, 4 stars

2. Legend, David Gemmell, 4 stars

3. The Sword of Rhiannon, Leigh Brackett, 3.5 stars

4. Grails: Quests of the Dawn, Richard Gilliam, Mercedes Lackey, Andre Norton editors, 3 stars

5. God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Christopher Hitchens, 3.5 stars

6. The Burning Land, Bernard Cornwell 3.5 stars

7. No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy, 4.5 stars

8. The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun, J.R.R. Tolkien, 3.5 stars

9. Resolute Determination: Napoleon and the French Empire (The Modern Scholar), 3.5 stars

10. The Company They Keep, Diana Glyer, 4 stars

11. The Desert of Souls, Howard Andrew Jones, 3.5 stars

12. The Brothers Bulger, Howie Carr, 3 stars

13. Phantastes, George MacDonald, 3.5 stars

14. Tolkien and the Invention of Myth, Jane Chance editor, 3.5 stars

15. One Who Walked Alone, Novalyne Price Ellis, 4 stars

16. Damnation Alley, Roger Zelazny, 3 stars

17. Walden, Henry David Thoreau, 4 stars

18. Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott, 4 stars

19. Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse, John Joseph Adams editor, 3.5 stars

20. Bridge to Terabithia, Katherine Paterson, 3.5 stars

21. The Broken Sword, Poul Anderson, 4.5 stars

22. The Dirt, Motley Crue, 3 stars

23. Tarzan of the Apes, Edgar Rice Burroughs, 4 stars

24. Tolkien: A Look Behind the Lord of the Rings, Lin Carter, 3.5 stars

25. The Dark Tide, Dennis McKiernan, 3 stars

26. Watership Down, Richard Adams, 5 stars

27. Shadows of Doom, Dennis McKiernan, 2.5 stars

28. The Darkest Day, Dennis McKiernan, 3 stars

29. The Allegory of Love, C.S. Lewis, 4 stars

30. Imaro, Charles Saunders, 3.5 stars

31. Sword Woman and Other Historical Adventures, Robert E. Howard, 4 stars

32. The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman, 4 stars

33. The Subtle Knife, Philip Pullman, 3.5 stars

34. The Fantastic Swordsmen, L. Sprague de Camp ed., 4 stars

35. Surprised by Joy, C.S. Lewis, 3.5 stars

36. Warriors, George R.R. Martin, Gardner Dozois eds., 4 stars

37. The Last Lecture, Randy Pausch, 3.5 stars

38. The Amber Spyglass, Philip Pullman, 3.5 stars

39. The Case for God, Karen Armstrong, 4 stars

40. The Golden Apples of the Sun, Ray Bradbury, 4 stars

41. Dangerous Visions, Harlan Ellison ed., 4 stars

42. The Rising, Brian Keene, 3.5 stars

43. The Undiscovered Self, C.G. Jung, 4.5 stars

44. Zombies: Encounters with the Hungry Dead, John Skipp editor, 4 stars

45. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny, 4 stars

46. The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien, 5 stars

47. The Demon of Scattery, Poul Anderson and Mildred Downey Broxon, 3.5 stars

48. Bringing Down the House, Ben Mezrich, 3 stars

49. Dark Crusade, Karl Edward Wagner, 4 stars

My eclectic tastes are on full display here. There's a lot of swords and sorcery (Dark Crusade, Imaro, The Fantastic Swordsmen, Legend) mixed with epic fantasy (FOTR, His Dark Materials trilogy, Iron Tower trilogy). I've been picking off some of the SF/fantasy classics (Lord of Light, Phantastes, Golden Apples of the Sun) while showing my weakness for zombie stories (The Rising, Zombies: Encounters with the Hungry Dead). I've got a fair bit of non-fiction mixed in too: Everything from both sides of the God debate (Hitchens vs. Armstrong), to an MIT card-counting ring (Bringing Down the House), to autobiographical material (Howard, C.S. Lewis) to Jung. If I'm interested in it, I'll read it.

This exercise has again underscored the need to increase my reading speed. I frankly have no idea how anyone can read 300 or 400 books in a year, but I've seen people claiming those totals. I am giving some serious thought to setting aside a future slot to a speed-reading title.

The Demon of Scattery, a review

I’ve had the Poul Anderson/Mildred Downey Broxon collaboration The Demon of Scattery (1979) sitting on my bookshelf for ages, and this past weekend I was finally able to take it down, dust it off, and breeze through its lushly illustrated 207 pages in a few hours. It wasn’t really what I was expecting, both in a good and a not so good way.

I think I hesitated reading it all these years because of its cover. It features a sorceress summoning up a snake-demon, though not the kind of sorceress I prefer—there’s far too much Marion Zimmer Bradley and not enough Weird Tales in her attire (yeah, I’m kind of shallow like that. And I have been known to judge a book by its cover).

I shouldn’t have been so quick to judge the book, of course, as the tale does not contain the scene depicted at right. Instead, what you get is a historical fiction-infused fantasy tale set on Scattery Island, a real place off the coast of Ireland. Uninhabited today, it once was home to a monastery that was subject to a few Viking raids in the ninth and 10th century. According to historical notes at the back of the book, the Vikings raided the monastery in 816 and 835 AD but then did not return to it for more than 100 years, despite the fact that Scattery Island was a strategic location for launching raids on the mainland. Scattery was also said to be home to a monster named Cata that once prowled its coastline, which may have been the reason the Vikings later gave it a wide berth. In short, the historical record contains plenty of raw elements for the makings of a fine tale.

The Walking Dead Season 2: Stop and Smell the Dessicated Roses

Warning: Some spoilers follow

Season 2 of AMC’s The Walking Dead is nearing its midseason point, and apparently it sucks, at least according to a vocal minority of viewers. Why? Too much talking and not enough action. With a name like The Walking Dead, each episode should be wall-to-wall flesh munching zombies and humans gunning down undead with head shots on the wing. Or so the detractors say.

Me? I’ve been enjoying the heck out of the series, and think it’s pretty darned perfect as far as serialized television goes. The Walking Dead isn’t just about zombies. It’s also a human drama, and I’m hooked.

But I guess characterization and engagement with philosophical and moral questions aren’t what the zombie diehards want. Here’s a real sampling of some of the comments I’ve found:

To read the rest of this post, visit The Black Gate website .

Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, a review

My reading selection is mainly the product of my personal (and admittedly diverse, and quirky) preferences. Which is why you see a mixture of epic fantasy, swords and sorcery, horror, military and/or historical non-fiction, and a smattering of science fiction reviewed on this website. I also branch out into books that are acknowledged classics of their genre, titles which I wouldn’t normally read were it not for their place on “top 100 polls” and the like. Some might argue that life is too short to read uninteresting books, or to conform to public opinion, but I’ve come to realize that consensus on some issues does matter, especially after finding that several of my forays into the classics have been well worth the trip. Watership Down is among the top 20 books I’ve ever read, for example. Ditto Slaughterhouse Five and 1984. Other titles have been duds and left me wondering “what’s the hype all about?”, but at least I can say I made the effort.

This helps explain my recent foray into Roger Zelazny’s 1967 Hugo Award winning novel Lord of Light. If you take a look at any of the top 100 SF lists, you’ll see this book frequently mentioned. That’s why I picked it up. Now that I’ve read it, I’d put Lord of Light into the category of a Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend, which I found to be a mixed bag.  It’s a very good book, and I get why it’s accorded its classic status. But just like Matheson’s tale, I would describe Lord of Light as a book of great ideas, marred a bit by its execution.

Black Sabbath reuniting—blech

My love for heavy metal is well documented here. So is my love for Black Sabbath, a band which I consider among the best heavy metal bands of all time (this is hardly a controversial statement, though perhaps some would quarrel with my placing them behind Judas Priest and Iron Maiden). Their first few albums—Black Sabbath, Sabotage, Paranoid, and Master of Reality—are among the greatest the genre has produced. In my mind they are the first heavy metal band (sorry Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple), and so are responsible for launching my favorite genre of music. For that reason alone, Black Sabbath will have my eternal gratitude.

Given those facts, you would think that I’d be doing proverbial backflips over the news that the original Ozzy-fronted Black Sabbath has reunited yet again.

But then, you’d be wrong. I am decidedly less than enthusiastic. The reason is that Ozzy is completely and utterly shot.