Lord Dunsany’s take on the sword and sorcery sub-genre is high on the Dunsany and low on the Lord (which is itself a very Dunsanian trait).
The Hoard Of The Gibbelins
By Lord Dunsany; Read by Greg Elmensdorp
1 |MP3| – Approx. 10 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: June 24, 2007
The bold knight Alderic seeks the fabled hoard of the Gibbelins. First published in the Jan 25, 1911 issue of The Sketch.
Here’s a |PDF|.
Posted by Jesse Willis
The SFFaudio Podcast #089 – Jesse talks to James Campanella, Ph.D. Jim is an associate professor in the department of Biology and Molecular Biology at Montclair State University in New Jersey. He’s also an audiobook narrator, and podcaster.
Talked about on today’s show:
J.J. Campanella watches very little TV, Lost, The Big Bang Theory, Antarctica, MSU, molecular biology, genetics, plant genetics, philology vs. phylogeny, the Science News Update podcast, “a funny Geordie sounding dude” (Tony C. Smith), duck penises, cloaca, sexing birds, African Grey parrots, ants, What Technology Wants, technology as an extension of evolution, “microscopic brains”, plant intelligence, tropism, phototropism vs. gravitropism, auxins, The Secret Life Of Plants, dowsing, plant signaling (with jasmonic acid), StarShip Sofa, The Merchant And The Alchemist’s Gate by Ted Chiang, knitting and cross-stitching, narrating skills, Uvula Audio, I, Libertine, The Call Of The Wild by Jack London, L. Frank Baum is seriously weird, violence vs. bloodless violence, the Tin Woodsman and his enchanted axe, goiing from cyborg to robot (via a Ship of Theseus metaphor), Sky Island, genocide in kids books, Doc Savage, The Avenger, Lester Dent, Hamlet And Eggs by J.J. Campanella, a comedic detective story, Georgia, 9/11, how to be always wrong, private detectives, The Code Of The Poodles by James Powell, what accent would a talking dog have?, The Friends Of Hector Jouvet by James Powell, Monaco, A Dirge For Clowntown by James Powell, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Divers Down by Hal Gordon, were kids in the ’70s were more respectful?, the Rick Brant series, Tom Swift, The Rocket’s Shadow (Rick Brant #1) by John Blaine, Jonny Quest, adventure, The Venture Bros., The Flintstones, Harold L. Goodwin, serial books, house names, The Bobbsey Twins, Edward Stratemeyer, “electronic adventures”, who read and bought those serial books?, the end of the pulp era, The Mystery Of The Stratemeyer Legacy, Nancy Drew, has paranormal romance replaced kids books?, the Twilight series, the Harry Potter series, Rick Riordan, The Wizard Of Oz, H.P. Lovecraft, Stephen King, the rich and amazing language of Lovecraft, Miskatonic University, Craig Nickerson, At The Mountains Of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft, Professor William Dyer, The Shadow Out Of Time by H.P. Lovecraft, Brazil, proper Portuguese pronunciation, “lethp listhping”, Doctor Who, Silurians, yithians, Horror vs. Science Fiction, Astounding Stories, time travel, “shoggoths etc.”, The Statement Of Randolph Carter, a really serious (and difficult) question: Are zombies Science Fiction or Fantasy?, Romero-style zombies, 28 Days Later, real zombies in nature (mostly in the insect world), Herbert West, Re-Animator, the source matters, if the zombie was dead then it is Fantasy, why are zombies so popular?, people like the idea of being able to kill without remorse, mummies vs. werewolves vs. vampires vs. zombies, Zombieland, Bill Murray, contemporary Fantasy, Neil Gaiman, comics, sword and sorcery, Elric, the Thomas Covenant series, Stephen R. Donaldson, Douglas Adams, American Gods |READ OUR REVIEW| vs. The Long Dark Tea-Time Of The Soul, James Alan Gardner, Expendable is an “absolute masterpiece”, Star Trek, why are there no James Alan Gardner audiobooks?, Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Man Of Bronze is terrible, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson |READ OUR REVIEW|, Jim Campanella describes it as “turgid”, Metropia, “photo-realistic Swedish anime”, baby eyes, Steamboat Willie, the evolution of Mickey Mouse’s appearance, infanticide, why do your big eyes prevent me from kill you?, saccharin, the sucralose story (is in the Dec. 2010 podcast of Science News Update).
Posted by Jesse Willis
The Blade Itself (The First Law: Book One)
By Joe Abercrombie; Read by Steven Pacey
Audible Download – 22 Hours 18 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group
Published: 2010
ISBN: 9781409111443
Provider: Audible.com
Sample |MP3|
Themes: / Fantasy / Sword and Sorcery / Dark Humor / Revenge / Violence /
For a couple years now, Joe Abercrombie’s The First Law Trilogy has been at the top of my to-read list, but as I’m a slow print reader, the series inevitably yielded to more readily available audiobooks. Imagine my delight, then, when I recently realized that Orion Publishing Group had published the series in audio last June. The wait was worth it. The opening volume, The Blade Itself is a darkly humorous tale full of antiheroes and intrigue. Abercrombie’s strong writing and wry wit set The Blade Itself a cut above other novels in the reactionary subgenre of fantasy spawned by George R.R. Martin.
At first blush, the world of the First Law Trilogy looks like your average fantasy world. The bulk of the action takes place in Adua, capital city of The Union, a land with a dotard king facing imminent war on two fronts: the newly-unified North and the Gurkish Empire to the South. The city, and especially its central citadel the Agriont, is teaming with ambitious councilman, posturing soldiers, and brutal inquisitors. The North, as one might epect, is a sparse unwelcoming land peopled by warrior clans recently unified under the iron fist of King Bethod. In The Blade Itself we see only snatches of the Gurkish Empire, but it follows the usual desert formula for southern kingdoms. (Why do most fantasy series seem to be set in the Northern hemisphere?) This opening volume hints at an intricate magic system that underlies and informs the world, but so far it’s rather underdeveloped.
The viewpoint characters bring this seemingly run-of-the-mill fantasy world to life in vibrant color. Each character is an antihero, in some sense of the word. Like George R. R. Martin, Richard K. Morgan, and other recent writers, Abercrombie is writing against the tropes of the traditional good-versus-evil format of epic fantasy. Unlike some other writers in this vein, though, Abercrombie rarely seems too self-conscious about what he’s doing. Logen Ninefingers, dubbed the “bloody-nine” in the North, does not read like an anti-Aragorn, nor does Bayaz, First of the Magi, read like an anti-Gandalf. Rather, they’re fully developed characters in their own right. Then there’s San dan Glokta, survivor of a horrible ordeal of torture at the hands of the Gurkish Empire who has in turn become a torturer for the inquisition. Rounding out the cast is Jezal, a headstrong noble youth determined to win the year’s fencing contest. With the exception of Jezal, these characters have endured tremendously hard lives, so naturally their thoughts aren’t filled with sunshine and butterflies. This is a dark book.
The fun lies in watching these characters come together and interact with one another. As in any good book, too, it’s fun to watch these characters, who we’ve come to empathize with even if we don’t actually like them, overcome their internal and external challenges. The most obvious case is Jezal and his fencing contest, which is brought to a most satisfying concentration. Then there’s Glokta, trying to stay afloat in the political post of Inquisitor, all while struggling merely to get out of bed. Then there’s Logen, fleeing his reputation as the “bloody-nine.” And at the heart of it all is Bayaz, First of the Magi, whose story hints at the direction the series may ultimately take. Bayaz, though not a point-of-view character, drives the plot in many ways, either subtly or overtly manipulating events to suit his needs.
If the book has a weakness, it’s the ending. Endings are always tricky things to pull off, especially in the first novel of a trilogy, where an author must bring the present volume to a satisfying conclusion while enticing the reader to continue with the series. Unfortunately, Abercrombie leans too far towards the latter. While the last hour or two of audio will be a treat for fans of vividly-depicted action sequences, they’re light on any satisfying story development. The ending certainly isn’t bad, it just left me a bit disappointed. On the other hand, it also did its job in whetting my appetite for the next volume.
As alluded to earlier, the standout character in The Blade Itself is perhaps Abercrombie’s deft writing style. Admittedly, it took some getting used to. I remember complaining on Twitter back when I first had a go at reading the print edition that the book was too full of sentence fragments and “said bookisms.” I stand by that complaint. The thing is, the style really fits the world and especially the characters. The dialogue reads like you’re sitting in on the conversation, especially under the standout narration by Steven Pacey. And while I’m not personally a fan of long action sequences, there’s no doubt that Abercrombie writes them masterfully. You can feel every bone-jarring sword blow and taste the tang of blood in the air.
I approached this audiobook with some hesitation. I feared that no narrator could match Michael Page’s performance of Abercrombie’s Best Served Cold. At best, I feared, I’d be disappointed; at worst, I wouldn’t even be able to listen to the book in its entirety. Fortunately, Steven Pacey is equal to the task of narrating such an ambitious work. His narration walks the fine balance of capturing the characters’ voices–literally and figuratively–without calling too much attention to them and thereby detracting from the story. The toothless Glokta, for instance, speaks with just a hint of a lisp, a slight slurring. Every now and then, his narration moves a touch too far toward the dramatic, but for the most part it’s spot on.
The Blade Itself, if it were a film, would carry a solid R rating, and therefore isn’t for everyone. Strong language and violence abound. Under its dark veneer of brutality, however, the novel shines with complex characters, compelling writing, and a story that, though not yet fully baked, promises to yield great rewards in subsequent novels.
Posted by Seth Wilson
Here’s a stack of mostly horror titles that have been inching their way into my dreams! It’s a solid mix of public domain novels (and collections) along with brand spanking new series and standalones. Check out Brian Keene’s modern horror tale, Castaways (its at the bottom). Keene writes comics, it may be the best place to start with the modern stuff! With regards to the PD material, I’m torn between People Of The Dark, which includes my favorite Conan story Queen Of The Black Coast, and Algernon Blackwood’s The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories. All of these titles should also be available in MP3-CD editions and MP3 download editions via TheAudiobookShop.com too.
A novel idea, take several of the modern issues of Weird Tales, and make an audiobook out of it…
Weird Tales
By various; Read by Wayne June and others
5 CDs – Approx. 6 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: August 2009
ISBN: 9781897304075
Includes tales from issues #336, 337 and 338 of Weird Tales: The Unique Magazine
Stories included:
Ripper! by William F. Nolan
Shore Of Night, Shore Of Day by Katrien Rutten
Hearts And Minds by Barbara Krasnoff
The Ghost Of Me by Melinda Thielbar
The Sacredotal Owl by Michael Bishop
Sympathy For Dragons by John Gregory Betancourt
The Upper Berth by F. Marion Crawford
This cover looks rather boring on first glance, but look closer, it has a bit more than you expect…
A Princess Of Mars
By Edgar Rice Burroughs; Read by Brian Holsopple
6 CDs – Approx. 6 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: August, 2009
ISBN: 9781897304457
Ex-confederate army captain John Carter finds himself unwittingly transported to Mars, while fleeing Apache Indians. This new world is populated by a race of monstrous Martians, whose culture is based on the ability to fight for their race. Fortunately, the gravitational difference between Mars and Earth has given him the strength that he will need for survival.on this hostile planet. John Carter battles ferocious Martian creatures, but gains the respect of the beautiful Dejah Thoris, Princes of Helium. This is the first of eleven in the ‘Mars’ series.
This is the second novel in a new series, but I’m betting that wouldn’t effect the story one whit…
Hunt: Through The Cradle Of Fear (#2 in the Adventures Of Gabriel Hunt series
By Gabriel Hunt (aka Charles Ardai); Read by Jim VanDusen
6 CDs – Approx. 8 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: November 2009
ISBN: 9781897304761
From the towers of Manhattan to the jungles of South America, from the sands of the Sahara to the frozen crags of Antarctica, one man finds adventure everywhere he goes: GABRIEL HUNT. Backed by the resources of the $100 million Hunt Foundation and armed with his trusty Colt revolver, Gabriel Hunt has always been ready for anything – but is he prepared to enter… The Cradle Of Fear? When a secret chamber is discovered inside the Great Sphinx of Egypt, the mystery of its contents will lead Gabriel to a remote Greek Island, to a stone fortress in Sri Lanka … and to a deadly confrontation that could decide the fate of the world!
Five words: QUEEN OF THE BLACK COAST. ’nuff said…
The Weird Works Of Robert E. Howard – Volume Two: People Of The Dark
By Robert E. Howard; Read by Wayne June, Brian Holsopple, Gary Kohler, Bob Barnes and Charles McKibben
5 CDs – Approx. 5.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: August 2009
ISBN: 9781897304136
People Of The Dark is the second volume of The Weird Works Of Robert E. Howard presented in audiobook form. It continues to offer many of Howard’s works from the classic magazine Weird Tales meticulously restored to it’s original texts. This volume contains;People Of The Dark, Queen Of The Black Coast, The Garden Of Fear, The Haunter Of The Ring, Valley Of The Worm, The Challenge From Beyond and includes some of his famous heroes such as Conan.
The Willows gave me the willies, so I’m thinking these are perfect tales for a dark and stormy night and a bucket of ice cream…
The Empty House And Other Stories
By Algernon Blackwood; Read by Brian Holsopple
6 CDs – Approx. 6 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: August 2009
ISBN: 9781897304686
Most connoisseurs of modern horror fiction rate Algernon Blackwood (1869-1951) as the finest horror writer of all time. Blackwood was unsurpassed in originality, atmosphere, and characterization. His finest works still surprise and shock today’s readers. The Empty House And Other Stories, originally published in 1906, was Blackwood’s first collection. It includes such classics as the title story, A Haunted Island, A Suspicious Gift, and many more.
This one sounds like a reverse Marco Polo story, with dragons, sorcerers and magic instead of pasta…
Gonji: Red Blade From The East (Volume 1)
By T.C. Rypel; Read by Brian Holsopple
8 CDs – Approx. 9 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: July 2009
ISBN: 9781897304549
Cast out from his Japanese homeland, Gonji, the Samurai warrior, journeyed across barbaric Europe in the quest of Vedun, the distant city in the loftiest peaks of the Carpathian Alps. Ceaselessly fighting the hated plague and hostile peasants, Gonji struggled to reach the mighty walls of majestic Vedun. But demons and dragons, and mages and monsters pursued the warrior across the wintry plains and the jagged mountains. His swords flashing with fury, Gonji battles his foes and strengthened his will, determined to conquer his hardships, and fulfill his destiny!
Apparently this is the first in a series, perhaps something along the lines of Jim Butcher’s Dresden series?
The Things That Are Not There
By C.J. Henderson; Read by Charles McKibben
10 CDs – Approx. 9 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audio Realms
Published: July 2009
ISBN: 9781897304426
Private detective Theodore London ran the best agency in New York City until a demon-driven storm trashed his operation. Ready to quit the business, fate delivered a beautiful woman to his doorstep—one being pursued by an army of winged monsters determined to use her as the key to unlock a doorway that will lead the world to madness.
The plot of this novel kind of reminds me a bit of Terminal Freeze |READ OUR REVIEW|, but warmer…
Castaways
By Brian Keene; Read by Maynard McKillen
7 CDs – Approx. 8 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Dark Realms
Published: March 2010
ISBN: 9871897304709
They came to the lush, deserted island to compete on a popular reality TV show. Each one hoped to be the last to leave. Now they’re just hoping to stay alive. It seems the island isn’t deserted after all. Contestants and crew members are disappearing, but they aren’t being eliminated by the game. They’re being taken by the monstrous half-human creatures that live in the jungle. The men will be slaughtered. The women will be kept alive as captives. Night is falling, the creatures are coming, and rescue is so far away.
Posted by Jesse Willis
The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian
By Robert E. Howard; Read by Todd McLaren
18.5 Hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Media
Published: 2009
Themes: / Fantasy / Conan / Sword and Sorcery /
What do readers want out of fantasy fiction? Epic quests to banish evil from the world? Coming of age stories of young wizards and warriors growing up and into their great, latent powers? Many do: I enjoy these types of stories myself, from time to time.
But when my heart yearns for pulse-pounding, savage adventure, curvaceous women and thrilling sword fights, forgotten, vine-grown cities, and ancient, monstrous evil guarding hoarded gems and gold, I turn to Robert E. Howard, creator of Conan the Cimmerian.
Now, thanks to Tantor Media, we have the luxury of listening to pure, unaltered Howard as well. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian is the first of three planned releases by Tantor collecting all of the original Conan tales. This 15 CD set (18.5 hours) includes the first 13 Conan stories, in the order Howard wrote them. Narrator Todd McLaren delivers the stories with passion and precision.
The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian was originally published in 2005 by Ballantine Books/Del Rey, followed shortly by The Bloody Crown of Conan and The Conquering Sword of Conan. Taken together, these three books for the first time included all of Howard’s original, unedited Conan stories. For those who may not know, Howard’s tales first appeared in Weird Tales magazine in the 1930s, and were later published in edited form, along with pastiches of variable quality, by Lancer/Ace books in the 1960s and 70s.
The stories in The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian include:
• The Phoenix on the Sword
• The Frost-Giant’s Daughter
• The God in the Bowl
• The Tower of the Elephant
• The Scarlet Citadel
• Queen of the Black Coast
• Black Colossus
• Iron Shadows in the Moon
• Xuthal of the Dusk
• The Pool of the Black One
• Rogues in the House
• The Vale of Lost Women
• The Devil in Iron
Rather than provide a simple plot summary of the short stories listed above, I thought I’d use this platform to talk about Howard’s place in fantasy fiction and the broader field of literature. Many fantasy readers turn their nose up at Howard. They think his stories are all surface, pure story with no depth. Or they mistakenly conflate Howard’s Conan with the dumb brute of the films Conan the Barbarian or Conan the Destroyer. These folks are of course wrong.
It is true that many of Howard’s tales were written for quick publication in the pulp magazines of the era. As a result, some are rather formulaic. But Howard at his worst captivates with his seemingly effortless ability to produce breathless action. He had a talent for depicting whirling combat and wonderful images in a few words, and for poetic turns of phrase.
At his best, Howard wrote with surprising depth worthy of closer analysis, even study. His most ubiquitous, well-known theme was civilization vs. barbarism. Howard believed that as nations became civilized they grew correspondingly decadent and corrupt. Men who fight savagely and shed their blood to carve out shining kingdoms grow soft in times of peace and plenty until greed and sloth set in. Old kingdoms weaken through internal strife until they collapse from within or are invaded from without. In Howard’s works and in the mind of the author himself, the howling “barbarians at the gates” were always waiting to pounce when kingdoms grew weak, and Conan himself was one of the horde. Honest rule by might and the axe was preferable to the soft lies and deception of civilized men, whose faces were masks concealing their falsity.
To quote Conan from “Beyond the Black River,” “Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph.”
Other critics have noted existentialist strains running through Howard’s stories, as well as a hard-boiled realism that leant even his most fantastic, otherworldly tales a feeling of grounded, earthly reality. Howard also infused his stories with the myth of the American frontier. Born in Texas in 1906, Howard listened with rapt and wistful attention to old men who had witnessed first-hand the closing of the frontier, settling virgin wilderness and fighting Indians in savage wars for territory.
In my opinion Howard’s best Conan tales don’t appear in The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian: “Beyond the Black River” and “Red Nails” represent Howard at his peak, and are scheduled to appear on Tantor’s later discs. But “The Tower of the Elephant” is worth the purchase price alone, and “Queen of the Black Coast,” “The Scarlet Citadel,” “The Phoenix on the Sword,” “The Frost-Giant’s Daughter” and “Rogues in the House” are all terrific as well. “The Vale of Lost Women” is the only true dud here (it went unpublished in Howard’s lifetime, and was probably better off left in a footlocker), while “The Pool of the Black One” didn’t do a lot for me, either.
In addition to Howard’s stories, Tantor also includes a wonderful introduction by Patrice Louinet, which does a far better job than I describing Howard’s themes. “If the true work of art is something that at once attracts and disturbs, then the Conan stories are something special, an epic painted in bright colors, featuring heroic deeds and larger-than-life characters in fabled lands, but with something darker lying beneath,” Louinet writes.
The one problem with the set? Tantor inexplicably failed to include track listings. You have to skip around to find the stories, and while it didn’t bother me too much for this review (I listened straight through), you’re out of luck if you ever want to just pop in a disc and listen to “The God in the Bowl,” for example. Ah well. I know Tantor has corrected this oversight and plans to include track listings on its future releases.
Still, this omission aside, Tantor Media should be commended for releasing the audio versions of the books that every true Howard fan should have in his or her collection.
Posted by Brian Murphy
Dragons of the Dwarven Depths: The Lost Chronicles, Volume I
By Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, read by Sandra Burr
13 CDs, 1 MP3 disc – 15 hrs [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Published: 2006
ISBN: 9781423316107 (CDs), 9781423316121 (MP3 disc)
Themes: / Fantasy / Epic Fantasy / Heroic / Sword and Sorcery / Magic / Adventure /
In an untold story from the War of the Lance, the companions have saved the refugees of Pax Tharkas and led them to a hidden valley. For a time they are safe, but the forces of the Dragon Army are in pursuit.
This novel takes place after the first Dragonlance novel, Dragons of Autumn Twilight. The story starts with a large ensemble of characters already in place. Along with the refugees that these characters have saved, they must choose a path for escape. The Draconian army is still strong and hungry for vengeance against the rebels. The best path for the group is to send a small group to the underground dwarven kingdom of Thorbardin, where they hope to find shelter for the winter for their party, and also find the legendary Hammer of Kharas.
As a reviewer it’s important to tell you that this is my absolute first exposure to the Dragonlance universe. This book is very much a sequel of sorts. Although it’s the first book of a trilogy, it’s filling in the untold tales of Dragonlance’s first trilogy.
This book is not a good jumping-on point to the series. It took effort to pay attention through the early parts of the book, because characters are introduced in quick succession. After you get to know the characters (and they separate into smaller groups) the listening becomes much easier.
Looking at the cover, it would be foolish to expect more than a Tolkienesque fantasy. And that’s exactly what you get. An adventure with a pantheon of familiar fantasy creatures as well as humans. The characters all had distinct traits and their own motivation. The evil characters are just that – evil – yet interesting. But more interesting was that many of the characters on the side of good came in various shades of gray.
My favorite element of the audiobook was listening to the excellent performance of Sandra Burr. She has a pleasant narrative voice. She creates many unique voices for the menagerie of characters. Not only does she have to do the dialog of mostly males, but many are not even human. Her voice characterizations helps the listener sort out all the different inhabitants of the novel.
The writing of this book had to present some difficulties for the authors. The characters all have a past and future in other books, so there are many restrictions that would have to be adhered to for the sake of consistency and continuity. As a new reader to the series I did not get a sense that the characters were being “shoe horned” into a contrived story. In the end, the story kept me engaged, and for fans of the Dragonlance books, I’m sure it’s a welcome addition.