The Marquis de Leech

Moorcock's actually the author by whom I have read the most individual books (some fifty-six). When he's on form, he's very good - I love Stormbringer. When he's bad, he's very bad - the less said about The Revenge of the Rose, the better. The sad thing is that, as time has gone on, he has increasingly felt the need to hit the reader over the head with his messages. His objections to Tolkien in Epic Pooh might be summarised as "Tolkien has political opinions I disagree with. Therefore, he's bad" - in short, not worth bothering with.

Also, if Tolkien's plot holes are an issue, one can get very... thorough... with critiquing Moorcock. But plot holes honestly don't matter to writing, except as insofar the reader notices them. I suspect Moorcock (never one for consistency) would agree.

Anyone calling Moorcock the Father of Dark Fantasy clearly doesn't know their genre history very well. Clark Ashton Smith, anyone? Moorcock's biggest contribution was being a forerunner of deconstructionist fantasy (not of Tolkien, but of Robert E. Howard), and introducing various tropes. Soul-drinking swords, for instance. Oh, and the conscious Jungian and Freudian symbolism. 

Short story out today: The Last Libation

This one was actually written last year, but given the current goings-on in the USA, the timing is awkward.

1 hour ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3381533088?book_show_action=true&from_review_page=1

A review of Thorns of a Black Rose; the (female) reviewer commented favourably on my depiction of the two main characters (both female).

Interesting that they are critical of Jasper Fforde. To be honest, I've never found his lead character over-sexualised. If the Thursday Next books have a flaw it's that they lack structure, and often degenerate into vehicles for clever jokes, a la a more literary Douglas Adams.

I wouldn't normally share a rejection notice, but this one actually made me smile. For context, it's a magazine's rejection of my genderflipped 1930s Chicago Bluebeard-retelling:

Quote

The piece moves along smoothly, but the premise didn't really hold together for me. Why do all the husbands look? Why does she have to kill them for it? Why is the key so easy to find? Why is it dripping blood? Why is important who's Italian?

 It's Bluebeard, mate.

I've had a short story acceptance for a 2000-word insanity-and-Dionysus piece, The Last Libation.  

My writing is less energetic than my reading, unfortunately. I am half-way through a sword and sorcery piece, though now that I have put Old Phuul on a solid footing, I need to get back to that.

3 hours ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

Did they fix it?

Just checked... they have now.

Bugger... they seem to have uploaded the non-revised version for some reason.

My hard sci-fi effort, Pink Unicorns Solvable in O(2) Time, will feature as part of a locally-produced anthology of Dunedin speculative fiction, Beyond the City Limits.

1 hour ago, Darth Richard II said:

So, is under heaven set in the same world as any of his other works? I thought it was but a character just mentioned there is only one moon.

I haven't read River of Stars, but it's obviously set in the same world as Under Heaven (a one moon place, rather than the two-moon one).

Back in 2015, I actually acted in a stage production of one of Handke's plays ('Offending the Audience'). I thought the name looked familiar, but was not aware of his political views until now. Rather gives a new meaning to the play's title...

My short story, A Christmas in Bohemia is now out, as part of the Fall/Winter 2019 edition of Infernal Ink Magazine. 

There comes a time in every author's life when he must look himself in the mirror and remind himself that he has published necrophiliac Christmas porn.

13 hours ago, Isis said:

I tried to read Tigana last month. I couldn't get past the first 20 pages. It's painful. 

Of all the issues I can think of with Tigana, they're not in the first twenty pages.

11 hours ago, Zorral said:

For me, A Brightness Long Ago was a thin gruel of reading experience, as well as an unsparked recycling of previous characters and plots and subplots, particularly out of Tigana, his 'real' first novel, at least his first novel for adults.  But that's my opinion, and so many see it differently, which is fine.

Fionavar ain't standard Kay in terms of what came later, but it is certainly an adult work.

1 hour ago, SeanF said:

Under Heaven is really really good.

Considering that I've read the majority of Kay's output (minus the last three novels and the poetry book), I always thought it rather odd that I had never previously found a book of his I'd enjoyed without reservations. Under Heaven is the first. 

I've read Lord of Emperors and Under Heaven so far this month. The prose of the latter is gorgeous, and part of me could not help but grin at certain events - which in another book would be covered in intricate detail - being treated almost as an after-thought.

18 hours ago, The hairy bear said:

As for Jean, there's this theory that he was going to die on the next book on the basis of the short blurbs that Lynch gave for all the books. The one for Thorn had the last mention to Jean, and ended with "Things change forever". I don't think that's referring to Jean's death, though.

Agreed. The books are, at heart, the Locke and Jean Show. Anyone else is fair game, but those two? Killing either kills the story.

Lynch deserves special credit here for the fact that he's produced the work in the teeth of depression.  I will be certainly buying it when it comes out.

I hated Republic of Thieves. So many opportunities for real political shenanigans, gone to waste...

4 minutes ago, fairwarging said:

I think one of the great benefits of monarchy by inheritance is a neat and clear succession (most of the time). You don't want the Realm descending into chaos whenever a ruler dies, or tons of plotting whenever a ruler falls ill. This is why the English were so stressed that Elizabeth I refused to name a successor- they knew there could be chaos when she died. 

Elizabeth I wasn't the problem, at least until Mary Queen of Scots was out the way.

A better example is Henry I. As one historian puts it, "waiting for Henry I to die must have been like waiting for the Bomb."

Sweetrobin is arguably the most eligible bachelor in the realm. 

I just remembered. Sweetrobin is still ruling the Vale.

7 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Care for commoners is a modern concept that has no place in George R. R. Martin's Westeros. There are small traces of this in Doran Martell's political approach and the softness of Edmure Tully - but that extends only to your own smallfolk, not to the smallfolk of your enemies. And curiously enough the only person who gave a rat's ass about the lives of innocents she basically had nothing to do with actually is Daenerys.

Noblesse oblige ain't modern, and traditional aristocrats have always understood what happens if the poor are treated too badly. 

I would agree though that tyranny towards nobility in Westeros is treated rather differently from tyranny towards the peasantry. Aerys Targaryen is still remembered fondly by the smallfolk, because his shenanigans never reached them.

4 hours ago, Zorral said:

Even as far back as the 1980s, China financed and helped rebuilt the Khan's mausoleum.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-06-13-mn-6896-story.html

The Mongolians, of course, really revere him.  In the entertainment forum, coincidentally, just last week was it? I put up two Youtubes of young Mongolian music videos about the return of Genghis and how his ideals for living should return.

Georgians have a distinct fondness for Stalin, of course.

5 hours ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Probably no more or less than the other Kingdoms Aegon conquered. You know many Chinese citizens today revere Genghis though he’s committed loads of atrocities to build his empire. Oh and I would guess there’s not too a lot of resentment for Napoleon amongst the British even though he did his damndest to break them in pursuit of his empire.

There is, actually.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11665655/Waterloo-200-Its-Britain-not-France-that-has-a-Napoleon-complex.html