The spectre of war once more looms on the global horizon. A new generation of writers and military theorists are addressing the new forms of warfare that now challenge the nation-state’s monopoly on war.
Terrorism, technology, fourth generation warfare, the decline of the Pax Americana, and the rise of China are among the issues contemplated by the 20 contributors to Riding the Red Horse, a collection of 24 essays and short stories from technologists, military strategists, military historians, and the leading authors of military science fiction. From the Old Guard to the New, the anthology features some of the keenest minds and best-selling authors writing in the genre today. Three national militaries and three service branches are represented by the contributors, the majority of whom are veterans.
Edited by LTC Tom Kratman, US Army (ret), and Vox Day, Riding the Red Horse covers everything from real-world lasers, intelligence ops, threat assessments, and wargame design to space combats, fleet actions, and ground operations taking place in some of the most popular future universes in science fiction.
The anthology consists of contributions from Eric S. Raymond, William S. Lind, Chris Kennedy, James F. Dunnigan, Jerry Pournelle, Ken Burnside, Christopher Nuttall, Rolf Nelson, Harry Kitchener, Giuseppe Filotto, John F. Carr, Wolfgang Diehr, Thomas Mays, Benjamin Cheah, James Perry, Brad Torgersen, Tedd Roberts, Steve Rzasa, Tom Kratman, and Vox Day. Narrated by Jon Mollison, Riding the Red Horse is 14 hours and 8 minutes in audiobook format.
APPENDIX N: The Literary History of Dungeons & Dragons is a detailed and comprehensive investigation of the various works of science fiction and fantasy that game designer Gary Gygax declared to be the primary influences on his seminal role-playing game, Dungeons & Dragons. It is a deep intellectual dive into the literature of science fiction’s past that will fascinate any serious role-playing gamer. It also contains an extensive interview with the designer of the Tunnels & Trolls RPG, Ken St. Andre.
Author Jeffro Johnson, an expert role-playing gamer, accomplished Dungeon Master and three-time Hugo Award Finalist, critically reviews all 43 works listed by Gygax in the famous appendix of the original D&D game books, and in doing so, draws a series of intelligent conclusions about the literary gap between past and present that are surprisingly relevant to current events, not only in the fantastic world of role-playing, but the real world in which the players live. Johnson is also the Editor of the Castalia House blog and a regular contributor there.
Featuring an Introduction by John C. Wright, himself an inveterate role-playing gamer, APPENDIX N is 355 pages, DRM-free, and retails for $6.99.
Brian Renninger described the significance of Johnson’s APPENDIX N:
With this book we are coming out a dark age. Jerry Pournelle has said “The definition of a Dark Age is that we no longer remember what we once could do.” It’s not just that we have lost capability but, not knowing that we ever had capability that makes it dark. Of course, the term “Dark Ages” has fallen out of current fashion. It seems judgmental and unscientific to call that time after the fall of Rome and through the end of the Viking Age “dark” as if it were lesser in some way. But, I’m not an academic and history is not science. And, Rome was sacked. The aqueducts did stop running. Latin was forgotten, by all but a few specialists, to be replaced by the babble of dozens of local tongues. It’s dark because the records of that time are sparse – fewer people wrote and the people who did write, wrote on fewer topics.
Appendix N is just a reading list. But, a reading list tailored to a topic. The topic being inspirational works for playing the original role-playing game – Dungeons and Dragons. The list was intended to inspire players on adding variety to their game. And, to give players examples that explain why the game was made the way it was made.</
Jeffro Johnson set himself the task to read all of Appendix N in the context of its stated purpose. He found what he was looking for: clear evidence for many of the foundational rules of Dungeons and Dragons hidden in plain sight in the text of old fantastic adventure writing. But, he also found more – the nucleus of an earlier canon of fantastic literature. In that canon he discovered greater variety, subtlety, strangeness and a broader sophistication of theme than found in the general run of fantasy writing today. And, he found some damned fun stories.
So, for us, what has been forgotten? To a large degree, we have forgotten the scope that fantasy fiction can obtain when allowed unfettered freedom of imagination. We have forgotten that fantasy fiction can be just as edgy and daring when addressing the best of human nature rather than the worst. In fact, we have forgotten that literature can and should encompass all things. Or, even more, that literature should also encompass impossible things – especially fantastic literature.
Jeffro has indeed unearthed something. It is the hidden heritage of our beloved genres. I feel a little embarrassed, frankly, that I was so wrong about the fiction that I love so much. What I thought I knew about the genre was a series of walls and fences, put into place to guide me toward opinions and attitudes that were presented as things inevitable…. Jeffro’s work has become a lodestone, pulling at a set of emerging and disparate writers. We are out there, creating what we want from influences as varied as Lord Dunsany and anime. From the maps he drew we are navigating rivers back to their sources. We are exploring myth and knocking the rust off old ideas like heroism and honor.
Some may wonder why Castalia publishes such seemingly esoteric books, especially given the fact that I’m not an RPGer, and never was except in the very most casual computer-game sense. The reason is that the dominance of the Left is cultural, and they arrived at their position of political influence in the West primarily through cultural means as per Gramsci rather than the economic means Marx predicted or the violent means Mao, Lenin, and Che utilized. Those on the Right who sneer at cultural matters as being irrelevant or unimportant fail to realize that they are playing a superficial and losing game. It is from children’s tales and children’s games that tomorrow’s voters are made.
“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.” – GK Chesterton
Those reviewing A Sea of Skulls should really be a little more careful. Such positive reviews bid fair to cause more than a few SF-SJWs to stroke out. Didact’s Reach reviews A Sea of Skulls and finds it to be rather better than one might expect:
If the critics found ATOB a bit difficult to stomach because it proved to be such an effective demonstration of what a (supposedly) less skilled but (definitely) more disciplined writer could do when compared with GRRM’s declining powers, they are going to very quickly find that A Sea of Skulls will be an even bigger shock to their worldview.
For with this book, Vox Day has not merely matched George R. R. Martin’s fantasy writing skills and output. He has exceeded him, by miles, leaving old Rape Rape wheezing and panting in the dust.
In fact, I am willing to go so far as to argue that, with this book, Vox Day has catapulted himself into the storied and rarefied rank of writers that sits just below The Master himself.
That’s right, I went there. I just said that Vox Day has written a book that is nearly as good as J. R. R. Tolkien’s work.
Not as good. But not terribly far off, either.
From one fantasy fan to another, praise simply does not come any higher than that….
This book is, quite simply, an extraordinary achievement. With it, Vox has separated himself from all of his contemporary rivals and has clearly laid down a marker for everyone else to match- and I personally don’t think anyone will be able to do so for years, maybe decades, to come. What he has written here is far more than merely a great book. It is a masterclass of what high fantasy could actually be.
That’s just an excerpt. Read the whole thing there. Of course, what may be the biggest testimony in favor of the growing consensus that the ARTS OF DARK AND LIGHT series has unexpectedly become the best epic fantasy series going is the total silence on the part of those who usually don’t hesitate to speak out critically every time I recommend a book, or, in some cases, exhale. Just as SF/F sites like Black Gate and File 770 inexplicably have nothing to say about many of the very best-selling authors in science fiction, SF authors such as Vaughn Heppner and B.V. Larson, who have sold literal millions of books, they are silent on the subject of a massive epic fantasy saga that some readers now consider to be the best to have appeared in decades.
Now, I am under absolutely no illusion that my work will ever reach the lofty height of Tolkien’s. It can’t. It won’t. Tolkien’s grasp of history, myth, and language are deeper than mine, and the greatness of his work reflects that. The Lord of the Rings is the greatest work of science fiction and fantasy fiction, and, based on my extensive reading of fiction dating back to Homer and the Lady Murasaki, it will remain so for the foreseeable future.
But that does not mean that it cannot be exceeded in various areas, some of which happen to be particular strengths of mine. The martial aspects, the magic systems, the politics, and the socio-sexuality are all elements that can be improved upon. Even the philosophy of evil, in my estimation, is rather on the thin side; who would actually want to serve Sauron? I never found Saruman’s switching sides to be terribly convincing; yes, everyone wants to be on the winning side, but what is the point of being a lieutenant of evil if it requires living in squalor surrounded by orcs?
If nothing else, elf chicks are hotter. So are human chicks, and, arguably, dwarf chicks, for that matter. Is living in a mud pit surrounded by howling, bestial orcs really the way a quasi-immortal wants to spend the rest of his days? I’m just not seeing a credible motivation there.
And let’s not even get started on the whole “fly in on a squadron of eagles and drop the One Ring in Mount Doom” strategy.
Anyhow, it’s very flattering, and encouraging, to see the latest installment in the series has been so well-received. Fans needn’t be concerned that any such praise will go to my head, as to the contrary, it has inspired me to buckle down, grit my teeth, and try to raise my game even more. When even those who openly detest me are willing to admit that AODAL is markedly better than ASOIAF and genuinely merits comparison to The Lord of the Rings, then perhaps I’ll be willing to contemplate a little coasting.
In the meantime, I have about another one million words to write before AODAL will be finished. The only proper verdict at this point is: it’s too soon to tell. I’m barely one-third of the way through the monster. I expect it will be around 1,660,000 words in the end.
Do elves have souls? In a fantasy world in which the realm of Man is dominated by a rich and powerful Church, the Sanctified Father Charity IV has decided the time is ripe to make a conclusive inquiry into the matter. If, in his infallible wisdom, he determines that elves do have immortal souls, then the Church will be obliged to bring the Sacred Word of the Immaculate to them. But if he decides they do not, there will be holy war. Powerful factions line up on both sides of the debate. War-hungry magnates cast greedy eyes at the ancient wealth of the elven kingdoms and pray for a declaration that elves are little more than animals. And there are men who are willing to do more than merely pray.
The delegation sent to the High King of the Elves is led by two great theologians, brilliant philosophers who champion opposite sides of the great debate. And in the Sanctiff’s own stead, he sends the young nobleman, Marcus Valerius. Marcus Valerius is a rising scholar in the Church, talented, fearless, and devout. But he is inexperienced in the ways of the world and nothing in his life has prepared him for the beauty of the elves–or the monumental betrayal into which he rides.
SUMMA ELVETICA: A CASUISTRY OF THE ELVISH CONTROVERSY is the prelude to the massive epic high fantasy saga ARTS OF DARK AND LIGHT. In addition to the novel, it contains eight additional tales of Selenoth, including the Hugo Award finalist, Opera Vita Aeterna. 520 pages. $27.99 hardcover, $19.99 paperback.
If you’re collecting the series for your library, you’ll definitely want this one to go with the other doorstopper. And speaking of series, isn’t it fortuitous that WorldCon is experimenting with a Best Series Hugo this year?
An eligible work for this special award is a multi-volume science fiction or fantasy story, unified by elements such as plot, characters, setting, and presentation, which has appeared in at least three volumes consisting of a total of at least 240,000 words by the close of the calendar year 2016, at least one volume of which was published in 2016.
All right, let’s see here:
Multi-volume science fiction or fantasy story. Fantasy. Check.
Unified by elements such as plot, characters, setting, and presentation. Check.
Has appeared in at least three volumes. Three volumes. Check.
A total of at least 240,000 words. 634,590. Check.
At least one volume published in 2016. A SEA OF SKULLS. Check.
It looks like the Rabid Puppies have a strong candidate for Best Series here. Isn’t that nice? And as the reviewers have noted, as the series have continued, AODAL is stacking up increasingly well against ASOIAF.
Meanwhile, over at Castalia House, Dragon Award-winner Nick Cole has made his debut with a bang, with a post entitled You are Fake Sci-Fi:
Fake Sci-Fi is ruining actual Sci-Fi and here’s who’s to blame: Fake Science Fiction Writers. But first… a little background.
Science fiction has always been a rather fragile affair. At times it has not had the significance it enjoys now. In fact, there were times when it was, for all practical purposes, dead. Just a few grandmasters held the torch during those times, breathing life into the guttering flame during those dark unsexy years of the seventies and eighties when it was just us true believers. But now it’s enjoying a cultural renaissance.
Or is it?
If you’ve heard me talk before, you know that I have a point I occasionally rail on. And it’s this: SciFi is a weak medium that’s been high jacked by radical leftist thinkers recently, to advance cultural change through imaginative storytelling both visual and written in order to download their weird thinking into the collective hardrive.
Just a little clearing the plate as we gear up for some new releases, beginning with the much-anticipated Appendix N: A Literary History of Dungeons & Dragons from Jeffro Johnson. The three Eternal Warriors novels are now available again on Amazon. If you are a New Release subscriber, be sure to check your email. These were my first solo novels, and it tends to show, particularly in the first book. They don’t need to be read in order.
Mariel thought she was the guardian angel of an ordinary child — until the night an army of fallen angels takes an unholy interest in her charge. Overcome by an angel prince of awesome power, Mariel can only watch as a terrible evil descends upon the home of the boy she is guarding, then vanishes with him. 307 pages. $4.99. Available on Kindle Unlimited.
On a fallen planet, evil may be defeated, but it is never vanquished. When the evil archangel Kaym seeks vengeance, he does not aim at those who belong to his divine Enemy, but at the vulnerable souls around them. Two troubled boys are easy prey for Kaym, and as the high school prom approaches, they are willing to serve as his chosen instruments of death. 337 pages. $4.99.
There is war among the Fallen. As the dread daughter of Moloch cuts a broad swath through the demon princes of Europe, the long-conquered Faery kingdom of Albion threatens to rise against its dark master. Treachery and intrigue are the order of the day as evil battles evil, and jackals lurk amidst the shadows to devour the defeated. 346 pages. $4.99.
As others have noted, the dialogue is the worst part of the book. Considering that this was Mr. Beale’s first novel, we immediately discover that he is not a most naturally gifted writer. While it always feels evident that he has made great efforts to craft the dialogue carefully, there are moments where it titters on being banal and cringe-worthy.
The story was alright, but the Christian message was not subtle, and ended up being a complete turnoff. American Protestant Evangelical Christians of a certain variety will enjoy this, though. I didn’t, and can’t recommend it at all.
The book has a couple of strengths that make it unique in Christian fiction. First, the author is honest about the power of evil. He does not whitewash, downplay or ignore the temptations of evil and it’s potentially consuming power. Beale represents evil as the willful choice and temptation that it is, and in doing so incorporates it’s tragic consequences effectively into the story, without diminishing the power of God’s grace and redemption.
Not only an amazing sequel to the first story, but dives right into the logical consequences in ‘real life’ of the universe the author described in the opening book. This second book, I must say, was even more enjoyable and immediately identifiable than the first. I literally could not put the book down once I got into the story line a few dozen pages into the book.
I have been most impressed by Mr. Beale as an author. His development from his first novel to his second is phenomenal. What strikes me most is his dead-on ability to catch the dialogue and culture of his characters. There are few writers who come close to his ability at this. More than that, he is writing not only page-turning stuff, but page-turning stuff with a brain.
This book was better than the first, without a single doubt. It brought the spiritual war to Earth, where it indeed is being fought daily.
This is the third, and in my opinion, the best, story of the War in Heaven trilogy, though this book departs considerably from the other two. While the first two are very noticeably ‘young adult’ in their writing style, this one approaches a regular novel, albeit it is rather unusual in terms of its content. All are written in the vein of C. S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy and Milton’s Paradise Lost, taking the perspective of a ‘fallen world’ very literally.
This, the third book in the Eternal Warriors Series, shows a significant jump both in Mr. Beale’s story-writing abilities and the complexity of the Eternal Warriors setting. One experiences the world of this third book as significantly more expansive, alive, and realistic than the world in the first book. Likewise, the internal worlds of these characters also loom larger.
Excellent finale to this excellent trilogy. I felt a little sad when I finished as I wished the characters were around for a fourth book. I especially enjoyed the spiritual dimension – both the good and evil. Fast paced and fun read. The monsters were enticingly freakish.
You can monitor my brand in real-time on Amazon by watching my sales rank. You can do this for any author. Amazon ranks books based on how many copies have been sold over the past hour to 24 hours.
Mike Cernovich, Gorilla Mindset – #9,431
Robert Cialdini, Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade Kindle Edition by #5,476
Scott Adams, How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life – #6,548
Lena Dunham, Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She’s “Learned” – #23,209
MILO, Dangerous – #897
Donald Trump, The Art of the Deal – #1,646
Hillary Clinton, Stronger Together – #152,422
Mike Cernovich, MAGA Mindset – #47,065
Ben Shapiro, True Allegiance – #40,936
Vox Day, SJWs Always Lie – #5,022
Mike Cernovich, Danger & Play: Essays on Masculinity – #27,356
For those keeping track at home. I’ve surpassed Ben Shapiro, who had a ten-year head start on me and also has many billionaire sugar daddies, and am on par with Vox, whose IQ is way higher than mine and who has been writing longer than I have. (He’s my editor, proof that I work with the best!)
My brand is bigger than a Hillary Clinton surrogate (Lena Dunham) who had her own TV show, and not as large as MILO, Trump, or Scott Adams.
MILO is a once-in-a-generation talent, so there’s no competing with him, ever. No one can.
Amazon sales rank is much more relevant than the mainstream publishers, and the authors published by them, want to admit it is. Yes, it doesn’t capture all possible sales, but the fact is that it captures far more than is required for a statistically relevant sample.
And while it is only a snapshot in time, and cannot capture the conventional sales from major publishers made via the bookstores, it is a vastly more accurate, and comprehensive, picture than that provided by the newspaper bestseller lists, or, God forbid, the SJW-converged awards. As Spacebunny mentioned to me yesterday, the Newbery Medal used to be an indicator of great books you should read, like The Black Cauldron, A Wrinkle in Time and The Dark is Rising. Now it is a reliable indicator of books you should avoid reading at all costs.
But the fact of the matter is that the Amazon rankings correctly indicate that bestselling authors such as Vaughn Heppner (#1,005), B.V. Larson (#884), and David VanDyke (#2,058) have bigger personal brands, and are much bigger influences on SF readers, than conventional authors such as John Scalzi (#8,062), Charles Stross (#9,127), and even China Mieville (#28,169), especially since the latter are heavily reliant upon their publisher’s brands, distribution, and marketing efforts. Sure, more people recognize the names of the latter trio, but far more people actually buy and read books published by the former. And that’s the aspect of brand that counts.
At Castalia, we’re intent on building up the personal brands of our authors, not churning through authors with one predatory two-book deal after another, sitting on the rights as long as possible, then begrudgingly purchasing the mercenary allegiance of those who sell the best. Whether an author sells 50,000 books or 25 books, if we like the quality they are producing, we’ll keep working with them. That’s why you almost always see the authors we’ve published bring us additional books. And also that’s why we’ve invited our authors to begin blogging at the Castalia House blog, including Nick Cole, David the Good, Peter Grant, and Mr. John C. Wright, Esq.
Our goal this year is to make Castalia House the best, most intelligent, SF/F-related site on the Internet. I hope you’ll be a part of that.
Both Selenoth-related. And yes, this is an example of the stuff we discuss at Brainstorm from time to time, but I need more general opinions on these two items.
1. A number of people have been saying they would like to see some sort of summary of the previous book in order to help refresh their memory of A THRONE OF BONES, or even to let them jump right into A SEA OF SKULLS. I really don’t like the idea of a conventional “What Has Gone Before”, since I don’t like intruding on the text, but I can imagine where a letter or two, such as appeared in the first book, might be apt. They would go into the Extended Edition, probably after the Prologue. Yes/No?
2. A few people have encouraged me to crowdfund the two audiobooks, because they are so long that it’s hard to find top quality narrators interested in ACX’s revenue share option. While we do have one good English volunteer presently tackling the short stories and Summa, it’s going to take him a long time just to get through those; I think he’s wrapping up Witchking and is moving on to Wardog soon. (We’ll put them out together with Summa, just as we’re doing with the print.) I’m a little leery about the crowdfunding idea, since you guys are already supporting so many things and this is simply not something I consider a priority on the order of Infogalactic, or even Brainstorm. A top-quality narrator goes for 200 to 400 per hour, and ATOB alone will require 36 hours. Do the math and you can see the problem. Anyhow, share your thoughts on this, if you have any.
To be blunt, I don’t listen to audiobooks myself, so it’s just never been a priority for me. But, I understand some people love them, and I can understand that fans of epic fantasy probably would enjoy having 72+ hours of Selenoth to listen to. So, I’m open to ideas and suggestions. Please note that I’m not looking for volunteers; we have a good volunteer already and I’m not willing to do anything that isn’t going to be both professional and excellent.
Larry Correia fisks a minor author who appears to be hell-bent on convincing herself that mainstream publishing is the only way to go despite having sold fewer books than every single Castalia House author:
I realized that Laurie wasn’t providing writing advice for people who actually want to make a decent living as writers. She is providing advice to people who want to be aloof artistes at dinner parties, before they go back to their day job at Starbucks.
As for what Laurie says about gatekeepers, it is all horse shit. She has no flipping idea what she’s talking about.
Publishers are the “gatekeepers”. If they like you, you’re in, and if they don’t like you, you’re out. Problem is, at best they only have so many publishing slots to fill every year, so they cater to some markets, and leave others to languish. And at worst, they are biased human beings, who often have their heads inserted into their own rectums.
Agents represent the author. Their job is to find stuff they think they can sell to a publisher, and then they keep 15%. So “good” is secondary to “Can I sell this to the gatekeepers?” And then we’re back to slots and rectums.
Editors try to make the author’s stuff better. Period. They aren’t gate keepers, because it is their job to make the stuff that got through the gate suck less (seriously, the HuffPo should hire one). Only self-published authors can hire editors too. Andy Weir hired Bryan Thomas Schmidt to edit the original self-published The Martian. Last I heard that book did okay.
“National and international reviewers” are on the wrong side of the gate, and I’m baffled why she included them. Reviewers come along after the fact, some are useful, but most aren’t. Even though I was ignored or despised by most of the big review places for most of my career, they haven’t made a lick of difference to my sales.
These gatekeepers are assessing whether or not your work is any good.
The problem is that “good” is subjective. What you personally think is “good” is irrelevant when there are a million consumers who disagree. I wouldn’t buy a copy of Twilight, but the author lives in a house made out of solid gold bars. “Good” is arbitrary. The real question is whether your product is sellable. (and yes, it is just a product, get over yourself)
Readers expect books to have passed through all the gates, to be vetted by professionals. This system doesn’t always work out perfectly, but it’s the best system we have.
It was the only system we had before technology came along and upset their apple cart.
When only the gatekeepers could vet what was “good”, sometimes they were right, but since often the “professionals” were 20 something lit majors just out of college, or some clueless weasel who had spent his whole existence in the echo chamber of Manhattan publishing, often the system fed its own tastes and ignored vast swaths of the market.
And when you neglect a market, it will spend its entertainment dollars elsewhere. So in this case, competition is good. Because the real competition isn’t between traditional and indy publishing, it is between reading and movies and video games and streaming. Ultimately the market decides who wins, not some self-appointed gatekeeper.
As Larry correctly observes, her atttitude is that of an author who is more interested in personal validation than professional status. The viability of independent publishing doesn’t mean there isn’t some advantage to publishing with the Big Five, especially if your name happens to begin with MILO. But, as in so many other things, what works for Milo is very unlikely to work for you. He’s a genuine star. Regardless, even very successful independent writers who sell millions of copies don’t hit #1 on Amazon months before release.
Nor is print anywhere close to dead. It’s not really fair to compare our print sales to our digital sales, since less than one-third of our books are in print yet and we have even fewer audio books out, but the breakdown of Castalia’s 2016 book sales is as follows:
67.8% ebook
20.5% print edition
07.5% Kindle Unlimited
04.2% audiobook
That’s unexpected, since we originally assumed Castalia would be an ebook-only publisher. But the real game changer, where the mainstream publishers are concerned, is KU. They don’t play there and they can’t afford to play there. And since publishing is a negative sum game, every $12 million paid out per month by Amazon probably represents at least another $48 million in revenue lost to the major publishers plus around $10 million lost to the authors published by them. It’s my suspicion that Amazon tries to set the KU compensation so that an author will make roughly the same amount from a KU sale-equivalent that he’ll make from conventional publishing sale, rather than the same amount he’ll make from an ebook sale.
KU isn’t great for independent publishers even though some of our big books pay out more per book equivalent than we make per sale. For reference, the average KU payout per page was $0.004848 in 2016. But at least we can afford to be there.
At Castalia House, we are intent on building gradually, on the strong foundations of well-loved series of novels rather than chasing one-off hits. Amazon has listed Arts of Dark and Light as a series now, and the reviews for the latest installment continue to be gratifyingly positive.
Vox Day has a gift. He is exceptionally skilled at crafting viewpoints that are reasonable, relatable, emotionally compelling, and completely opposed to each other. This serves him well in the genre of epic fantasy, as it enables him to ensure the reader is fully invested in all the many pieces that make up the puzzle of a great fantasy epic.
Not only do his characters feel realized, his plot is suitably grand. From labyrinthine schemes, to an army that has yet to show its true terror, and a pervading presence of evil that threatens all of Selenoth, our heroes have quite the obstacles to overcome. With these first two books we’ve been shown small pieces of the disaster that is to befall Selenoth, and I for one, cannot wait for the next installment.
Head and shoulders above its predecessor, which is no mean feat! It manages to have multiple characters with completely different viewpoints without a) becoming a confusing mess or b) being disappointing when subbing in an uninteresting character for an interesting one, since all the characters were genuinely interesting. All were fully fleshed out and heroic in their own way. Amazing world-building also really made the story come alive, everything had a real sense of place. A fantastic read, and I can’t wait for the next book in the series!
One of my favorite, all-too-brief parts of Lord of the Rings was the brief view of things we get from an orcish perspective when Sam is temporarily bearing the ring on Frodo’s behalf; not with guilty pleasure because the orcs were bad, but because it gave us a glimpse of the world of Middle Earth and War of the Ring from such a different point of view. A Sea of Skulls, the second installment in the Arts of Dark and Lighttrilogy pentalogy set in the world of Selenoth–a fantasy realm where elves and dwarves, orcs and goblins, have been partially displaced by a Catholicized Roman Empire exerting powerful influence through the iron discipline of its legions–gives us that and much more.
If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like for Roman infantry, with their centurions and balllistae, to stand their ground against goblin hordes, war pigs, and orcish shamans (or have now begun to wonder), the world of Selenoth is for you, and the Arts of Dark and Lighttrilogy pentalogy tells a complex and engaging story of war and intrigue set in that world as the various races of Selenoth are manipulated and set against each other by powerful actors in the shadows….
This is grown-up fantasy which makes for a decent study of human (or orcish, for that matter) nature, not to mention Roman military chain of command, and entertains questions like how the seemingly inevitable decline of an advanced but decadent elven civilization could possibly be reversed, and how dwarves unexpectedly stuck in their own tunnels might feel about it. The violence depicted is quite explicit, both in the grim reality of war and especially in the opening scene of a brutal orc raid on a human village, but not exulted in, and one manages to understand the comradery-in-arms of warriors on every side of the struggle, human or otherwise.
But speaking of trilogies that are not trilogies, let’s not forget the first quarter of John C. Wright’s excellent Moth & Cobweb series. The final book of The Green Knight’s Squire have also been getting excellent reviews.
If you like the old tales of elves, heroes, Arthurian legends, men and monsters and great deeds, then you will enjoy this modern retelling. Highly enjoyable and recommended.
Swan Knight’s Sword is a fitting end to the story of Gilberec Moth, an idealistic teenager out of place in the human world who gradually becomes a brave, worthy, Christian knight….The same elements present in the earlier works are apparent here. Swashbuckling adventure featuring lavish description of mystical beings and surroundings as well as full-blooded, desperate combat. A strong sense of Christian morality. Many newly revealed secrets of both Gil’s past and the elf world.
As with the second book, there are a myriad of references, both Christian and pagan, expertly blended together. I was particularly amused by the one to a character of Edgar Rice Burroughs, an author all modern adventure writers owe a debt of gratitude to. Or the use of Roland’s horn.
However, this installment also introduces several new wrinkles. There is a more varied, consistent use of humor. Much of it comes from Ruff, Gil’s trusty dog whose barks he can understand. In fact, all the interaction with Gil talking to animals is funny. John C Wright evidently discovered the same comedic truth that Ricky Gervais has; personifying animals is always funny. There is also verbal humor and some absurdist situations.
Swan Knight’s Sword features an especially strong conclusion, being the culmination of Gil’s transformation from a strange boy into a righteous, mighty man. While it satisfyingly ends this tale of Gilberec Moth, it promises more adventure for both him and the world at large.
Swan Knight’s Sword is the best in this trilogy. A beautiful paean of adventure, courage, honor, loyalty and love. This book reminds me of the stuff I read in my youth, before the fantasy genre was a cesspool of pornography and meaningless nihilistic violence. I laughed, I cried, I wished I had a sword. But of course one does not simply walk into MordorMart and buy a sword, one must be bequeathed a sword by a father, or win one in a heroic quest. And sometimes one must hunt down and confront the magically invulnerable sasquatch that stole your father’s sword. This is one of those times…
On one side of the argument is a collection of godless academics with doctorates from the finest universities in England, France, and the United States. On the other is THE IRRATIONAL ATHEIST author Vox Day, armed with nothing more than historical and statistical facts. Day strips away the pseudo-scientific pretentions of New Atheism with his intelligent application of logic, history, military science, political economy, and well-documented research. The arguments of Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, and Michel Onfray are all methodically exposed and discredited as Day provides extensive evidence proving, among other things, that:
More than 93 percent of all the wars in human history had no relation to religion
The Spanish Inquisition had no jurisdiction over professing Jews, Muslims, or atheists, and executed fewer people on an annual basis than the state of Texas
Atheists are almost four times more likely to be imprisoned than Christians
“Red” state crime is primarily in “blue” counties
Sexually abused girls are 55 times more likely to commit suicide than girls raised Catholic
In the twentieth century, atheistic regimes killed three times more people in peacetime than those killed in all the wars and individual crimes combined. THE IRRATIONAL ATHEIST provides the rational thinker with empirical proof that atheism’s claims against religion are unfounded in logic, fact, and science.
Now in audio from Castalia House, TIA clocks in at just under 10 hours and is narrated by Jon Mollison. You can listen to a sample from the audiobook at Audible. You may also wish to note that ON THE EXISTENCE OF GODS is also available in audiobook format.
Also, in case you might be interested in more Selenoth, THE LAST WITCHKING is free on Amazon today.
The spectre of war once more looms on the global horizon. A new generation of writers and military theorists are addressing the new forms of warfare that now challenge the nation-state’s monopoly on war.
