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A Feast Unknown (basically, Tarzan and Doc Savage as the sons of Jack the Ripper)

haha waht

double waht

I've never bothered with him but maybe I have been thumbing through the wrong stuff (ie Riverworld books) at the bookstore

*checks the wiki*
Huh, I had forgotten the Jack the Ripper element.

I've heard he has lots of hack work. I think lots of good creators have hack work, sometimes to the extent of dwarfing their good work in quantity.

What do you know? Charles Beaumont is getting his own Penguin Classics book too.

Yay! From the old Rolling Science Fiction etc A book on my shelf twenty years before I read it: The Howling Man, short stories by Charles Beaumont. Title tale (later a Twilight Zone script, like several of these, most even better in the original) is the one about a traveler in bad weather, who stops at a monastery. Very hospitable to him, but why is that poor gentle man locked away? The traveler is increasingly troubled--he's also the first-person narrator, a nice, humble guy himself, which often means trouble up ahead, when a oh-so-non-literary, nice li'l narrator also has to convey the anxious spoon-feeding exposition and underscoring of the "literary"-as-fuck author. But *this* narrator, tortured by his conscience and his fear, his certainty, has obsessively drawn himself into hard-learned, self-taught eloquence, right from the beginning. How often does this happen?!
Beaumont was Hollywood king of the killer opening, though some of these come off too slick. And his sardonic-to-macabre humor , though often agreeable, even empathetic, could shade into something more repellent--misogyny, for instance: slick and shallow and sincere. Seems, according to William F Nolan's intro, that he came from some kind of boondocks gothic situation (orig name: Charles Nutt, a prodigy with sev. false starts before he made it, still youing, as a writer). A bit like Saki, H.H. Munro, whose sister confirmed that the aunts who raised them could be sadisict. Dunno about Nutt/Beaumont's alibi, but in any case, you could say the last laugh was on him: he died of Alzheimer's at age 38.
As Nolan tells it, he was a complex person, mercurial, but close and considerate to his wife, kids, and friends, with great enthusiasm beyond or along with the facility. I'd even like to read his damn car books! Also need to check out some of the b-movies he scripted, fairly well-known but not to me.

― dow, Thursday, August 23, 2012 10:29 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

nice

― the late great, Thursday, August 23, 2012 1:51 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Was just listening to a long Harlan Ellison interview and he namechecked Beaumont a couple times. Need to investigate...
---Elvis Telecom Sorry Elvis, my first time doing cutnpaste on Mac, but he prob posted that during the same week of Aug '12. Thanks Ward, I will check out Farmer.

The aforementioned Valancourt Book published a Charles Beaumont collection a little while back, The Hunger and Other Stories, which I considered getting.

I'd expect any Beaumont collection to be a bit uneven, but worth reading (at the very least).

Reposting from Harlan E thread because sf. Harlan E, Isaac A and Gene W discuss sf with Stud T and Calvin T.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZvcKB9vQO0

Thanks! I remember seeing that, esp. Wolfe's "dropping Gandhi" bit," and Ellison's reaction. Didn't remember the discussion of SF stories about TV and moon-landings, and how nobody put the two together in a story (Wolfe says somebody may have, but editors didn't buy it...) Could have sworn Pohl was on there too: I remember him with wire-rims, shrewd expression, trim stash, wiry build, light-colored suit (of course I also "remembered" Wolfe on this show as having shaved head, goatee, slim). Not seeing it listed on YouTube, except maybe where Pohl's talking to Bradbury.

Might try to look for that Bradbury/Pogo video. Checked out The Classic Philip José Farmer: 1952-1964 from the library and the first two stories, "Sail On! Sail On!" and "Mother" are both very good. The writing has trace elements of the problematic pulpy punning, but the ideas and imagery and energy all come through loud and clear.

Back cover sez:

"Mr. Farmer's name guarantees brilliant science fiction."
Alfred Bester

I just read Ancillary Sword and Ancillary Justice. They're cool, I guess, kind of mid-PKD in that they're unevenly written and full of big ideas (that aren't too deeply explored).

I don't get why they're so lauded.

Bought a cheap copy of AJ, but style didn't grab me, so didn't make it too far.

PJF official web page has a lot of stuff including original reviews from way back when
http://www.pjfarmer.com/reviews.htm
and excellent photo album
http://www.pjfarmer.com/photoal.htm

One thing of his I remember as being grebt and a good use of his talents is the short story "The Jungle Rot Kid on the Nod," which is Tarzan as if it were written by William S. Burroughs instead of Edgar Rice. Worth searching out, and why not right now, since it would have been PJF's birthday last week and Burroughs would have been 101 this week.

probably answered elsewhere re: PJF, but where's an absolute virgin to begin? What's low commitment (short novel, say) but representative?

Tough to say, intimidated by his graphomania and other manias myself. Perhaps at this point I prefer his earlier work, based on partial reading of this collection.

I would go with the 2008 reissue of Strange Relations. The original 1953 collection was just five novelettes (including one of my favorite by him, "Mother,") but the new edition adds The Lovers and Flesh, two good early novels. Those seven stories hit most of his major themes and will definitely let you know if you want to dig deeper into his work. One of the novelettes, "Daughter," is a sequel to "Mother" and also a pretty funny retelling of the Three Little Pigs story iirc.

"Mother" definitely a good place to start.

agreed on the ancillary books

Flesh also a fun read for baseball fans, as it has turned into a blood sport in the far future.

Couldn't find anything with Pohl and Bradbury other than a very short clip. Did find this clip of Zelazny reading: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRQ4wKLfYbc

http://borderlands-books.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/borderlands-books-to-close-in-march.html

I confess in recent years I haven't frequented it as much as I used to (mostly cuz I can't spend as much money on books as I used to and spend a lot more time at the library), sad to see them go though. I made a point of getting that hardback copy of Silverbob's Vol. 3 Short Stories from them just a couple months ago.

Just finished Rogues, yet another xpost George RR Martin & Gardner Dozois-edited loosely thematic anthology of new short stories, novelettes and novellas (I think, though forget the word-limit for each category; some long-ass offerings for sure). I should say "finished with," since I won't bother with yet another Martin bog at the very end: yet another Game Of Thrones prequel, apparently intended to read like a modern-English version of an ancient chronicle (JRRT does it better, RR; sorry, since I gather from some of your dismissals of GOT critiques that you think you're improving on his work in some ways, at least). I know how this (with no dialogue, no scenes per se, just a lot of reference material for your TV writers and fans) will go from skimming and from the one in Dangerous Women. M&D the previous multi-genre entry in M&D's series of collections. That one was a lot richer and even deeper overall: maybe roguery is just too cute a linkage for so many stories at once? Or I can't handle lightening up, especially in transitioning from My Brilliant Friend and The Brothers Karamazov? Nah, it's the editors' fault!
But, of the stories most relevant to this thread (multi-genre, like I said with some good light mystery/caper yarns), Carrie Vaughn's "Roaring Twenties" (flappers who are actually witches on a mission, in an enchanted yet lobby-Fed-hacked speakeasy), has feminine narrative perspectives x interactions on the fly, ditto Lisa Tuttle's "The Curious Affair of The Dead Wives" (spooky late-Victorian love/sex quests, gender-self-image and other personal adjustments, plus power struggles, going bump in the night).
Scott Lynch is just a guy, but his witches are positively sassy with the resourceful responses in "A Year and A Day In Old Theradine." Think Leiber and Vance would approve. (They're both name dropped in Martin's intro, as is Howard, but I'll have to take RR's word for the roguery of Conan.)
Daniel Abraham's "The Meaning of Love" also moves right along with the lucid twists, but more bittersweet, in cycles of majors and minors, like a good who-knows-how-old robust folk ballad. Somewhat similar shading/realness but in a pastoral setting and different-enough voice: Patrick Rothfuss's "The Lightning Tree," whose central figure is like a more sensitive Tom Sawyer, albeit one who is evidently a fairy, the kind with an eye for human lasses (and vice-versa, though they may not be---well, you'll see).
The most surprising story is Paul Cornell's "A Better Way To Die," about a good subject of a bad (and/or mad? Or just superrealpolitik) king and regime and way of life, a subject and brave agent who truly believes in "the balance" when the king and some senior advisors shift between levels of cultural piety. integrity, sanity---can we really continue a sense of reality and power based on primogeniture when multiple realities are the seemingly do-able New World(s)? Somehow, this seems like a serious question here, as the cards and scenes are re-shuffled and played. The author has written Dr Who scripts. also for Batman & Robin and Wolverine comics (and a Superman graphic novel at my library), so maybe all that helped with roping me in, as it prob did re my early hero Alfred Bester.

"wobbly-Fed-hacked," the Fed hacker is wobbly, baby, geez what a small screen sorry all the fluffs here.

JRRT does it better, RR; sorry, since I gather from some of your dismissals of GOT critiques that you think you're improving on his work in some ways, at least

lol

"you know what Lord of the Rings is really missing? Quality rape scenes"

Yeah, his basic defense (vs all kinds of objections) is "I bring the realness to fantasy." But Westerns doesn't *realleee* have a culture: despite "let's put in some relationships" from time to time, activities, incl sexual (voluntary and otherwise) mine a narrow vein.

Westeros! Damn you small-screen autocorrect!

Sorry, I'll try not to do this at the library from now on.

But Westeros doesn't *realleee* have a culture

aggh yes thank you this bugs the shit out of me! (full disclosure I have only watched the show I am not bothering w the books) His version of realism is like some parody of 80s comics "they're not just for kids any more!" reportage - ie, "realism" = boobs + blood.

the huge cultural forces/institutions of the middle ages that he draws inspiration from - religion, lyric/epic poetry, regional traditions/holidays/celebrations - these are all either waaaaaay in the background in GoT or totally ignored altogether

(I meant he draws his inspiration from the middle ages there, if that wasn't clear)

few things turn me into a JRRT/LOTR stan faster than seeing someone claim that GOT is more adult/mature/complex (etc) because it's more violent or (worse) "darker" than tolkien.

Yeah his big rejoinder is, "What's Aragorn's tax policy?" ooooo---but what's Joffrey's tax policy, or that of anybody else on the Iron Throne or other Thrones. Do the peasants (or whomever) pay tribute and if so when do they harvest or mine or weave or distill or etc.? Everybody's fighting fleeing fucking drinking plotting arguing snarking talking talking talking 24/7 All's I know of their economy is the dwarf Hand of The King said the Iron Throne was far beyond overdrawn at the Bank of Something cos forever war.
(Again, this is the show: hopefully the novels are better than this, and much better than the "chronicles," which are wayyy worse than the show)

Beyond the big institutional stuff like religion and economics (which, granted, are only dealt with peripherally by Tolkien), he gives some sense of the culture all the characters are embedded in - the songs they sing, the things they like to eat, what they smoke, the stories they tell - you get a sense of the lives of average people. there's none of this GoT, it's all scheming and nursing old grudges and fatalism plus boobs

Tolkien is so fucking bucolic, where's all the high infant mortality, infectious diseases, serious cancer problem from all the pipe smoking.

shakey are you actually comparing the amount of detail in the LOTR books vs a tv show? this is bizarre and pointless even for you

I don't think that's what I'm doing, no

Tolkien is so fucking bucolic, where's all the high infant mortality

Among the hobbits aside, there don't actually seem to be any infants at all

The comparison is fair, considering four seasons of GOT, with no commercials breaking up the epic eps. I enjoy them sometimes, from moment to moment, but overall they do slog on, with no particular takeaway. I hope the novels are better

Is it four now, or five? No prob waiting for Season Whatevs DVDs to show up at my village library, this spring maybe.

Reading around in this Damon Knight anthology of ghost stories called The Golden Road. So far so good.

is there an sf/fantasy book covers/art thread? or should I start one? or just image bomb this thread

Rolling fantastical art thread (including fantasy/horror/weird art, surrealism/visionary, religious spectacle art and subtly strange art)
I'd be happy if you used this thread. It's not getting much action.

that doesn't quite seem to fit the bill for what I had in mind (ie Charles Moll book covers)

Charles Moll fits in fantasy though. I made that thread for everything from Bosch, Dali to pulps, paperbacks and all sorts of commercial art.
Start another thread if you insist something more specific but I just wanted anything fantastical or weird in there.

reading this now. more than 300,000 words! SF size queens crack me up. so far nothing has flattened me or made me ponder my existence, but it has been entertaining.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xpa1/v/t1.0-9/10968501_10153689509587137_1212808210369550914_n.jpg?oh=d35d015f6380e049278f231d4045112e&oe=554FD1CE&__gda__=1431543256_cbb0d020b32b3a57fadcd471ad3d13dd

I think I might have saw that recently because I'm sure I seen a "year's best" collection of surprising size.