Den II: Muvovum

Den II: Muvovum
by Richard Corben

 

'Den II: Muvovum' was one of the longest-running serials in Heavy Metal magazine, running in 13 parts from September, 1981 all the way to March, 1983. 

While these installments all were very short in length, each of them delivered the D-cup imagery, T & A action, and sly humor that made the HM readership fond fans of Corben's work.

This trade paperback from Catalan Communications was printed in 1984, and compiles the entire 13-part series. It's a quality trade paperback, with 'slick' paper and very good color separations that show off Corben's unique color printing process - all the more impressive when you consider this was the early 80s, well before PC-based coloring was a mainstay of the industry.

It's not necessary to have read the first installment of 'Den' ('Den: Neverwhere') in order to understand the comparatively simple plot of 'Den II'. Without disclosing any spoilers, Den joins his friends in Zegium for a trip to the neighboring territory of Muvovum, there to search for the powerful Stones of Nar, the magic of which can transport Den (and his increasingly truculent girlfriend Kath) back to Earth.

No sooner have Den and Kath been transported to Earth, when trouble arrives in Zegium, in the form of the Queen, who seeks the Stones for her own use.

Events get even more dire when Den's friend Tarn goes astray in the Dramite country of Muvovum. Be prepared for some uniquely gruesome monster action......

It's up to Den to return to Neverwhere and set things aright....but he's not going to have it easy.

 

The softcore porn sequences that may have seemed racy back in the early 80s will probably be observed by contemporary readers with eye-rolling amusement; however, no matter how young and hip you are, Corben's artwork should impress.

'Den II' is an entertaining comic, whether you're reading it for nostalgia value; as an accompaniment to getting stoned; or both. I was fortunate to get this reasonably good-condition copy of 'Den II' for $5. Unfortunately, copies of this trade paperback compilation in good condition go for exorbitant prices.........indeed, this is true for many of the compilations of Corben's work Catalan issued in the 80s. 

Maybe Dark Horse / New Comic Company, or UK publisher Titan Books, will reprint some of this work in new, affordable compilations.....?!

Book Review: The Year's Best Fantasy Stories: 2

Book Review: 'The Year's Best Fantasy Stories: 2' edited by Lin Carter 

4 / 5 Stars

‘The Year’s Best Fantasy Stories: 2’ (192 pp) was published by DAW Books (No. 205) in August, 1986, and features cover art by George Barr.

I got my copy way back in August, 1976, when I saw it on the shelves among the other sf paperbacks at Gordon’s Cigar Store. At the time, I found it to be one of the better DAW anthologies. Upon rereading it nearly 40 years later, how does ‘Year’s Best Fantasy 2’ hold up ?

One thing that has become quite clear over the intervening years is that in 1976, as far as publishers were concerned, the category of fantasy was very much a sub-genre of sf. Most mass market paperbacks that dealt with fantasy were either the Lord of the Rings trilogy, or ancillary titles associated with that work. Aside from the LOTR, there might be some barbarian adventure titles on the shelving, but that was pretty much it. The idea that one day, much of the shelf space at major book retailers would be devoted to fantasy, would have seemed …..well……. fantastical.

The stories in ‘Year’s Best Fantasy 2’ all were first published in 1975, and at that time, print outlets for such stories were few. Most of the stories appeared in digest magazines like The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, small press magazines like Anduril, or anthologies from specialized publishers like Arkham House.

Most of the stories in this anthology are as much horror stories as they are fantasy, a reflection of the fact that in 1975, the genre was still centered on the tropes inherited from the pulp era.

In his Introduction, editor Lin Carter commiserates over the failure of 'The Silmarillion', the fabled Tolkein epic perpetually In Preparation, to be released in 1975 (the book finally came out in 1977, and turned out to be remarkably dull). 

Carter is encouraged by the bestseller status of Richard Adam’s 1975 fantasy novel 'Shardik' (which also was a colossal bore).

The stories:

The Demoness, by Tanith Lee: self-consciously overwritten, but entertaining, tale of a female vampire.

The Night of the Unicorn, by Thomas Burnett Swann: an allegory set in Mexico’s Acapulco region.

Cry Wolf, by Pat McIntosh: Thula the warrior maiden meets a shadowy pair of adventurers. A fast- moving, and effective, sword-and-sorcery tale.

Under the Thumbs of the Gods, by Fritz Leiber: unremarkable Fafhrd and Mouser story; our heroes mourn lost loves.

The Guardian of the Vault, by Paul Spencer: a warrior is assigned a very special guard duty. One of the better entries in the anthology.

The Lamp from Atlantis, by L. Sprague de Camp: mild horror story about a fabled talisman. Surprisingly well-written, for a piece of de Camp short fiction.

Xiurhn, by Gary Myers: Lovecraft / Clark Ashton Smith homage involving an outcast mage who seeks vengeance on his tribe. Ponderous prose.

The City in the Jewel, by Lin Carter: as the editor of the ‘Year’s Best Fantasy’ series, Carter had no real scruples about promoting his own work. Sometimes his work was awful. But this ‘Thongor’ story, although employing a self-consciously ‘pulp’ –style prose, is reasonably entertaining.

In ‘Ygiroth, by Walter C. DeBill, Jr: Another Lovecraft-inspired tale about dark doings in ancient lands. Competent, if not all that memorable.

The Scroll of Morloc, by Clark Ashton Smith: this story was actually written by Lin Carter, one of a number of putative Smith tales Carter fabricated from plot scraps and titles from Smith’s posthumous belongings. The value of churning out a Smith pastiche is questionable; readers should prepare to encounter a remarkably constipated vocabulary, including words such as ‘jungle-girt’, ‘zenithal’ (pertaining to the zenith of astronomical bodies), ‘antehuman’, ‘thaumaturgies’, ‘shamanry’, ‘desuetude’ (to fall into disuse), and ‘protoanthropophagi’, among others.

Payment in Kind, by C. A. Cador: the corrupt citizens of a desert city receive their comeuppance. Another of the better entries in the anthology.

Milord Sir Smiht, the English Wizard: a ‘Dr. Eszterhazy’ story about an eccentric mage operating in Davidson’s proto-Steampunk version of late 18th century Central Europe. It relies on humor; unremarkable.

Summing up, ‘The Year’s Best Fantasy Stories: 2’ is one of the more rewarding volumes in the series. Well worth picking up.

Occupied Spaces

'Occupied Spaces'
by Brad Johannsen
Harmony Books, 1977

If, during the late 70s, you opened a copy of the Publishers Central Bureau mail order catalog of remaindered and overstocked books.....

.....you were certain to see listed one Occupied Spaces, a book of psychedelic artwork by Brad Johannsen.

Occupied Spaces (48 pp) was published by Harmony Books, a sub-imprint of Crown Books, who were the kingpin of remainder publishing and marketing in the 70s. They remain a force in retail bookselling even today, providing the 'bargain books' titles you see on the tables at the front of every Barnes and Noble.

Spaces contains some striking, intricate artwork, interspersed with excerpts of text and poems from sources as diverse as Arthur Rimbaud, science writer Louis Thomas, 'The Practice of Zen', and Johannsen himself.

Needless to say, Spaces belonged to that unique category of '70s stoner' art that Heavy Metal was soon to represent in such mannered glory......

Whether you are motivated by nostalgia, or the desire for appropriate visual accompaniment to getting stoned, Spaces is worth investigating. Copies in good condition can be had from your usual online retailers for reasonable prices.

Johannsen provided cover artwork for a number of books and record albums during the 70s. These include album covers for two LPs from the Canadian group Lighthouse: 'Thoughts of Movin' On', and 'One Fine Morning'. An interesting, if rather esoteric, article about the fonts used for the album cover of 'One Fine Morning' is available here.

Johannsen contributed art to 'High Tide', an illustrated compendium of stories and poems from Herman Hesse and Lao Tzu (.......very 70s.......) published in 1972. Unfortunately, used copies of High Tide are very pricey (starting at $95).

I periodically do a Google search using his name, but sadly, information about Brad Johannsen remains scant. Interestingly, one of the reviewers of High Tide at amazon.com relates an anecdote about meeting Johannsen:

I happened to meet Brad Johannsen in a conference room floating about the New York Public Library, where he opened a drawing book, borrowed some colored pencils from the art department, and instantly created a cover for a small booklet ... for cash (Brad was broke). Brad didn't own a single copy of his own books, and he had an interview coming up... so we agreed to meet again and I gave him my copy of his second book, Occupied Spaces.

Unfortunately, online searches for additional information about Brad Johannsen turn up little else. He was present when someone met Steve Wonder......and that's about all I could find.

Book Review: The Garments of Caean

Book Review: 'The Garments of Caean' by Barrington J. Bayley

4 / 5 Stars

I picked this book up, along with another 10 treasured old paperbacks, at the Utah Book and Magazine store on 327 S. Main Street in Salt Lake City this past October.

'The Garments of Caean' first was published in 1976; this DAW Books version (206 pp) was released in February, 1980.

Upon first glance, the cover artwork, by H. R. Van Dongen, is unimpressive. It makes the book seem like yet another entry in humorous sf, the kind of book regularly written by Ron Goulart, and published by DAW, throughout the 70s.

However, the adage 'don't judge a book by its cover' makes sense here, because 'Garments' is actually a very readable examination of anthropology and sociology within the framework of a space opera, offering a more imaginative approach to this sub-genre then most other works of its era.

As the novel opens, Peder Forbarth, a resident of the planet of Ziode, finds himself filled with trepidation. He has reluctantly teamed up with the notorious smuggler Realto Mast, to make a clandestine space voyage to the remote world of Kyre. There, Forbarth is to explore the site of crashed spaceship, a spaceship originating from the planet Caean. 

Caean is famed through the system for the style and textures of its clothing; however, few retailers on other planets have access to Caean inventory. Forbarth's mission is to locate the downed spaceship and loot its hold......a hold crammed with all manner of Caean clothing. 

Although Peder Forbrath is a corpulent, timid man whose main occupation is as a clothing salesman and tailor, he braves the dangers of Kyre and succeeds in emptying the hold of the crashed spaceship. He selects as his reward seemingly modest article from the haul: a single suit of clothing.

But this is no ordinary suit; it is in fact a suit of wondrous Prossim cloth, a rare fabric whose origins are known only to the Caeans. And the suit selected by Forbarth is one of only five ever crafted by the finest tailor in the known worlds, Frachonard.

Once clad in his Frachonard suit, Peder Forbarth finds himself possessed of a new confidence......a new sense of self-worth, a new willingness to embrace, and overcome, life's challenges. As Forbarth embarks on a new career as a stylish 'man about town', easily mingling with the upper crust of society, he learns that when a man is clad in Caean clothing, the clothes do indeed make the man.

But for Peder Forbarth, donning the Frachonard suit is only the beginning. For there is a troubling mystery underlying the evolution of Caean, its society, and its fashion sense. And as Forbarth and his fellow citizens of Ziode are going to discover, there is much more than what meets the eye when it comes to Caean clothing......

'The Garments of Caean' is first and foremost an effort by Barrington J. Bayley to emulate Jack Vance. The narrative routinely makes use of a large assembly of eccentric, obscure adjectives, and adopts the same dry, slightly sardonic narrative tone that characterizes's Vance's literary style. The inclusion of a character named Realto Mast pays tribute to the Vance character 'Rhialto the Marvellous'.

However, Bayley also displays his own innate skill and worthiness as an author. While it focuses on anthropology and sociology in terms of its scientific focus, 'Garments' avoids getting bogged down in the sort of exposition that tends to render other sf novels addressing these themes dull and plodding. 

'Garments' is filled with offbeat, imaginative passages that transcend the typical space opera. There is a gruesome 'Planet of Flies'; deep-space-dwelling races of highly modified humans who engage each other in brutal warfare; a planet with an ecology that that has evolved sonic weaponry; and a prison planet from which escape is seemingly impossible.

This is the first Bayley sf novel that I've ever read. Some critics call him one of the overlooked talents of late 20th century sf. Whether or not this is true, I certainly will be checking out his other novels in this regard.

Bunker's Family by Nicollet

'Bunker's Family' by Nicollet
from Metal Hurlant No. 14, February, 1977

Unfortunately, my efforts to translate the text of this comic using Google Translate are singularly unsuccessful, yielding mainly gibberish. And, as best as I can tell, an English translation of this comic was never printed in the pages of Heavy Metal.

Nonetheless, the warped, satiric genius of 'Bunker's Family' will come across regardless of your fluency in French.......

Christmas 2014 Acquisitions

Christmas 2014 acquisitions

The majority of these paperbacks were obtained from Books and Melodies LLC, a bookstore located at 2600 James Street in Syracuse, New York:

The entire storefront is occupied by the bookstore. The sf section, while not overly large, contained a number of obscure and less frequently encountered titles, most priced at $2 - $3 each. 

Horror fiction is interspersed with the mysteries. There is an extensive section of general fiction, and a large section for nonfiction works, as well as lots of shelf space for DVDs and records (the vinyl kind). 

Books and Melodies is well worth visiting if you are in the Syracuse area.

  
I can't say I'm a big Delaney fan, but these two volumes may be worth investigating.

The Margaret St Clair novel was an utter mystery, while The Ophiuchi Hotline is a well-known example of mid-70s sf.

I'm skeptical of The Steel Crocodile, but it does have a classic late 60s - early 70s cover illustration from The Dillons. The Elwood anthology is likely mediocre, but worth a try.

Lowland Rider may be another over-rated early 90s 'psychological thriller'  masquerading as a horror tale. The Chaos Weapon is a sequel of sorts to Kapp's 1972 novel Patterns of Chaos (review coming soon).

The Dead Astronaut is a collection of sf tales appearing in Playboy during the 60s. The Destroying Angel is second-gen cyberpunk, and seems like a worthy read.

Book Review: The Eyes of the Overworld

Book Review: 'The Eyes of the Overworld' by Jack Vance

5 / 5 Stars

The stories in ‘The Eyes of the Overworld’ were first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1965 – 1966, with the compilation first appearing as an Ace paperback in 1966. This Pocket Books edition (190 pp.) was published in March, 1980; the cover artist is uncredited.

This is the second volume in the four-volume series of ‘The Dying Earth’, the other volumes being ‘The Dying Earth’ (1950), ‘Cugel’s Saga’ (1983), and ‘Rhialto the Marvellous’ (1984).

‘Eyes’ introduces the main character for two of the four books in the saga: Cugel the Clever, probably one of the most well-known antiheroes in sf and fantasy literature. Cugel is routinely amoral, grasping, and avaricious, and often as not has only himself to blame for getting into trouble with various wizards, deities, and angry townspeople. 

At the same time, Cugel is often a source of ironic amusement, and often winds up getting the better of individuals who are as unpleasant as he is himself. The reader can’t help but wind up liking Cugel, despite his faults.

The opening chapter of ‘Eyes’ sees our hero running afoul of a powerful mage, who dispatches Cugel to a remote hinterland, there to recover two marvelous jeweled loupes, which allow their user to visualize a world of wealth and magnificence existing on a higher plane, a world quite nicer than that of the Dying Earth. 

In the course of executing this quest Cugel has various adventures, all of which are related by Vance with the semi-stilted diction that characterizes his written works, a stilted prose that relies on sardonic humor laced with sharp bits of violence.

This being a Vance novel, of course, readers also must prepare to encounter a vocabulary of nouns, adverbs, and adjectives that rarely (if ever) appear in most literature of any genre. 

Despite its comparatively short length, ‘Eyes’ remains an exemplary fantasy / sci-fi novel and is a more worthy read than many of the 500+ pp novels that now dominate the retail shelves. 

If you haven’t yet read any of the Dying Earth novels, ‘Eyes’, along with ‘Cugel’s Saga’, remain the two best entries in the series, and are well worth getting, even though copies in good condition are often expensive.

Exterminator 17

Exterminator 17 
by Jean Pierre Dionnet and Enki Bilal

'Exterminator 17' first was serialized in the French magazine Metal Hurlant in 1976 - 1977. An English translation, in black and white, was serialized in Heavy Metal, starting with the October, 1978 issue and continuing through the March, 1979 issue.

This 1986 Catalan Communications trade paperback compiles all of those English-language episodes, in a color format (done by Dave Brown). Humanoids published a hardcover edition in 2002. Dionnet went on to release a three-volume sequel, titled La Trilogy D’Ellis ('The Ellis Trilogy'), with illustrations by Igor Baranko, that was  published in France from 2003 - 2008. An English-language compilation of Exterminator 17 and the entire Ellis Trilogy was issued by Titan Comics in 2018.

When I picked up and read my very first issue of Heavy Metal in November, 1978, it was my first introduction to European styles of comic book artwork, and I found 'Exterminator 17' to be one of the most offbeat such comics I’d ever seen.

This mainly was due to Bilal's artwork, which was extremely detailed and meticulous, but at the same time, distinctive in its sensibility. The festoonings and graticules and linework gave each image a cluttered, 'organic' quality, while the incorporation of stains, blotches, chips, gouges and smears on the bulkheads of the spaceships, and the clothing of the characters, added a visual element of decay and entropy - things simply not encountered in American comic book art. 

Bilal's rendering of human faces and features was also novel and imaginative....an outstanding example is the unscrupulous plastic surgeon surgeon aboard the 'genetic probe ship' : 

The plot of 'Exterminator 17' also has its own offbeat sensibility that meshes well with the artwork (although in its later stages, the narrative undergoes some confusing jumps and shifts that suggest that somewhere along the way, some pages were dropped from final production).

The eponymous Exterminator is a member of an army of combat androids; these armies were created as proxies for settling disputes between rival political blocs. As the comic book opens, the army to which Exterminator 17 belongs has been deployed to the planetoid Novack for a battle with another android army.

Barely have the rival armies engaged, however, when the dispute is settled by distant negotiations. A built-in 'kill switch' instantly renders all the combatants 'deactivated'.

But as it turns out, the creator of the androids is himself near death. And before he succumbs, his conscience leads him to take an unprecedented step towards freeing the androids.....and the vehicle of this freedom will be Exterminator 17.

I won't disclose any spoilers, save to say that Exterminator 17 embarks on a journey to the stranger realms of the galaxy, and not everyone he meets is trustworthy.....

Summing up, if you're a fan of Metal Hurlant and Heavy Metal, and / or European sf comics, then getting a copy of the 'Exterminator 17' graphic novel is a worthy investment. I recommend the 2018 Titan Comics volume, as it includes the Ellis Trilogy.

Book Review: Commander-1

Book Review: 'Commander-1' by Peter George

2 / 5 Stars

Peter George (1924 – 1966) was a British author who served in the RAF during WW2. In 1958 he published a novel about a paranoid American Air Force commander who launches a nuclear attack on Russia, titled 'Two Hours to Doom'; in the US, it was retitled 'Red Alert'.

In 1962, the American authors Eugene Burdick and Harvey Wheeler published another nuclear disaster novel, titled 'Fail Safe', that also dealt with an command and control error that leads to a nuclear war. George sued them for plagiarism, and the case was settled out of court.

For his part, George co-wrote the screenplay for the 1964 Stanley Kubrick film Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, which was based on 'Red Alert'.

In 1965 George published another novel, 'Commander-1'. This Dell paperback was released in June, 1966. (That same year, Peter George shot himself at the age of 42.)

As ‘Commander-1’ opens, it is Christmas Eve, December 24, 1965. In the Pentagon War Room, Brigadier General Barry Kingston assumes command of the night shift, expecting a quiet and uneventful period of duty. However, NORAD detects the launchings of missiles overseas, and there is a troubling absence of communication from the main US early-warning facility (referred to as ‘Clear’).

As an apprehensive Kingston exchanges phone calls with NORAD, additional launches of Russian ICBMs are observed. The US goes to DEFCON 2 status. Contact is lost with New York City and Scot's Hill, North Carolina, where the President is spending the holidays. The War Room command has no choice but to go to DEFCON 1, and orders an attack on Russia with the entire US arsenal. World War Three commences.

The novel then shifts locale to an un-named US nuclear submarine stationed underneath the polar ice pack. Its Commander, James Geraghty, has been ordered to conduct an experiment in which civilians are housed in an isolation chamber aboard the sub, simulating the closed quarters associated with space travel. To Geraghty’s increasing disquiet, after December 25, he is unable to raise radio links with his home port, the Navy, or with any US military installation.

Once Geraghty does make contact with his superiors, he learns that there has been a nuclear war, and that most of the world is in ruins. He and his submarine now constitute one of the last military resources of the US.

The remainder of ‘Commander-1’ deals with Geraghty’s decision to find a top-secret US base designed to be the final redoubt in the event of WW3. But even as Geraghty embarks on his new mission, his already precarious mental state begins to change….and not for the better.

‘Commander-1’ is primarily a dark satire of the military mind, related in a detached, matter-of-fact prose style, the primary goal of which is to document the growing egomania of Geraghty, the submarine commander. It fails to offer much in terms of vivid descriptions of post-apocalyptic landscapes and devastation; indeed, most of the action unfolds aboard the submarine, or on remote islands in the Pacific.

I won’t disclose any spoilers, but the ending of ‘Commander-1’ is in keeping with author Peter George’s belief in the futility of the Cold War and the nuclear arms race (topics that apparently contributed to the depression that led him to commit suicide). It’s a grimmer novel that Red Alert, and in a sense, more polemical. 

I doubt it will appeal to readers who are interested in the more traditional post-apocalyptic tale, about the struggle for survival in irradiated wastelands populated by mutants and cannibalistic barbarians. 'Commander-1' is best regarded as a product of the height of the Cold War, which (for anyone under 40) has since become a sort of vaguely recalled aspect of 20th century American history......