Monday, September 9, 2024

Playboy September 1974

Playboy
September 1974
September, 1974, and the number one single on the Billboard Hot 100 is 'I Shot the Sheriff,' by Eric Clapton. Quite a few classic soul / R & B tunes also on the list.
The September issue of Playboy is formidable; 246 pages, including a lot of advertising. Advertising for men's fashion, which, in 1974, was either horrible, or inspirational (depending on your point of view). For my part, I think the 'Casino' hat is pretty stylin' !

There is a lot of worthwhile content in this September issue, such as the interview with UK author Anthony Burgess. He reveals that an inspiration for his novel 'A Clockwork Orange' was a brutal incident involving his wife, that took place during the Second World War..........

It's a measure of how integral magazines were to the print media of the 1970s that this issue has some rather elaborate formatting, including a keyhole (the iris centered in the star) overlay of a brilliant illustration by Don Ivan Punchatz:

Elsewhere, we have a 'stepback' illustration for a short story by John Collier. These kinds of special inserts were expensive, but publishers (back then) deemed them valuable. It's doubtful if magazines being printed nowadays would be willing to do this sort of thing.........

The magazine's 'After Hours' section highlights the growing footprint of comics, and Marvel comics, in particular, as a pop culture phenomenon.

A noteworthy short story in this issue is 'A Place to Avoid' by David Ely. Ely (b. 1927), perhaps best known for his 1963 suspense novel 'Seconds,' presents a well-told tale of an Ugly German interacting with the peasantry of postwar Italy.

On the topic of Nudies, this issue makes clear the efforts by the Playboy editorial staff to emulate Penthouse. But they can't do it right. Trying to imitate Bob Guccione's softcore, soft-focus, simulated sex portfolios, Playboy does something called 'Do It Now !' about sex in public. The photos are cringey, even gross (an overweight middle-aged man in the steam room ?!). Guccione has Playboy beat by a mile.

At least this September issue gives us the traditional blonde nubile, this time in the form of 19 year-old Jane Lubeck, who is a 'Raiderette' cheerleader. I like Jane. She's that all-natural, 70s kind of a girl.
That's how they did it, fifty years ago in the Fall of '74 !

Thursday, September 5, 2024

Book Review: Wolf's Complete Book of Terror

Book Review: 'Wolf's Complete Book of Terror' 

3 / 5 Stars

I remember getting this book sometime in the early 1980s, perhaps as a selection from the Quality Paperback Book Club (along with 'Godel Escher Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid').
 
Leonard Wolf (1923 - 2019) was Romanian-born emigre to the States who had a lengthy and successful career as an editor of anthologies, many of these devoted to horror and the 'Macabre.' He also wrote two nonfiction books on Dracula. His daughter Naomi Wolf is a well-known feminist and social critic.
 
'Wolf's Complete Book of Terror' (473 pp.) was published in June, 1979, by Clarkson Potter in both trade paperback and hardcover editions. It's illustrated with black-and-white reproductions taken from Old Tyme woodcuts, and low-res photo reproductions. 

Issued at a time when the Paperbacks from Hell boom was just starting to get traction, 'Wolf's Complete' benefitted from being a book club selection. I don't think many readers under 40 are going to understand how influential the book clubs were in terms of promotion and marketing, back in the 70s and 80s, when there was no amazon.............. 
 
Anyways, there are 63 entries in the anthology, consisting of excerpts from novels; short stories; and poems. In terms of chronology, they span from several centuries ago (the folk tale 'Bluebeard', from 1697) up until 1973, and LeGuin's 'The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.' The overwhelming majority of the entries are 'classical' in origin and selected, presumably, because they were in the public domain and thus less expensive in terms of acquiring the rights for reprinting in an anthology.
 
The book's highbrow approach to its selections is both its weakness and its strength. Some entries (such as 'Omelas,' 'Axolotl,' and 'The South') only are vaguely related to horror or the supernatural, and were included to pad things out. While there are a good number of classical ghost and horror tales ('The Fly,' 'It's a Good Life,' 'They Bite,' and 'The Monkey's Paw'), by the late 1970s these stories were starting to pall from being so regularly anthologized.

To the good, 'Wolf's Complete' did introduce me, when I was a college student, to writers such as Baudelaire (whose entry, the poem 'A Carrion,' is unlikely to be encountered in any other horror / supernatural anthology).

Summing up, those looking for a collection representative of classical horror tales and poems, culled from writers and cultures from around the world, will find 'Wolf's Complete Book of Terror' to be a good single-volume anthology. However, those wanting contemporary material, more firmly adhering to horror fiction tenets, will want to look elsewhere.

Monday, September 2, 2024

National Lampoon September 1976

National Lampoon
September 1976
September, 1976. Looking at the Billboard 200 chart, which tracks LP sales, we see that the top 5 albums include some monster records of the decade: Fleetwood Mac, and Frampton Comes Alive. Breezin', by George Benson, is that rare jazz album that makes it into the top 10 of the rock / pop chart.
The latest issue of National Lampoon is out, and it's not very good. The feature articles are pretty lame, as if the editorial team is just going through the motions.
 
Even the advertising has a tired feel to it. Casablanca records, riding the wave of popularity of Kiss, issues a lavishly packaged three-record album, containing the first three LPs from the band. The deluxe packaging can't obscure the fact that the three LPs all are pretty awful.....
An advertisement for comic book books reminds us that back in '76 there was no such thing as a 'graphic novel,' and much of the stuff featuring comics in hardbound compilations was intended for the nostalgia market.
As far the Lampoon's content goes, the comics are the best entries. 'Trots and Bonnie' takes aim at lesbians, while 'Goobers' continues to offend racial sensibilities. That's how they did it, back in September '76..........

Thursday, August 29, 2024

Book Review: Time Travelers

Book Review: 'Time Travelers' edited by Gardner Dozois
2  / 5 Stars

'Time Travelers: From Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine' (275 pp.) was edited by Gardner Dozois and published by Ace Books in March 1989. The cover art is by Colin Hay.

This anthology features stories, all published in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine over the interval from 1976 to 1986, that deal with time travel.

This anthology is interesting in terms of providing a comparative showcase of older, established sci-fi writers, whose submissions to IASFM display the persistence of New Wave-era themes and prose styles; and newer writers, allied with the still-emerging genre of cyberpunk. 

The editors of IASFM were more accommodating to submissions from established authors like Aldiss, Watson, Varley, and Silverberg. Obviously this policy was informed by the value of having 'name' authors advertised on the magazine cover. 

My summary of the contents: 

Air Raid, by John Varley (1976): travelers from the future teleport into airplanes, as part of a scheme to save the human race. This story later was expanded into Varley's 1983 novel 'Millennium.'

The Small Stones of Tu Fu, by Brian W. Aldiss (1978): a traveler from the future obtains comfort from the Zen musings of an elderly Chinese sage. An effort by Aldiss to write something 'profound', something New Wave. I found this story underwhelming.

Time and Hagakure, by Steven Utley (1977): a Japanese man is able to telepathically communicate with those living in the past. Can he change the fate of people dear to him ?

The Comedian, by Tim Sullivan (1982): Chris Reilly is doing bad things, because a hologram, sent from the future, is telling him to........There is a 'shock' ending.

Twilight Time, by Lewis Shiner (1984): Travis travels back in time to 1961, and his boyhood home of Globe, Arizona, where Ace Doubles, True, and 'Rip Hunter' comics beckon from the racks of the National News stand. His dreams of renewal and redemption are on the verge of fulfilment. There's just a slight problem: Travis's Globe didn't have a swath of vitrified dirt lying across the road into town........! This is the best entry in the anthology.
Sailing to Byzantium, by Robert Silverberg (1985): Charles Phillips has been transported from the USA of 1984 to the 50th century, where there are only 4 million people on the planet, and these people enjoy remarkable luxury and comfort due to advanced technologies. Is there a catch to the lives of splendor enjoyed by the lotus eaters of the 50th century ? Maybe.........

This novelette won the 1985 Nebula award. This shouldn't be all that surprising, since it's basically a reboot of Silverberg's novelette 'Born With the Dead', which won the Nebula in 1974. 

'Sailing' is very much a piece from the New Wave era. It is resolute in exploring humanistic themes; a prose style so lyrical, as to be overwritten; the standard-issue Silverberg protagonist, which is a sensitive man afflicted (or blessed) simultaneously with amnesia and anomie; a meandering plot culminating in a revelation about one's sense of Self. 'Sailing' badly suffers when compared to the leaner, more taut storytelling of Shiner. 

Ghost Lecturer, by Ian Watson (1984): the Roman poet Lucius Accius is brought forward in time as a promotion and marketing stunt by the scheming television producer Jim Roseberry. However, the way Lucius sees the world and the things in it is very different from the way we in the 20th century see things. So there will be consequences......

This is another of the weaker stories in the anthology. It's a New Wave piece from Watson that seeks to use sci-fi as a vehicle to say something Profound about the phenomenon of Perception. It may have been trendy had it seen print in 1973, but in 1984, it seems tepid and dated.

Hauntings, by Kim Antieau (1985): Kate enjoys living in an old farmhouse, even if late at night she hears people whispering in her ear. 

Klein's Machine, by Andrew Weiner (1985): Phil Klein is a nice Jewish boy. Very smart, but psychologically troubled. He is found semi-comatose on a Greyhound bus, and eventually a shrink pries loose from Phil an incredible tale, one of travel into the far future. This story has a quirky sort of originality, but the ending has an ambiguous quality that left me unimpressed.

The Pure Product, by John Kessel (1986): people from the future are able to travel to our present, and do Bad Things with impunity. This story tries to say something Profound about free will and the nature of existence. It's too scattered to be very effective.
Aymara, by Lucius Shepard (1986): writer William Page Corson investigates a tale about a strange, ruined city deep in the Honduran jungle, and a time travel incident involving a woman from the future - named Aymara. 

This novelette starts off on a promising note, but too-quickly devolves into a melodrama where the actions of the characters are told, not shown. The time travel component of the narrative has a perfunctory quality, as author Shepard is more concerned with documenting the travail of lost love.

The verdict ? 'Time Travelers' really only has one good story, that being the entry from Lewis Shiner. Too many of the other contributions settle for predictable, 'softer' storytelling outcomes, rather than trying to do more involved, hard-sf oriented treatments of the theme. The anthology gets a Two-Star Rating.

Monday, August 26, 2024

The Best Science Fiction Novels of the Eighties

The  Top 10  Science  Fiction  Novels  of the  Eighties

In August 2023 I wrote up a post about my top 10 science fiction novels of the Seventies. None of my readers reacted violently to my list; indeed, some found the selections to have merit (!?). So, here I am with my top 10 science fiction novels of the Eighties.
 
As is the case with my Seventies selections, for the Eighties, I am showcasing novels that might not be foremost in mind as compared to those that won Hugo or Nebula awards, or were bestsellers (such as was the case with 'The Fountains of Paradise' or 'The Robots of Dawn.')
 
I do include trilogies, which I collectively count as one selection.

These aren't presented in any particular order, but simply represent a 'Top 10' compendium of 5-Star novels.

Here we go:
 
Slow Fall to Dawn, by Stephen Leigh (1981): this is the first volume in the 'Neweden' trilogy. On the eponymous backwater planet, society is governed by myriad guilds. To eliminate the untoward effects of crime and war, the ruling council demands that disputes between parties be settled by hiring contract killers from the guild of the assassins. The novels follow the adventures of Gyll the Thane, the leader of the assassin's guild, and a man with ambitions of expanding his operations into the Federation. The Neweden novels have a lyrical, Vance-ian flavor that I found appealing, and enough plot turns and twists to sustain interest over the span of three volumes.
 
West of Eden, by Harry Harrison (1984): on an alternate Earth, the comet that killed the dinosaurs never strikes, and as a result, the Age of Reptiles proceeds, in due course giving rise to a race of bipedal, talking lizards whose skills in bioengineering enable them to rule the tropical regions of the planet. In the temperate latitudes, populations of Cro-Magnons eke out a precarious existence. When one of their number, a young man named Kerrick, is captured and reared by the lizards, he gains insights into the biology of the reptiles, knowledge that can be used to resist their rule. Harrison is a veteran author and he demonstrates this in 'West of Eden,' deploying a smooth prose style that makes all three volumes engaging reads.
 
Jitterbug, by Mike McQuay (1984): this novel is burdened with one of the more unfortunate cover illustrations imposed on an eighties sci-fi book, which is too bad, because the contents are much better than the cover would indicate. ‘Jitterbug’ is set in a near-future USA under the rule of Saudi Arabia and Islam. Outside the walled environs of New Orleans, people terminally infected with a modified herpesvirus roam the depopulated countryside, interacting with outcasts and criminals. A young and ambitious outcast named Olsen strives to join the corporate elites secluded within the city. 'Jitterbug' combines sarcastic humor with revealing observations of Islam and Arab culture that, at the time, were rare in the genre of science fiction.
 

Protectorate, by Mick Farren (1985): the Eighties saw some pretty good alien invasion novels, such as 'Footfall,' by Niven and Pournelle (1985). But I think this novel by Mick Farren is a little bit better than 'Footfall.'
 
In 'Protectorate,' Earth has been conquered by a race of insectoid aliens known as the Wasps. Capable of summarily killing any human who displays ill-intentions towards them, the Wasps seemingly are omnipotent, and most of the surviving members of humanity are content to hustle amid the ruins of their vanquished civilization. But then a young man named Gwynn arrives on the scene…..a man with the power to defy the Wasps ! Farren avoids making ‘Protectorate’ a simplistic novel about heroic earthlings rising up against their alien oppressors, and deploys regular episodes of violence and mordant humor to give the book an offbeat, cynical sensibility. 

Starhammer, by Christopher Rowley (1986): this is the first entry in the ‘Vang’ trilogy. The novel is set in the far future, when Earth is subservient to a race of blue-skinned aliens known as the laowon. Protagonist Jon Iehard is a detective assigned to ferret out and eliminate humans who resist loawon rule. One such resistor is Eblis Bey, an elderly man who seeks the long-lost planet Baraf, where, it is rumored, lies the Starhammer: a weapon of unimaginable power that can free humanity from the thumb of the laowon. But what Jon Iehard doesn’t realize is that the Starhammer was created to counter a weapon of even greater lethality….the Vang trilogy is great space opera, tinged with horror and dark humor. 


Count Zero, by William Gibson (1986): this quasi-sequel to ‘Neuromancer’ delivers the cyberpunk experience, but has a more accessible prose style and more straightforward plotting than its predecessor. The cast of characters is just as interesting as those populating ‘Neuromancer,’ and Gibson’s descriptions of near-future fashion, tech, and sociocultural tropes remain engaging despite the passage of nearly 40 years. 


Shining Steel, by Lawrence Watt-Evans (1986): On the planet Godsworld, Christian fundamentalists engage in violent conflicts over petty issues of doctrine. John Mercy-of-Christ, the military commander of the True Word and Flesh sect, prepares to become the dictator of Godsworld. But then comes disturbing news: a task force of offworlders have taken an interest in the planet, and they have weapons that easily can crush the forces of the True Word and Flesh. Gifted with a plot that avoids the predictable, ‘Shining Steel’ provides a treatment of the conflict between Religion and Science that is more imaginative, and nuanced, than most.
 

Through Darkest America, by Neal Barrett Jr. (1986): This novel (and its sequel, 'Dawn's Uncertain Light,' 1989), takes place in the U.S. several centuries after World War Three has left society at a level equivalent to that of the mid- 19th century. Howie Ryder is a young man growing up on a prosperous farm in the southeastern region of the country. When his family defies the heavy hand of the government, Howie finds himself the subject of a manhunt, and flees west to seek safety in the wastelands. One part The Outlaw Josey Wales, one part Leigh Brackett's classic novel 'The Long Tomorrow,' and one part splatterpunk, 'Darkest America' is fast-moving and suspenseful.


The Return, by Richard Maynard (1988): this novel first was printed in the UK under the title 'The Quiet Place.' The UK edition's cover art is more graphic and informative than the cover used in the American edition (where the novel was retitled 'The Return'). 'The Return' is infused with the pessimistic attitude prevailing in British science fiction. The plot revolves around a starship crew who return to Earth following a relativistic voyage into deep space. They are appalled to discover that Europe has reverted to barbarism, and a brutal fight for survival is waged as they seek to discover what, or whom, has brought about the downfall of civilization. 'The Return' brings something new, albeit downbeat, to the post-apocalypse genre, and deserves wider recognition.
 
 
Metrophage, by Richard Kadrey (1988): this cyberpunk novel is set early in the 21st century in a chaotic, partially destroyed Los Angeles. L.A. is divided into a mosaic of neighborhoods, some enjoying wealth and privilege, while others are stricken with poverty and lawlessness. The streets are peopled by various tribes comprised of techno-enthusiasts, scavengers, self-styled anarchists, and ethnic groups. The novel's hero is one Jonny Qabbala, a punk who earns a living running drugs for the Smuggler Lords. A plague of suspicious origin will devastate the low-income environs of the city.....unless Jonny can find a cure. Kadrey’s dialogue is well-written and melds nicely with a quirky cast of characters, whose adventures unfold in an L.A. that’s one part ‘Mad Max,’ and one part ‘Blade Runner.’ 

So there you have it, the Top 10 science fiction novels of the Eighties !

Thursday, August 22, 2024

Book Review: John the Balladeer

Book Review: 'John the Balladeer' by Manly Wade Wellman
5 / 5 Stars
 
'John the Balladeer' (261 pp.) was published by Valancourt Books in 2023. It's a reprinting of the 1988 Baen Books edition, which is long out of print, and copies of which are expensive (one eBay seller / speculator is asking for $355.47 !).

'John the Balladeer' compiles all the stories about the eponymous guitarist that Wellman wrote and published between 1951 and (posthumously) 1987.
 
Wellman (1903 - 1986) is of course one of the most celebrated writers of horror, fantasy, and science fiction of the late 20th century. All of his books eagerly are sought by Paperback Fanatics, and it's nice to see Valancourt reprint this particular title, making Wellman's works more accessible to the modern-day readership.
 
'John the Balladeer' was one of the more prominent characters in Wellman's fiction. Sometimes referred to as 'Silver John,' because his guitar had silver strings, John appeared in both the short stories compiled in this anthology, and novels such as 'After Dark' (1980) and 'The Hanging Stones' (1982). John deployed down-home geniality and a Christian ethos to confront and defeat various occult and supernatural troublemakers running loose in the wild country along the North Carolina - Tennessee border.
 
This anthology features a Forward by the late David Drake, a friend of Wellman's and a fellow North Carolina writer. David Drake provides an anecdote about visiting the Wellman cabin in Madison County, the real-world inspiration for the locales in which John travels. Karl Edward Wagner, another North Carolina fantasy fiction stalwart, was in attendance at the same time as Drake, so everyone had a good time taking in the high country air and some stringed instrument music. 
 
Wagner in turn provides an Introduction, in which he lays out the history of the John stories and the rationale behind their chronological presentation in the book. 
 
A reality of the Silver John stories is that they utilize a somewhat stilted prose meant to emulate a regional dialect, and accommodating this dialect takes some patience on the reader's part. 
 
He was purely ugly. I'd been knowing him ten years, and he looked as ugly that minute as the first time I'd seen him, with his mean face and his big hungry nose and the black patch over one eye. When he'd had both his eyes, they were so close together you'd swear he could look through a keyhole with the two of them at once.
 
***

"Been quite a much of blight this season," said the carpenter.

"Yes, down valley, but not up here." Mr Absalom glittered his eyes toward the house across the ditch . "A curse was put on my field. And who'd have reason to put a curse on, from some hateful old witch-book or other, but  Troy Holcomb ? I told him to his face. He denied the truth of that."

"Of course he'd deny it," said the carpenter.
 
***

It was another girl, older than Tilda, taller. Her hair was blacker than storm, and her pointy-chinned, pale face was lovely. She looked at Tilda a-kneeling by the spring and she sneered, and it showed her teeth as bright as glass beads.
 
***

I found 'John the Balladeer' to be more enjoyable when I read one or two stories at a time, rather than methodically going through the book from cover to cover in several sittings.

Who will like 'John the Balladeer' ? It's not a book of horror stories in the traditional sense of haunted houses, vampires, ghosts, specters, abominable snowmen, and killer crabs. But it does offer a down-home, folksy perspective on the supernatural, mixed in with a healthy leavening of Americana. If that appeals to you, then 'John the Balladeer' well is worth getting.

Tuesday, August 20, 2024

The font for the Dune novels of the 1970s

 The font for the 'Dune' books
Over at the 'Fonts in Use' blog, an interesting post about the origin of the font used on the covers of the Berkley Books paperback editions of the Dune books from the 1970s. It apparently is 'Davison Art Nouveau,' introduced in 1967 by Meyer Davison.
Davison Art Nouveau wound up being used for most / all of Frank Herbert's novels, as well as calendars, published by Berkley. 

The Comments accompanying the article also are pretty interesting, going deeply 'into the weeds' with Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass- !?

Saturday, August 17, 2024

Book Review: Blood Knot

Book Review: 'Blood Knot' by Burt Cole
1 / 5 Stars

Reading old issues of Penthouse, Rolling Stone, and Playboy from the 1970s and 1980s exposes one to all manner of book reviews, and some of the titles featured in the reviews can be intriguing. Thus it was that I investigated 'Blood Knot' (197 pp.), which was published in hardback by St. Martin's Press in 1980. As best as I can tell, it never was issued in paperback.

'Burt Cole' is the pseudonym of the U.S. writer Thomas DIxon (b. 1930), who, from the late 1950s to the late 1980s, published a number of novels in the science fiction, melodrama, and thriller genres. 

I will state at the outset that 'Blood Knot' is a proto-splatterpunk novel, published in the years before the genre formally existed.

The novel is set in the near future, i.e., the 1990s, in a United States gripped by civil war between the fascist federal government and the Marxist People's Republic. All manner of atrocities and abominations freely are committed by both sides. It is unclear who the victor will be, but the People's Freedom Army (PFA) controls the rural areas of the eastern half of the country, leaving the feds to hold the cities and towns. The PFA regularly mounts forays to harass federal positions, while the feds, for their part, look to intercept and destroy PFA sorties through the use of armored vehicles and heli-gunships.

'Blood Knot' follows the fates of two members of the PFA. One is Mano, who, at the start of the book, is idling in the PFA rear area in the New Jersey countryside, recuperating from a debilitating war wound. Mano is a conscientious soldier: under no illusions that the war is a noble thing, but convinced of the righteousness of the People's Republic.

The other main character in the book is Kindred, a middle-aged man of seemingly mild appearance and demeanor who trains the PFA recruits in hand-to-hand combat methods. Kindred's body count has earned him a healthy respect (even fear) among the members of the PFA. Author Cole informs the reader that Kindred is a psychopath, with no moral scruples; he will kill anyone who angers him, as casually as swatting a fly. A Deep and Abiding Question the novel laboriously raises, is whether a psychopath in the service of a people's revolution is morally justifiable. Is Kindred an asset, or a liability ?

Over the course of the novel the paths of the two men will meet, for Mano's dedication to the cause, and the welfare of his fellow PFA members, is in conflict with Kindred's fondness for mayhem.

'Blood Knot' has an interesting and offbeat premise. Its depictions of a USA engaged in a bleak, destructive war are effective. However, the novel has major weaknesses.

One is the prose, which is stilted. I encountered the following adverbs:

buttocky
ventriloquially
screechily
staggaredly
tickedly
jerkily
runnily (referring to a bowel movement - !)

I've read some pulp prose in my time, but never with this many clunkers crammed into less than 200 pages. I also came upon the words 'durbar' (an assembly held by South Asian royalty) and 'fugacious' (short-lived).

Along with the prose style, 'Blood Knot' has its problems with plotting and composition. The narrative abruptly switches in time and place, without much in the way of framing or transitional passages. This is confusing. Then there are the passages, some several pages in length, where Kindred lectures (in clinical detail) on protocols for killing people. Author Cole intends these passages to inform the reader as to how hardened Kindred is, but deploying more than one passage for this purpose is (pun intended) 'overkill.'

The final 20 pages of the novel are filled with splatterpunk scenes. While I can tolerate my share of splat, when presented with page after page of gore and grue (including detailed descriptions of edged weapons being inserted into bodies), I had little enthusiasm for finishing the book.

I am comfortable with giving 'Blood Knot' a score of One Star. Apparently Cole's 1989 novel, 'The Quick', which I have not read, is a reboot of 'Blood Knot,' with a hero named 'Shaman' who is a version of Kindred. I may or may not tackle 'The Quick;' anyone who has, is welcome to post a Comment here with their opinion.