Weirdbook Four

Weirdbook #4

by W. Paul Ganley (Editor), William Scott Home, Eddy C. Bertin

semi-pro weird tales magazine

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

W. Paul Ganley is a publisher and editor of science fiction, poetry and horror fanzines. He has published his own works under the pseudonyms Toby Duane, A. Arthur Griffin, and Walter Quednau.

Further reading.

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the fourth Weirdbook issue W. Paul Ganley and now the fourth one I have read. They are meant to come out more often but are appearing annually, 1968, 1969, 1970, and now 1971. I am reading them in order. The first three issues had a never-before-published original Robert E. Howard story to save them. This one, sadly, does not. The other stories are getting marginally better with each issue, and that trend continues here with this one, but for me they are still not quite good enough in themselves to merit giving the entire issue four stars even if some of the stories inside merit the rating. Most do not. The poetry--this time we have only seven poems--still does nothing for me, with one notable exception: Wade Wellman's "Archetypal Patterns" was a deep read, mentioning both Coleridge and Virgil.

The lead-off story was the best one. It was William Scott Home's "The Fruits of Yebo's Sins." A former lord, named Yamnad, has fallen on hard times and after returning from an exile pays a visit to a former underling of his, now risen to lordship, by the name of Yebo. We learn of the fascinating history between these two characters, how one rose while the other fell, and what Yebo now intends to do to maintain his position. It's insidious! This nine-page story, the longest in the magazine, was well-written and suspenseful. Good stuff!

"the sandals of SARGON" by Sotireos Vlahopoulos and James Wade was not a particularly strong story. It's basically about a son, Sardurian, with Daddy issues regarding his father, Sargon. It's pretentiously over-written, complete with copulating shadows, temple's loins that engulf people, etc. However, the format is intriguing. It's written in divided stanzas in ten sections of varying lengths from various characters' perspectives. The story is very original.

Darrell Schweitzer has a decent horror story in this issue titled "come to mother." It's a too-short, barely one-page, glimpse into a son who loves his mother too much and spends too much time at a cemetery visiting her.

The next-to-last story was "High Moon" by Gregory Francis. It was a fairly straightforward vampire story which seemed a little out of place in a magazine of weird literature. People who like vampire stories more than me will probably enjoy this story. It's an interesting take of a man who falls in love and proposes to his girlfriend only to find out she's a vampire. Then he wants to change his mind about the proposal, but that proves difficult for unexpected reasons.

I enjoyed reading this issue partly because of its obscurity and the fact that few others this century are reading them. This issue more than the previous three struck me as leaning more heavily into horror fiction than weird. For some, this will be no problem, but I am more a fan of weird fiction.

It's fun to know that these stories are only available to those who, like me, are willing to hunt down and purchase these idiosyncratic back-issue gems. If they are ever collected into one big eBook and sold that way, probably much of their appeal will disappear. Issue number five has just arrived to me in the mail. So, I will soon be on to that next great read. I am looking forward to seeing further improvement in the quality of these stories.