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Swords Against Tomorrow
IT WAS A TIME OF HEROES
The world was young then and the human soul yearned for adventure. A man was measured by his strength and deeds - the greatest of heroes was he who was the mightiest! In the days of the epic - of Odysseus, of Hercules, of Beowulf - gods walked aming men and no man knew but that he would be marked for glory.
Under the master touch of POUL ANDERSON and LEIGH BRACKETT, heroes again journey - this time beyond the stars. The swordsmen and sorcerors of FRITZ LEIBER, JOHN JAKES, and LIN CARTER belong to the past of this planet yet they too share one thing in common with the star-trekkers - an undying love of adventure.
Whether men of the future or men of the past, the home of these heroes is the present - in our world and in our time!
Contents
"Introduction" (Robert Hoskins)
"Demon Journey" (Poul Anderson)
"Bazaar of the Bizarre" (Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser) (Fritz Leiber)
"Vault of Silence" (Kellory the Warlock) (Lin Carter)
"Devils in the Walls" (Brak the Barbarian) (John Jakes)
"Citadel of Lost Ships" (Leigh Brackett)
The world was young then and the human soul yearned for adventure. A man was measured by his strength and deeds - the greatest of heroes was he who was the mightiest! In the days of the epic - of Odysseus, of Hercules, of Beowulf - gods walked aming men and no man knew but that he would be marked for glory.
Under the master touch of POUL ANDERSON and LEIGH BRACKETT, heroes again journey - this time beyond the stars. The swordsmen and sorcerors of FRITZ LEIBER, JOHN JAKES, and LIN CARTER belong to the past of this planet yet they too share one thing in common with the star-trekkers - an undying love of adventure.
Whether men of the future or men of the past, the home of these heroes is the present - in our world and in our time!
Contents
"Introduction" (Robert Hoskins)
"Demon Journey" (Poul Anderson)
"Bazaar of the Bizarre" (Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser) (Fritz Leiber)
"Vault of Silence" (Kellory the Warlock) (Lin Carter)
"Devils in the Walls" (Brak the Barbarian) (John Jakes)
"Citadel of Lost Ships" (Leigh Brackett)
176 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published August 1, 1970
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
December 26, 2012
Relatively brief anthology that gave a pleasant afternoon's reading. The first story (a relatively obscure sword & sorcery/planetary romance piece by Poul Anderson called Demon Journey (original title: Witch of the Demon Sea)) was definitely the highlight and is probably worth tracking the anthology down for. There were also solid stories by Leigh Brackett and Fritz Leiber and passable efforts by Lin Carter and John Jakes.
May 24, 2021
I've searched for this anthology in the wild for many years with no luck. Then lo and behold, someone in a FB group I follow had one for sale. This copy is very worn, not worn out; just about perfectly worn. It came to me from Wisconsin, but boasts a store stamp of The Book Rack in Lubbock, TX. The Book Rack also stamped the price, which is half of the cover price of $.39! Man those were the days to find used books! I gave about 10x that amount(which is still fantastic). Near as I can tell The Book Rack is still operating in Lubbock which is awesome because bookstores are becoming an endangered species.
Now this is going to sound foolish. I didn't realize this was a S&S anthology. I know, I know. I was merely going by the authors in the table of contents, and well, I knew Leigh Brackett hadn't ever written S&S. So with that in mind I assumed this was something akin to a S&P book. I was very wrong in that regard.
The TOC is a who's who of authors I readily enjoy reading. Every story is a reprint except for Carter's Vault of Silence, which seems to be an excerpt from his novel Kellory the Warlock. Which is original to this anthology.
Demon Journey by Poul Anderson
I had never heard of this story. I was excited to be able to read something new (to me) by Anderson. But wait, I have read this. Evidently the title was changed for this anthology from the original Witch of the Demon Seas. I read this a few months ago in Swordsmen of the Stars published by DMR Books.
Corun the pirate is given reprieve. Sail into hostile waters and make peace with hostiles. His companions intentions are not altruistic. Such a great action packed climax, although the ending is flat.
Bazaar of the Bizarre by Fritz Leiber
It has been many years since I've been to Lankhmar. I'm eagerly looking forward to new adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser within Tales of the Magician's Skull.
The Mouser stumbles unknowingly into an invasion. The Devourers are a race that sell junk and garbage to deplete worlds of their valuables. Not unlike Dollar General. Fafhrd is prevailed upon to rescue his companion and the world. High jinks ensue.
Vault of Silence by Lin Carter
Kellory is a man driven by vengeance. Seeking a weapon to destroy his enemies in one fell swoop, he saves a princess in peril.
This was a completely new story for me. Evidently this is just part of the novel Kellory the Warlock. I wonder which was written first the story or the novel? I do not own a copy of Kellory, and when I went to search for one online there doesn't seem to be very many copies of it. Limited printing? And only in hardcover? Strange.
Devils in the Walls by John Jakes
I read this Brak the Barbarian story many years ago in Fortunes of Brak. Someone really needs to bug Jakes about finishing this series.
Brak finds himself sold into bondage. He is offered his freedom, but he must face a cursed fortress and bring out the treasure kept safe within.
Citadel of Lost Ships by Leigh Brackett
Alright. What is a Leigh Brackett story doing in a sword and sorcery anthology? Search me. Perhaps Hoskins wanted to sell this anthology by name recognition? I don't think Leigh Brackett has ever written a bad story but this wasn't one of my favorites. This was another new story to me.
Fugitive from the law seeks shelter among the natives on Venus. When he learns of their ultimate demise he seeks help off-world. Discovering a plot to undermine the freedom of not only the people of Venus but people throughout the solar system.
Conclusion:
This is a great addition to my collection. But I wouldn't have sought it out if I would have realized just how many of these stories are collected elsewhere. I think the Carter and the Brackett stories are the only two I do not own somewhere else.
Recommended only for die hard sword and sorcery fans.
Now this is going to sound foolish. I didn't realize this was a S&S anthology. I know, I know. I was merely going by the authors in the table of contents, and well, I knew Leigh Brackett hadn't ever written S&S. So with that in mind I assumed this was something akin to a S&P book. I was very wrong in that regard.
The TOC is a who's who of authors I readily enjoy reading. Every story is a reprint except for Carter's Vault of Silence, which seems to be an excerpt from his novel Kellory the Warlock. Which is original to this anthology.
Demon Journey by Poul Anderson
I had never heard of this story. I was excited to be able to read something new (to me) by Anderson. But wait, I have read this. Evidently the title was changed for this anthology from the original Witch of the Demon Seas. I read this a few months ago in Swordsmen of the Stars published by DMR Books.
Corun the pirate is given reprieve. Sail into hostile waters and make peace with hostiles. His companions intentions are not altruistic. Such a great action packed climax, although the ending is flat.
Bazaar of the Bizarre by Fritz Leiber
It has been many years since I've been to Lankhmar. I'm eagerly looking forward to new adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser within Tales of the Magician's Skull.
The Mouser stumbles unknowingly into an invasion. The Devourers are a race that sell junk and garbage to deplete worlds of their valuables. Not unlike Dollar General. Fafhrd is prevailed upon to rescue his companion and the world. High jinks ensue.
Vault of Silence by Lin Carter
Kellory is a man driven by vengeance. Seeking a weapon to destroy his enemies in one fell swoop, he saves a princess in peril.
This was a completely new story for me. Evidently this is just part of the novel Kellory the Warlock. I wonder which was written first the story or the novel? I do not own a copy of Kellory, and when I went to search for one online there doesn't seem to be very many copies of it. Limited printing? And only in hardcover? Strange.
Devils in the Walls by John Jakes
I read this Brak the Barbarian story many years ago in Fortunes of Brak. Someone really needs to bug Jakes about finishing this series.
Brak finds himself sold into bondage. He is offered his freedom, but he must face a cursed fortress and bring out the treasure kept safe within.
Citadel of Lost Ships by Leigh Brackett
Alright. What is a Leigh Brackett story doing in a sword and sorcery anthology? Search me. Perhaps Hoskins wanted to sell this anthology by name recognition? I don't think Leigh Brackett has ever written a bad story but this wasn't one of my favorites. This was another new story to me.
Fugitive from the law seeks shelter among the natives on Venus. When he learns of their ultimate demise he seeks help off-world. Discovering a plot to undermine the freedom of not only the people of Venus but people throughout the solar system.
Conclusion:
This is a great addition to my collection. But I wouldn't have sought it out if I would have realized just how many of these stories are collected elsewhere. I think the Carter and the Brackett stories are the only two I do not own somewhere else.
Recommended only for die hard sword and sorcery fans.
February 24, 2021
This is an anthology of swords & sorcery stories that Hoskins edited in 1970, a few years after de Camp's Pyramid pair and a few years before the series of originals that Carter and offutt edited later in the decade. (Such anthologies were somewhat rare, back before D&D took over the collective conscious across campus.) It's not a bad book, but the one for which one have wished. It contains a Fafhrd & Grey Mouser story by Fritz Leiber, a good Leigh Brackett story that didn't fit with the theme being more of a science fiction piece, John Jakes' first Brak the Barbarian story, a long Poul Anderson story that did nothing for me, and an original Lin Carter story that's not memorable. There's no Jirel of Joiry story by C.L. Moore, there should have been one with Michael Moorcock's Elric... and how could he have skipped anything by Robert E. Howard?
July 23, 2015
I am coming to conclude that "style", in terms of writing, is what is left when everything inessential has been removed, and is not what has been added as a layer to the essence. I don't think Lin Carter ever grasped that. His writing is chock full of artificial structures and embellishments that appear glued to the surface rather than baked in to the material. Little things like random sentences reversing subject and object. Like a too-profuse littering of colons and semicolons (sometimes within a single sentence). Like descriptive words coming in lists of three. Like paragraphs packed a little too full and not precisely chosen for effect.
(Compare, of course, to "Bazaar of the Bizarre", also collected in this volume for your convenience. For all its 'style', I can not point to a single extraneous or misplaced word or image. It fits together like a beautifully jeweled jigsaw puzzle, and conveys so much sheer story in relatively few pages.)
It is fascinating to see Carter take something as relatively fresh as stepping away from his usual Howardian/Burroughsian character archetype and plot tropes--Kellory is a scarred man and frustrated warrior driven to warlockry out of vengeance against the Thungoda horde--and make the same old mistakes. The usual nubile girl whose character traits are being a princess, falling out of her clothes, thinking picayune thoughts, and being inexplicably attracted to repellent men. A lackadaisical approach to story events . In short, he finds an interesting character at the intersection of Elric of Melnibone and Solomon Kane, and surrounds him with the usual. Still, I remain curious about the full book, Kellory the Warlock.
On the Brak the Barbarian front, in "Devils in the Walls", it is good to know that Brak is better served by the short story format. Despite the briefness of the tale, however, it does include yet another senseless pony death.
"Bazaar of the Bizarre" is excellent, of course, as is the oddly-chosen "Citadel of Lost Ships". "Demon Journey" is blunted by attempts at a scientific basis--magic as mesmerism, gunpowder, etc.--and by an artificially uplifting ending that relies on a convenient heel face turn by the love interest.
(Compare, of course, to "Bazaar of the Bizarre", also collected in this volume for your convenience. For all its 'style', I can not point to a single extraneous or misplaced word or image. It fits together like a beautifully jeweled jigsaw puzzle, and conveys so much sheer story in relatively few pages.)
It is fascinating to see Carter take something as relatively fresh as stepping away from his usual Howardian/Burroughsian character archetype and plot tropes--Kellory is a scarred man and frustrated warrior driven to warlockry out of vengeance against the Thungoda horde--and make the same old mistakes. The usual nubile girl whose character traits are being a princess, falling out of her clothes, thinking picayune thoughts, and being inexplicably attracted to repellent men. A lackadaisical approach to story events . In short, he finds an interesting character at the intersection of Elric of Melnibone and Solomon Kane, and surrounds him with the usual. Still, I remain curious about the full book, Kellory the Warlock.
On the Brak the Barbarian front, in "Devils in the Walls", it is good to know that Brak is better served by the short story format. Despite the briefness of the tale, however, it does include yet another senseless pony death.
"Bazaar of the Bizarre" is excellent, of course, as is the oddly-chosen "Citadel of Lost Ships". "Demon Journey" is blunted by attempts at a scientific basis--magic as mesmerism, gunpowder, etc.--and by an artificially uplifting ending that relies on a convenient heel face turn by the love interest.
July 19, 2008
A really fun collection of heroic fantasy short stories. I originally rated it at 4 stars but I'm going to give it another one.
April 27, 2022
A collection of entertaining tales, from some great authors. The last Leigh Brackett story, while most excellent, feels like it doesn't fit, being the only sci-fi tale in it.
September 28, 2018
First story (Poul Anderson) has a bad ending. Leiber and Jakes stories are excellent. Lin Carter and Leigh Brackket's stories are both forgettable.
September 28, 2015
Very good sword and sorcery anthology from 1970 with interesting stories by Poul Anderson, Fritz Leiber (Fafrd and the Gray Mouser), John Jakes (first Brak the barbarian story expanded), Lin Carter and Leigh Brackett. The only one out of place was the Leigh Brackett story that was more a rockets and raygun story; no swords or sorcery.
April 20, 2017
It was fun to read the old masters again :)
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews