Weird Fiction discussion

We are starting January 2025 with a highly obscure choice for group read. I love it! The poll winner is Swords Against Cthulhu edited by Gavin Chappell. Chappell also contributed one of the anthology's short stories, "A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness." So he's not just an editor.

This anthology has contributions by authors I have never heard of previously. All of the authors write exclusively only short stories (exceptions being two novels, one to each of two authors), and those almost all in the horror and weird genres. Most of the authors are young and only one was published before 2011. D.J. Tyler published the first of his many short stories in 1999. Tyler is arguably the most (perhaps the only) established author in the anthology.

I have no idea what to expect from this anthology. On GoodReads the book has only twenty ratings and not even one review yet. There have been three Swords Against Cthulhu volumes produced so far, the first in 2015, subsequent volumes in 2017 and 2018.

At $2.46 as the price for the Kindle version of the first volume I don't think it's a huge monetary investment to give this a try. But it might be a time investment. I'll get to this anthology early and try to give the group a heads-up in terms of the quality of the stories if that will help you determine your participation level.

Okay, I have read the first two stories and give them 3.5 and 4.5 stars respectively. We are in good hands with this collection.

I do need to let everyone know the sub-genre is 100% sword-and-sorcery. In fact the full title of the book is Swords Against Cthulhu: An Anthology of Sword and Sorcery Fiction. Wikipedia has an excellent article on the genre if you want a lot of details on it. The origins part leaves a bit to be desired though.

Sword and Sorcery started as a weird fiction sub-genre. In fact, I have just read a fascinating article in The Unique Legacy of Weird Tales: The Evolution of Modern Fantasy and Horror regarding its origins: "Gothic to Cosmic: Sword-and-Sorcery Fiction in Weird Tales." The sub-genre was begun by Robert E. Howard, its inventor. You no doubt have heard of Conan the Cimmerian, and perhaps his predecessors Kull and Solomon Kane, too, not to mention Turlogh O'Brien and Bran Mak Morn. These are all wonderful characters with great stories to their credit.

Others followed in Howard's footsteps and published in Weird Tales as well. Much of Clark Ashton Smith's work, some of which we read last month, is considered sword-and-sorcery. C.L. Moore's Jirel of Joiry, not my favorite series, appeared in Weird Tales. Interestingly enough, Fritz Leiber tried to sell his sword-and-sorcery series to Weird Tales but could not. Leiber had to settle for publishing in a less well known rival magazine. Henry Kuttner and Robert Bloch also published sword-and-sorcery in Weird Tales, as did an author I've never heard of but who sounds very interesting: Nictzin Dyalhis (1880-1942). He published eight stories in Weird Tales. The first two are described as space opera. The third and fifth is weird, involving reincarnation. But the fourth, "The Sapphire Goddess" (February, 1934) is definitely sword-and-sorcery. Even some of Seabury Quinn's stories were sword-and-sorcery-ish: "The Globe of Memories" (February 1937), "Roads" (January 1938), and a story of future barbarism, "Gotterdaemmurung" (May 1938).

Anyway, after the demise of Weird Tales in 1953, sword-and-sorcery stopped being considered a weird fiction genre to become classified as a fantasy sub-genre, a station where many people today still locate it, having forgotten or never known its weird fiction origins.

Again, these first two stories of Swords Against Cthulhu are modern and definitely in the weird fiction genre, although truth to say the second has strong horror elements to it. I hope the majority aren't quite as strong on the horror. That could get tedious. I like variety and unpredictability. In short, I am comfortable recommending this anthology to the general membership. Let's finish up Algernon Blackwood over the next week, shall we, and begin this January 1.

The person pictured on our marquis this month is Gavin Chappell, the editor of our anthology and one of its contributing story authors. I just reread the first two stories of our anthology and must say I remain impressed with their quality.

In the Gate of the Inner City by Damir Salkovic ★★★

This is a story about a group of warriors being sent by a sultan into the mythical city of Samarkand in order to oppose a khan who wants to take power over the city. Unfortunately for these men, the khan's plot is already well under way and they have a difficult time trying to hold the sultan's rule. In fact, there are a number of traps set for them they have to survive.

This is an exciting story with a lot of action and some good fight scenes. Salkovic does a good job of introducing a lot of characters and getting the reader to care about them. Otherwise the fight scenes would be meaningless.

However, there are a lot of characters to track in this story, thirteen by my count, and sometimes, due to the writing style, an action or characteristic can be challenging to figure out which character it applies to. I get the feeling I'm reading a scene from a longer story or even novel in which the characters have already been established. If so, Salkovic does a good job of introducing the characters and individualizing them.

I also liked the world of Samarkand, a medieval eastern city set in a valley. Many characters ten to have Arabic names, all of which are used correctly, and there are various nouns in correct standard Arabic, madinah for city, for example. It's sophisticated immersion and adds to the reality.

I just wish I had time to get to know these characters even better before they get so involved in their various conflicts. We also never find how some have fared by story's end, such as Dawud, a main protagonist at the beginning, Mahmoud, a burly soldier, or Emir, the skillful swordsman. I'd read something longer with these characters if it existed.

The Burning Messenger by Matt Sullivan (pseudonym for Matthew John) ★★★★

This story was less character crowded than the previous story and therefore easier to follow, which I appreciated. It starts when Ulfric's son, Brun, returns to the village to announce Ulfric's slaying by a rival chief. The community had good relations with this chief and have no idea what changed. Bronyr, an over-the-hill warrior, proposes to investigate. Hielvun, a young, former slave girl hoping to prove herself as a warrior, volunteers to accompany Bronyr, who is happy to have any help he can get. The two go visit the rival chief and encounter more trouble than they could have ever imagined.

This was an exciting, suspenseful story all the way through that was well told, even if rather straightforward. I would happily read another story by Matt Sullivan and/or Matthew John. In fact, I see his Rogues in the House: Volume 1 is easily accessible.

The Caverns of Khidina by D.J. Tyrer ★★★★1/2

Olbur's love-of-his-life has been seized and is being held for ransom. All Olbur has to do to win her freedom is slay a god. How does one slay a god, especially one after so many others have tried but failed? That's Olbur's dilemma. This was a fascinating tale of god-slaying gone wrong and the consequences.

If you click on Tyrer's linked name above, you can see he has written some interesting looking stuff. I'd return to this author.

Rite of Passage by Carl Fox ★★1/2

This is the first weak story of the anthology, I'm sorry to have to report. It had promise. There is an interesting protagonist: Laran, a barbarian along the lines of Conan, only heavily tattooed. There is an interesting setting or two. A future setting from which he looks back. And a past setting of a village which has nearby caves with interesting properties. These caves transport one to other worlds where one can stay, or one can return to the village. Going through the caves is an initiation into manhood.

This is all fine, but where the story breaks down is 1) There was no need to show the reader the future setting. It was never returned to and meant nothing. 2) No conscious decision to return or stay was made after going through the caves. We never know why so many villagers didn't return. The few who do never talk. Why? We never find out. The story just becomes a series of random adventures getting through the caves and having lustful relations with deceptive monsters. Then we're twenty years later looking at corpses. Laran charges into darkness, sword drawn. The end.

Yeah, it doesn't make much sense to me either.

Modu by Mark Sims ★★

Modu does not know who his father is and lives on an island. One day marauders from a northern island come lay waste to Modu's village killing most of the men and capturing a few, such as Modu's brother. Modu and his mother survive that raid, but not the next. Modu has learned to wield a sword in the meantime, but no matter. He gets captured by Obsidi, Lord of Oom-R'lyeh.

The events that happen to Modu are all chronicled, but the motivations of the antagonists is never made clear, and the stakes of the various conflicts are not either. The story reads as a rather random catalog of events.

Followers of Mogolith by Mark Slade ★★1/2

Yasmine, seventh daughter to the moon concubine to King Rafael, is our protagonist. She lives on an island and is early on captured, raped, and becomes the fourth wife to a fat nobleman who wants to raise a demon-god named Mogolith. Yasmine uses her resources to try to oppose this.

Again, as in the previous story it feels like we just have here a relating of random events. Something is missing from this story to engage the reader to care about outcomes. There must be a story-telling art to that which is hard to teach. It's hard to accurately say what exactly is missing, though something clearly is.

These two stories are followed by two unexceptional poems by David S. Pointer of 15 and 10 lines respectively.

I'm at the one third through point in this anthology. The first three stories were pretty good, the next three not so much. Here's hoping things pick back up with number seven.

The Voyage of the Clewtunt by Ernesto Canepa and Sergio Palumbo ★★★

This is a flawed story to be sure. But I like it anyway. The protagonist is 6 feet tall, attractive Verserla. She is on board a ship heading for the southern continent in order to sell her services as a mercenary. First she gets into an argument with another female mercenary because of that woman's jealousy of Verserla. But before that dispute resolves a sea monster attacks their ship.

That's the entire plot. You wouldn't think that plot would be enough to sustain what I think is a novelette. (I didn't count; but it's got to be more than the 7,500 words short stories are limited to.) And you'd be right. It isn't enough. The rest of the story consists or world-building, characterization, and lengthy narrative explanations many readers would call data dumping. I get that these flaws are enough to ruin the story for many readers, but I found the world and the characters so interesting, I didn't really mind. Again, this is just a novelette at best. Therefore novel-sized world-building and characterizations aren't at all called for, but it's okay. This was a fun read nevertheless. If I ever find out this world or these characters are in a longer work by these guys, I'm there!

A Muezzin from the Tower of Darkness by Gavin Chappell ★★★★

This is the anthology editor's story and it was a strong one: well told, well written, completely professional, and very interesting. First of all, a muezzin is the Moslem call to prayer, always done in Arabic. You have heard the chant countless times on TV whenever there is a Middle Eastern scene.

This story was a real surprise. It's the only one so far set in modern times in the here and now of the real world. We're in Ash-Sham, or northeastern Syria most likely, and the protagonist is Rashid Al-Amriki, Rashid the American. He's a convert to ISIS that is leading a group of ISIS fighters under Al-Baghdadi with the mission of clearing a region of apostasy, meaning eradicating heretics.

All is going well for Rashid until he receives orders to clear this certain village no one has ever been able to clear before throughout history. So what's the problem? (view spoiler)[The villagers certainly went down easily enough. But what's this about the archaeologist said about the village having supernatural protection? (hide spoiler)]

I really enjoyed this long short story. It's probably a novelette as well. My only hesitation in liking it further is that in some respects the plot is too simple and the ending too early. I would like to know more about the menace and more about what measures are ultimately used to deal with it. Still, this is in some respects, at least up until the point it stopped, the least typical (in terms of setting) and yet best story so far in the anthology.

The Sword of Lomar by Jason Scott Aiken ★★★

This entire short story is a first-person narration of a sequence of events that happened to seventy-five year old Agnes Lanigan of Arkham. Agnes is transported into the body of a warrior who fights a battle. And that's pretty much it. No bells. No whistles. Just a linear straightforward account of a fictional battle in which nothing remarkable happens.

The story was enjoyable enough because I like the genre and the plot made sense. But reading the story added nothing new to my life or perspective of anything.

The Duellists by David Busboom ★★★1/2

A sword duel turns weird, really weird. This was a fun story to read, but short. It has nothing more to speak for it than the weird twist added during the duel, but it was enough to make the story worth reading.

The Worms Crawl In by J. Stratton ★★★

This is a story of a thief and loser who is really down on his luck and treated horribly. Nickolaus sees a chance to better his situation by selling a freshly killed corpse to local body butchers. But of course this turns into a disaster. Nickolaus's luck runs true to form.

This story is well told and the characters are well drawn, but the entire situation is so squalid that it's hard to get into the plot. There's no sword and sorcery in it either. The story is straight horror, gross horror at that. I'm not sure really what it's doing in this anthology.

The Thing in the Swamp by Stephen Hernandez ★★★★

This was an exciting story (probably a novelette) about Vidric, a mercenary barbarian warrior of ill temper, hired by Jobe to rid the town of a swamp monster that had recently been killing the village's citizens. The monster turns out to be a pre-historic relative of Cthulhu's who traversed the cosmos to land here on Earth. It is a truly terrifying mission Vidric has agreed to accomplish.

The strength of the story was in its strong characterizations of both the protagonist and the monster, and the methods Vidric uses to learn of the monster and how he then proceeds to fight it. This is a good barbarian action tale Robert E. Howard would have been proud to write.

I read the last two stories and have included them in my admittedly overly long review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I am almost catching up as January is not over yet and I am already on the caves. So much interesting stuff that could have gone somewhere and didn't! it's a pity.

I am almost catching up as January is not over yet and I am already on the caves. So much interesting stuff that could have gone somewhere and didn't! it's a pity.

I am surprised at how many stars you gave the Voayge of the Clewtunt. This is the first story in a while where I see an actual editor is listed in addition to the authors , and I laugh when I try imagining what the story was before the editor attempted to edit it. It is written in such a bad language! All I could think of was the song "Chicken Attack" - you will be forced massively to give up. All your base belong to us. "A lonely piece of shirt without anyone inside was all that floated on the surface of the expanse that was still in turmoil." "Making some last strong efforts, the swordswoman took a deep breath of fresh air and then tried her best to continue such an assault by means of whatever lay around." Clunky sentences mounted on top of one another by a bureacrat.

Yeah, I sort of felt guilty giving that three stars, but despite the clunky writing style, I liked the story. I can forgive clunky writing to some extent. Theodore Dreiser and Joseph Conrad also wrote clunky, but what they had to say was so important. Pretentious or error-filled, amateuristic writing is what I take issue with. While I didn't find the writing to be that strong in "The Voyage of the Clewtunt," I did get the authors' meaning. I really liked the worldbuilding, and the character of Verserla. I also found their way of telling the story to be unusual and gave the writers credit for originality in storytelling style. I have never read anything quite like that.

I'm glad you brought these guys back to my attention. I researched them a bit more and find that Ernesto Canepa only co-writes with Sergio Palumba. Palumba writes a lot of other stuff solo. Anyway Ernesto Canepa and Sergio Palumba have written seven short stories together. This was only the first.

Here's the list (not that you're likely to care):
The Voyage of the Clewtunt (2015)
Silence, Please (2017) in Swords Against Cthulhu II: Hyperborean Nights
The Last SeaBus on Burrard Inlet... (2019) in The Devil's Hour: 17 Terrifying Horror Tales in one Anthology!
Parallel Existences (2020) in Schlock! Webzine, August, 2020
Xenoids (2020) in Xenobiology: Stranger Creatures: An Anthology of international Sci-Fi, Steampunk and Urban Fantasy short stories
On the Stage of the Mountain Seedling (2022) in Of Poets, Spies and Unearthliness
Whispers (2023) in Dickensian Steamfantasy: A Very Different 1800s

Well hey, maybe they learned to write better eventually. The story was interesting, even if a bit all over the place. I liked how the old girls did not continue fighting after the handsome laddie got ate.

But the next several stories I really liked a whole lot. Muezzin, The Sword of Lomar, the Duellists, and even the grossfest that is the Worms crawl in. Like a Monty Python scene of peasants in the mud, there to be a background for the nights' swords.