Today, a treat- a first taste of eerie and powerful fantasy in ‘The Makurian’ from Milton Davis. Yes, we should be out running the lurchers in the snow, but we’re also trying to get through our reading pile. We’re currently on two books we’ll say more about another time – Charles R Saunders’Nyumbani Tales, and a forthcoming anthology Terminus: Urban Fantasy from the ATL, both from MVMedia.
art by angus mcbride
Charles R Saunders is, of course, a legend whose work goes right back to the seventies. The first of his Imaro stories was included in Lin Carter’s Year’s Best Fantasy Stories in 1975, and he’s still active. Seen now as the founder of Sword and Soul, fantasy based on African cultures rather than European medievalism, we can say that Nyumbani Tales is a treat (links at end).
Milton Davis, who is MVMedia, not only writes and publishes Sword and Soul (amongst other things) but recently mentioned a new concept of his own, The Makurian, which had our attention immediately. Normally we lead in with trivia and background information, but this time we think it best to share the vision, and add a few notes afterwards. These extracts are provided with Milton’s kind permission.
The Makurian
‘I hunt them with the skills God granted me and the weapons the priest gave me. I do it not for honor, but as penance. One by one I stalk them and kill them, but I know their terror will not cease until I find the one who creates them and destroy him. I’m aware that in doing so I may lose my life as well, but it is a small price to pay for forgiveness of my own sins. Long ago I was no better than those that I hunt. The only peace for me is that which is eternal.’
He came alone. We expected at least a squad; we hoped for a brigade. An army would have been a blessing. Yet only one man was sent from Dongolo as an answer to our plea for help. And he was not a man that instilled hope. Yes, he was tall and ebony-skinned, but his body was lankly like that of a boy just beyond initiation rights. His blue kapok fitted loosely on him, his helmet snug. A quiver of arrows hung from his waist, the bow stored on his saddle. He carried a simple lance and shield. As he rode through our village we despaired. The demon would claim this one just like the others. We were sure of it.
He rode into our village, stopping at my shop.
“I am the Makurian,” he said. “Where is the demon?”
I pointed to the wooded hills.
“It resides within,” I said. “But you will need more help.”
“I won’t,” he replied. “God is with me.”
“God was with the others,” I replied. “And now they rest in His bosom.”
The man stared at me in a way that caused my throat to dry. Then he turned his steed and headed for the hills.
Three weeks passed and there was no sign of the Makurian. But neither was there sign of the demon. It was a late afternoon when I heard the shouting. Thinking it was the demon, I ran into my house and secured the door. Gathering my wife and children, we sat in quiet fear, expecting the worst. Instead there was a knock at my door. My wife begged me not to answer, but my curiosity overwhelmed my good sense.
“Who is it?” I said.
“The Makurian.”
I crept to the door, holding my rusted sword in my left hand. I unbolted the door, opened it and screamed. The Makurian stood before me, his face bruised, his left eye barely open. His kapok was ripped; a dent marred his helmet. There were no arrows in his quiver. He held a war club in his left hand, and in his right hand was his shield.
“You live!” I exclaimed.
“Yes, I do.”
His response puzzled me for he seemed disappointed.
“You need help,” I said. “I’ll fetch the healer.”
“No. I must return to Dongolo.”
He trudged back to his horse then mounted. There was a bag tied to the saddle which he untied the tossed toward me. The bottom of the bag was soaked with blood.
“Your demon is no more.”
With that he turned his horse and rode away.
I never gained the courage to open the bag, neither did anyone in our village. We built a bonfire and burned it. Afterwards we celebrated, giving our praises to God. We were not sure if the demon was dead, but we never saw it or the Makurian again. I hope to God it remains so.
The Makurian, coming 2018. Text copyright 2017 Milton Davis
Something to look forward to, we feel.
Makurian History
We’re not a history channel, but you should look Makuria up, as its background is really interesting. A black Christian kingdom in Nubia, around Northern Sudan, proud and independent for centuries, which developed religious links to the Coptic church in Egypt.
from Skilla1st
In a quite unusual turn of events, Makuria resisted the advances of Arab expansion, and managed to throw Egyptian Arab armies back. One of the reasons that Makuria is sometimes overlooked seems to be the lack of monumental remains – they had a rich culture, but simply didn’t build massive structures or grave-monuments.
“By the end of the 6th century (Makuria) had converted to Christianity, but in the 7th century Egypt was conquered by the Islamic armies, and Nubia was cut off from the rest of Christendom. In 651 an Arab army invaded, but it was repulsed and a treaty known as the baqt was signed creating a relative peace between the two sides that lasted until the 13th century. Makuria expanded, annexing its northern neighbour Nobatia either at the time of the Arab conquest or during the reign of King Merkurios. The period from roughly 750 to 1150 saw the kingdom stable and prosperous, in what has been called the “Golden Age”. Increased aggression from Egypt, and internal discord led to the state’s collapse in the 14th century.” Wikipedia
Makuria (as Dongola) is mentioned in the Libro del Conosçimiento de todos los rregnos or Book of Knowledge of All Kingdoms. This is an anonymous Castilian book of geographical and armorial details which has been dated to around 1385. While it is fanciful, it also contains a lot of fascinating details. It was written as an imaginary autobiographical travelogue of a Castilian mendicant friar, as he travelled the world recording local kingdoms and their flags.
Thence I went to another kingdom called DONGOLA marching with the deserts of EGIPTO, and the river NILUS. The river forms two courses, the greater, flowing to the westward, called the RIO DEL ORO. On its banks is the kingdom of GUYNOA. The other part flows through the deserts of EGIPTO and enters the Mediterranean Sea at DAM IATA. Between these two branches of the river is the kingdom of DONGOLA, a country well peopled with Christians from NUBIA…
Adorned with 16 granite columns, each with richly decorated granite capitals, the Church of the Granite Columns perhaps was the cathedral of Old Dongola. Lucio Andretti.
Terminus: Urban Fantasy from the ATL will be out in 2018. In the meantime, you can visit MVMedia to browse a wide range of their speculative publications. http://mvmediaatl.com/index.html
That’s your lot for today, dear listener. Do remember to subscribe for free by email (top left) if you want to be kept up to date with what we cover, and we look forward to seeing you again…
Well now. Normal service next week with weird and lurchery stuff, but here, quickly, is good news for readers. Occult Detective Quarterly Presents, is Green for Go, and so there’s more to announce – a chance of free books from the folk at April Moon Books and 18thWall Productions. Edited by John Linwood Grant and published by Electric Pentacle Press, this should be a fine looking anthology.
bond unknown – art by m wayne miller
Thanks to the many supportive backers out there, the book is full funded. The fiction and a major classic essay on psychic sleuths are in hand, and the illustrators have started work. Eight stories now rather than seven, adding up to around one hundred and thirty thousand words, with each story having a full page commissioned illustration.
You can still back the campaign, either for the extra rewards, or using it effectively as a pre-order for the eformat or print version of the anthology (link at the bottom) . All backers already get a free standalone novelette by Willie Meikle, epub or Kindle, produced especilly for ODQ. And when the campaign is over, greydogtales and the ODQ FB Group will be holding a draw where every reward backer’s name will be entered. So everyone will be eligible for a chance to win some extras.
April Moon Goodies
April Moon Books have provided a print copy each of three fabulous books for the draw:
Bond Unknown – Two all-new James Bond stories set in the time of the original novels, with a unique cosmic horror twist. Fans of the original, hard-drinking, hard smoking, violent OO agent will thoroughly enjoy the stories written by acclaimed authors William Meikle and Edward M. Erdelac. Their affection and respect for the character oozes from each page, and their knowledge of the Mythos brings an extraordinary element to the adventures.
The Stars at My Door – Featuring fifteen new stories from some of today’s hottest writers including William Meikle, Christine Morgan, John Linwood Grant, David Conyers, Glynn Owen Barrass and many more, these stories celebrate the optimism of old-school science fiction, but with a twist.
A Tear in the Veil – The debut novel from Patrick Loveland – the mind-bending story of Felix Brewer, a young man with a dark past, who, through the use of some utterly bewildering technology, is afforded the gift of true sight. That is, Felix can now see the flora and fauna that live in symbiosis with our dimension, albeit surreptitiously. However, his new-found wonderment comes at a price as his reality begins to shift, and dark forces target him for brutal extinction.
Or if you don’t want to wait, you can buy these three marvels by checking out the April Moon site right now:
18thWall Productions have generously offered a number of great ebooks, including:
Cryptid Clash 5 – By Nikki Nelson-Hicks. Something has gone wrong in Mongolia. Morgan Industrial Technologies’ natural gas station has gone dark. No communication in or out, it seems, and the satellite imaging shows the station wrecked. Wrecked as though everything has descended into a warzone. Which perhaps it has. The station may have been working on more than natural gas. Mongolian Death Worms, the olgoi khorkhoi of lore, have attacked this base–ripping up anything on the sands…
Speakeasies and Spiritualists – Eight stories inspired by Rose Mackenberg and the spiritualists Jazz Age milieu. Psychic investigators on the trail of the trail of a jazz musician who seems to have crawled from the grave. Amateur, living-room seances going very wrong when mixed with grief for those who died in the war. Strange men warning out of Florida storms. Dream Demons stalking Chicago, feeding off bar-dwellers, and floors painted with mystic stars.
You can see and order the whole Cryptid Clash range, and all of 18thWall’s other books, here:
The draw will be held in January 2018, and as mentioned above, all reward backers will be eligible to win something from the above. Many thanks to the above publishers for their support.
If you want to book your copy of ODQ Presents, then here’s the link:
Whooo, dear listener. A significant word today, as we interview author Willie Meikle concerning his brand new collection The Ghost Club, from Crystal Lake Publishing. It’s a word which ties things together nicely, with ghosts in general, a particular story in the collection, and that old reprobate Oscar Wilde. So settle back as we ask Willie some literary questions (mostly), and Whooo!
The Ghost Club, due out on 9th December, is very much a concept collection, and also one of those ‘found manuscript’ ones, where the annals of a very special club apparently come to light:
“Writers never really die; their stories live on, to be found again, to be told again, to scare again. In Victorian London, a select group of writers, led by Arthur Conan Doyle, Bram Stoker and Henry James held an informal dining club, the price of entry to which was the telling of a story by each invited guest.
“These are their stories, containing tales of revenant loved ones, lost cities, weird science, spectral appearances and mysteries in the fog of the old city, all told by some of the foremost writers of the day. In here you’ll find Verne and Wells, Tolstoy and Chekhov, Stevenson and Oliphant, Kipling, Twain, Haggard and Blavatsky alongside their hosts.”
As we have such a fondness for the history of weird and strange literature, it was a given that we’d want to talk about it.
Lying for Living
With both Twain and Wilde represented within, The Ghost Club reminded us immediately of the art of lying. For as writers we lie for money (well, greydog certainly does), and we study the subject most assiduously and in depth every day (which may be a lie). Even in the introduction to this book, doubt is cast:
“Of course, the discovery of this manuscript has been fortuitous, to say the least, for the owners of the club, and there have already been allegations of hoax and trickery.”
mark twain
Some lies have their merit. In 1880, Mark Twain presented his essay ‘On the Decay of the Art of Lying’, in which he said:
“Lying is universal—we all do it. Therefore, the wise thing is for us diligently to train ourselves to lie thoughtfully, judiciously; to lie with a good object, and not an evil one; to lie for others’ advantage, and not our own; to lie healingly, charitably, humanely, not cruelly, hurtfully, maliciously; to lie gracefully and graciously, not awkwardly and clumsily; to lie firmly, frankly, squarely, with head erect, not haltingly, tortuously, with pusillanimous mien, as being ashamed of our high calling.”
oscar wilde
Oscar Wilde, more outrageously, questioned the value of truth, especially in literature, in his own 1891 essay ‘The Decay Of Lying – An Observation’. In the process he happens to mention some of the other writers included in The Ghost Club, which was very predictive of him:
‘Even Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson, that delightful master of delicate and fanciful prose, is tainted with this modern vice, for we know positively no other name for it. There is such a thing as robbing a story of its reality by trying to make it too true, and The Black Arrow is so inartistic as not to contain a single anachronism to boast of, while the transformation of Dr. Jekyll reads dangerously like an experiment out of the Lancet. As for Mr. Rider Haggard, who really has, or had once, the makings of a perfectly magnificent liar, he is now so afraid of being suspected of genius that when he does tell us anything marvellous, he feels bound to invent a personal reminiscence, and to put it into a footnote as a kind of cowardly corroboration…”
Both essays are well worth a read, though for quite different reasons. And if the stories in The Ghost Club are lies, they are entertaining ones. Let us turn to a living writer now, and hear more.
Willie Meikle on The Ghost Club
greydog:Good to have you back on greydogtales, Willie. We’ve known each other for a while now, and we share your love of many of the classic authors, especially the ones who ventured into the weird and supernatural. They told some damn fine yarns. So we lit up on news of this collection, keen to see what you’d done with them. What set you off on the concept?
willie: The idea came to me on Facebook, and it might have been Dave Brzeski who I was talking to about H Rider Haggard. I was asked whether I’d considered writing an Allan Quatermain story. I hadn’t. Then I had. I couldn’t get that to work, but I wondered what might happen if Haggard met Doyle, and that got me to the Club, which in turn got me to the dining table, then the stories. All too soon the concept was big in my head, and when it got to that point, I knew I was going to have to write it.
It was originally going to be a Dark Renaissance deluxe hardcover book, with full Wayne Miller illustrations. I’d have loved to have seen that hardcover, but that is not to be. But Crystal Lake have Ben Baldwin for the cover, and we’ll give it a big push, and see where it takes us.
greydog:Was there a cut-off point in terms of period? At a glance, these authors produced most of their publicly memorable works during the Victorian or Edwardian eras. Presumably you wanted that ‘old-style’ feel to be preserved, rather than wade too far into the twentieth century.
willie: The cut off point is the early 1890s, which I picked to get the maximum number of writers available, and alive, and able to visit London, at the same time. Originally I wanted to get Dickens in there too, but he was too dead, although I did consider having his ghost tell a story at the Ghost Club but discarded it.
I also had to do some sleight of hand to cram H G Wells in before he actually published anything. But I set myself the task of keeping the background bits as accurate as I could, so that meant picking who got involved was actually made a bit easier. I also didn’t want to pick anyone who I hadn’t read myself, so that winnowed the field down a bit too.
greydog:Given the title, do we assume that the stories are all directly supernatural ones, or did you include what Hugo Gernsback called the wonder of ‘scientifiction’ as well?
willie: They’re almost totally supernatural, even the Verne one. Again, I made it one of the ‘house rules’ of the Club, so once I had that established, I stuck to it, although both the Wells and Verne ones are ‘scientific experimentation gone wrong’ tales as you might expect. And the Verne one has a rocket to the moon in it, so I had some fun along the way.
greydog: It’s quite a range of names. We notice you haven’t just settled for the more obvious ones, like Wells, Kipling and Verne, who lend themselves to pastiche. Does the selection of writers represent personal favourites from your own reading past, or those you thought would be most accessible to a broad readership?
willie: As I mentioned above, much of it came from who was available in the year I chose for the club to convene, and restricted to authors I had read for myself. There was a certain degree of thinking that I needed ‘names’ that people would recognise, but the main driver really was whether I thought I could get away with writing a story by that author without getting bitten on the arse.
Plus there was an awful lot of self-doubt along the way on this one. I’m not sure I want to put myself through that kind of mental anguish again for a while.
greydog: Who was the most enjoyable to emulate?
willie: I had a lot of fun with Wilde’s one, as I decided to go light and frothy, something a bit out of my normal comfort zone. I read Dorian Gray again, but it was more in Wilde’s short, comic stories that I found inspiration for this one, a tale of a boy, a maiden aunt with an answer for everything, and a thing rattling at the bedroom window.
I also enjoyed the Doyle one a lot since I went for a Lestrade story, which was a nice change for me after writing so much dynamic duo fiction over the last few years.
greydog: And which author did you find most difficult to tackle, in terms of being faithful to their approach?
willie: Tolstoy was a bugger. I reread War and Peace to try to get his style, then started a story that had fifteen pages of description of the Russian court, political shenanigans and the people who supplied it with food and alcohol, and I hadn’t even got to a plot point. So I tracked backward, had a closer look at one of the suppliers to the court, and discovered a Scotsman there who allowed me a way in to the Empress’ ballroom without going through all the turgid Russian political stuff.
I think I got away with it.
greydog:We’re amused that you included both Henry James and Oscar Wilde. James disliked Wilde’s airs and self-publicity, calling him a “fatuous fool”; Wilde much later wrote, in ‘The Decay of Lying’, that James “writes fiction as if it were a painful duty” (although he credits him with a “neat literary style”. We’re not huge fans of Henry James, who we find can get rather tedious at time. How do you get on with his stuff?
willie: I had a lot of trouble with his extended way with a sentence, It’s about was far from my natural writing style as I could get. But again a character spoke to me who allowed me a way into the story without getting too close to the windbag that the story was really about. It kept me at enough distance to get the job done. I was helped here by Dan Simmons of all people. I read his THE FIFTH HEART, which is a Henry James meets Holmes novel, and it was his Jamesian conversational voice that I heard as I was writing the story rather than James’ sometimes overly turgid prose.
margaret oliphant
greydog: Noting that Margaret Oliphant, Robert Louis Stevenson and Arthur Conan Doyle were, of course, all Scots, like yourself, do you feel a particular empathy with classic Scottish writers? Did you grow up with them ‘around’ you?
willie: Doyle and Stevenson were very much part of my growing up. Treasure Island was among the first things I remember reading, and I reread it so often I could probably still recite large passages from heart. Kidnapped was also high up on the favorites list. With Doyle I started with The Lost World rather than Holmes, and that too got read and read under the blankets with a torch.
Other Scots from that time of my reading still stick around too, John Buchan in particular then, a few years later on around the age of twelve, I had a thing for Alistair MacLean’s thrillers and devoured all of them avidly.
I also in later years read a lot of Scottish crime novels. William McIllvaney’s Laidlaw in particular was a direct influence on Derek Adams.
Although Sue has several of her books, I didn’t read Margaret Oliphant until fairly recently, when I discovered a collection of her supernatural stories in hardcover and was delighted to find she had a sharp wit and a nice way with a ghost.
greydog: You probably know our interest in how theosophy interacted with early weird fiction, so we were amused to see Madame Blavatsky included. Did you draw on her theosophy and ‘astral communications’ from Tibetan masters, or did you go straight to her supernatural fiction for this one?
willie: I have a tulpa, adventures on the astral plane, some musings on the ether and, yes, a meeting with a master. It’s an everything and the kitchen sink job, told in her ‘this is real so you have to believe it’ fictional style. I had a lot of fun with it.
greydog:For the close atmosphere of a ghost story session, with the lights low, we might have added M R James, but from what you’ve said already, he would be excluded by the time frame. Have you ever toyed with Jamesian pastiche?
willie: Not really. I’ve read quite a lot of it, and enjoyed much of it. But Steve Duffy in particular said all of that stuff so much better than I could, so I’ve mostly, deliberately, stayed away, especially from the English academe aspects. I’m more at home with Doyle, Stevenson and Hodgson for my ghost stories.
Besides, I was actually quite glad that he didn’t fit in chronologically, as I could then safely ignore him.
greydog: And no William Hope Hodgson, which we suppose is also an issue of the chronology. You write a wide range of adventure, horror, speculative and supernatural fiction, but in some circles you’re known for your sideline of writing Carnacki adventures. Was it time for the old chap to have a break?
willie: Yes, Hodgson again just didn’t fit in. I toyed with having Doyle encounter him as a boy, and be told a story, but I couldn’t make myself believe it, so it didn’t get written.
I have had thoughts of doing a volume 2, twenty years on that would let Doyle still be around and have a new set of Edwardian stories to collate, but that way lies that self doubt I mentioned up above, and eventually, madness.
greydog:If you did it again, which other author would you most like to try?
willie: I wanted to do a Jack London, wild Yukon story along similar lines to Blackwood’s The Willows but was disappointed to find on research that he was also far too young for this one. He’d fit in nicely in volume two 2. Dammit, I’m thinking about that again.
greydog: It is a tempting thought. On a personal level you are, after all, a man of taste. As you sit back in your leather chair and listen to the voices of old, what accompanies you? A well-aged brandy, a particular malt? Or a pint of eighty-shilling?
willie: I’m restricted by what I can buy out here in the sticks in Newfoundland in a small supermarket’s liquor section. That said, I can usually get The Glenlivet, which is a good all rounder in the single malt front, although I’d kill for a bottle of Ardbeg.
On the beer front, it’s mostly mass produced Canadian stuff and although we have a local microbrewer, it’s still bottled with a lot of fizz in it. I live for the infrequent Hobgoblin promotions that turn up every so often.
And damn you for mentioning 80/-.
greydog:Sorry about that. Finally – a quick plug. Any idea what you’ll be working on next, or is it all shrouded in the Land of Mist (cheap Conan Doyle reference)?
willie: I’ve been forging alliances with fantasy writers this year, and this has taken me into the writing of a big historic fantasy trilogy along with a name writer. We’re two books in and I’ll be working on the third this winter, then we’ll be setting about finding the right publisher for it. I haven’t tried anything like it since the Watchers trilogy more than fifteen years ago, and my writing has moved on a tad since then. It’s been great fun so far.
We’ve also got the VEIL KNIGHTS fantasy series to finish off, and although my novel in the series has already been published, as a collective we’ve got the big finish to coordinate and advertise coming up.
There’s that, and another horror pulp adventure book for Severed Press with the Scottish soldiers from Infestation and another menace to face.
I’ve got three new novels ( and a big batch of the DarkFuse reprints) coming from Crossroad Press, which includes THE BOATHOUSE, another in my Sigils and Totems works, RAMSKULL, a new Scottish Hammer horror tribute about satanism and bloody mayhem on a Hebridean island, and DEEP INTO THE GREEN, a Newfoundland based dark fantasy about miners delving where they shouldn’t.
One thing I’m quite excited about is a novella appearance in I AM THE ABYSS, a huge anthology from Dark Regions, mainly because I’m sharing page space with some great writers, and I get a double page color artwork from the great Les Edwards. I spoke earlier about feeling as if I’d made it? This helps.
I’ve also had a whisper of interest about a new Victorian ghost story collection. Don’t know if I have time for it, but you know me…
I’ll be 60 in January. I always thought I’d either be dead or slowed right down by now, but I’m still here, and it seems I still have stories to tell.
greydog: You do indeed. Many thanks for joining us, and the best of luck with The Ghost Club. It’s a very enjoyable read.
willie: Thanks very much for having me on.
You can pre-order The Ghost Club now, and as we say, it’s out on 9th December.
Listeners may care to note that Willie Meikle is also one of the key authors in Occult Detective Quarterly Presents, a thrilling anthology of new, longer supernatural fiction coming out next year. If you back the ODQ Presents campaign, which has already hit its main target, you get a free contemporary novelette by Willie in epub or mobi format as an extra.
You can help get every story in the anthology illustrated by supporting it here. Check out Update 3 for some great art.
In a doomed attempt to catch up with the review books we have in hand, today we cover some English stuff. Our prime pick is The Snow Witch, by Matt Wingett, plus we mention the speculative works of Allen Stroud and Jilly Paddock. No deep weird or dogs this time, because we’re pressed against the Occult Detective Quarterly wall, beating our little fists at too many other jobs. So see what you think of these…
The Snow Witch: The Book of Our Mood at the Moment
Sometimes we read review books which we adore, but we know that they’d appeal to only certain folk. We might say something is recommended on the basis of quality or originality, or because of the particular literary corner in which it sits – and we’re often looking at the degree of horror or weirdness in the work. Sometimes the book has a style which is so interesting that aspects of plot become less important, and so on. It varies.
This time we’re going to recommend a book on the basis that we think that almost everyone would get something out of, and we won’t give it a label. We will say that it has a degree of horror, but very much the horror of human behaviour, not the graphic sort. It has fantasy, but a subtle working thereof, without grand sorcerous showdowns. It’s contemporary in setting, but harks back to the roots of belief and earlier practices. And you might see it as a myth or fable, but couched in the language of today.
Matt Wingett’s The Snow Witch is about a young woman, originally from the Balkans, who visits a city during one English winter. She plays the violin to earn her way, and in the process her life intertwines with that of the locals. Simple, really.
Less simple are the personal losses, inadequacies and desires of those locals. From the brutality of relationships to the heartache in families, especially that of mothers, Wingett paints a genuine and empathic picture of real people struggling with their lives. He understands our need for hope and magic, and how we fail to grasp it sometimes. Amongst the small ensemble of characters, he also delivers a man who is so flawed and empty of compassion that the occasional potential for sympathy is washed away utterly by the end of the book.
For those who seek fantasy, both magickal and symbolic strands are interwoven with the above, including the protagonist’s inheritance from the Snow Witch’s mother, and the powerful fox motif which slinks through the book. For those who seek horror, Wingett also provides images that disturb – atrocities in the Balkans, brutalities and betrayals of the heart far more terrible and effective than chainsaws or zombies. Despite both of those comments, you can still read The Snow Witch simply as a fascinating story of people’s lives.
The Snow Witch is clever, moving, well written and extremely readable. An outstanding book for a winter’s night.
As we’re being a bit English today (an accident of timing), we’re including coverage of Allen Stroud’s new book The Forever Man, reviewed by Dave Brzeski. Dave is the Hard Man of the Occult Detective Quarterly editorial team, known for sending story submissions back to me with just “Fell asleep after three paragraphs,” scrawled on them. The antithesis to my agonised and over-lengthy decision-making process.
What you may not know is that his partner, Jilly Paddock, has been quietly putting out speculative fiction for some years. Jilly is not a publicist, and rarely promotes herself. However, the greydogtales Editor-in-Chief (who also takes the photos to save you from greydog’s appalling efforts) reports that they are very enjoyable, and that she always looks forward to the next one.
They range widely, but many have a pulp-detective feel combined with more modern science fiction, a pleasant duality. You can check out Jilly’s work through Amazon – here are a couple of examples.
“A nine year-old girl is abducted on a backwater colony world. Bad enough, but Sophie Crispianou is the daughter of the Terran Ambassador and the step-niece of Earth’s President, and the kidnapper has struck before, leaving his previous victim dead. Finding the child falls to Detective Inspector A. Afton Lamont and her new partner, Jerome.
“The Earth authorities don’t trust the local police to solve such a high profile case and send in some help from Terrapol, an agent with psionic abilities—a spook. Giselle is beautiful but deadly, a mind reader and possibly much more, and her only goal is rescuing the lost child, regardless of the consequences. Can this unlikely team find Sophie and save her before tragedy strikes? Deep in an abandoned mine at the edge of the city, something lurks, something old and evil, woken by the tears of a scared little girl and the cruelty of her captors…”
I don’t suppose I could write about something else? No? Y’see, the thing is, I went into this book cold. Didn’t really know much about it. I thought it looked a bit occult detectivey, and I’m quite into that sub-genre at the moment, so that’s what drew me in. So, is it an occult detective novel? Not really: ok, it does have some police officers investigating a very strange murder. The main protagonist, Doctor Andrew Pryde has the misfortune to have been sitting in the reference library with his nose in a book, when a corpse turns up. First he knows about it is when he looks up and notices the police. Obviously they suspect him, so he needs to investigate to try to clear himself.
Then there’s this scruffy, loner type, Ronald Gibbs. He’s investigating a series of missing people, all involving books. He has a group of like-minded types he talks to on the internet. Once they’ve finished confronting each other with knives, Ronald needs to convince Andrew that his problem is connected. Then it all starts to get a bit complicated.
Is that enough? Could you not just go read the book on my recommendation? Trust me, too many spoilers will just detract from your potential enjoyment.
All right, dammit, I’ll tell you just a little more. It involves alternate universes, and sacrifices and magic—or is that science we don’t understand yet? Damned if I know. It really is very complex—I’m not even sure that it’s just a coincidence that Stroud opens his foreword with a quote from Arthur C. Clarke, even if it isn’t the one about magic and science. There’s stuff hidden in the text of books, powerful stuff. There are also gods—or are they just people we don’t understand yet? I have no clue.
I suppose you could call it a police procedural, crossed with a fantasy novel. I don’t know why you’d want to, but if you feel the need you could. I detected a few possible influences. Neil Gaiman for one—and even a touch of Douglas Adams, albeit it’s not a comedy.
Do I have any criticisms? Well, for one thing the story is hardly over—I already told you it’s complex. It left me with far too many questions that I need answering. I suspect I may well have to reread this one before reading any follow-up. There had bloody well better be a sequel! I know where you live, Allen Stroud—ok, I don’t but I can easily find out…
Now you can all just stop pestering me and go read the damn book, all right!?
We made our basic goal! Our mega-anthology ODQ Presents is on, with a predicted publication date of March 2018. Now we’re looking for a little bit extra to get every single story accompanied by a specially commissioned illustration of its own.
Don’t forget that you can use the Kickstarter Campaign simply to pre-order the eformat or print of the anthology, and that everyone who backs it gets the free epub or Kindle version of Willie Meikle’s‘Eeny-Meeny-Miney-Mi-Go’ novelette.
Check out the latest update here, and do back us if you can.
Next time on greydogtales, something weird from somewhere else in the world, and all sorts of other nonsense. Call back for literature, lurchers, and life…
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