Ghoul's Night Out

The first copy of Brian McNaughton's The Throne of Bones I got in the mail from Amazon was damaged. Whomever had opened the box from Terminal Fright Publications had been a little too zealous with their box cutter and delivered a nice vertical slash to nearly the entire length of the cover. They sent me a replacement but the image of that disfigured dust jacket lingers. 

There's a lot to this book that will remain with me for a very long time; McNaughton's exquisite writing and the marvelously collapsing world of Seelura. I'll also remember the depths of depravity it explores. There are several graphic rapes, necrophilia, necrophagy, necromancy, and lots and lots of blood splattered across the landscape. For all its beauty, the book is laced with poison. 

I think even the most avid defenders of the violence and whatnot in books like A Game of Thrones might have trouble with the worst bits in The Throne of Bones. But then McNaughton never claims he's just showing us how corrupt and sadistic the world really is. ToB is part of a great tradition of dark and brooding art, fascinated by corruption (physical) and death. It's not looking to be defended, just to exist as a piece of art that just happens to be about a black and gruesome world.

I'm not interested in reading porn, be it erotic or torture. The thing is, ToB isn't either one. I appreciate the tremendous artistry involved in even the creepiest moments but it's still thoroughly unpleasant at times. There's an almost gleefulness to McNaughton's creepy inventiveness to what he does to and with many of his characters, but it never becomes sadistic. It's just I felt a little tainted after reading some of the book.

In the end, I think every fan of dark fantasy should try the book. That McNaughton's dead and never going to write more of these stories saddens me. But I also want to warn everyone picking it up that parts will leave them queasy. I guess that's what makes it such a powerful work of art.

This week's music was a bunch of heavy stuff interwoven by all the acoustic tracks from the classic Sabbath albums from the seventies. Very good mix for writing the review.

"Laguna Sunrise" by Black Sabbath

"Future Days" by Nebula (live)

When the Divine Voice Fades Like an Echo

My review of Darrell Schweitzer's Echoes of the Goddess just went up at Black Gate. How have I missed him all these years? I mean, I saw his name around and read a great story he co-authored in Cthulhu's Heirs (have I mentioned that the Chaosium Cthulhu Fiction series is awesome?), but I had no sense of how good a writer he is.

When I read and reviewed The White Isle last year, I was almost shocked by the misery of the book's underlying conceit. It's an early work (I think he was 23 when wrote it) that was more affecting by the mature works of lots of authors I like. I knew he was someone I needed to read more by.

Echoes of the Goddess is a collection of eleven stories, some connected, all set in the time following the death of Earth's Goddess. This is not heroic fantasy, but it's definitely not your standard issue fantasy either. It's a just what the subtitle says: tales of terror and wonder. When you're ready to burn the next book starring an elven ranger or a dwarven tunnel-rat or the secret heir to the grand poobah, pick this book up. It'll clean your palate and show you how good fantasy can be. Not every story is great, but I guarantee you'll remember the ones that are for a long time.

The reviews I read compared it to works by Lord Dunsany and Clark Ashton Smith which very generally fits. Schweitzer, though, is much more concerned with his characters than simply creating and telling ornate myths of his own making. Go read my review to get a taste of the actual writing in the book and my further thoughts on the book.

After some baroque music this past week, Schweitzer's book propelled me back toward the very heavy, spacey sounds of bands like Nebula and Orange Goblin. Maybe not the most appropriate tunes for Echoes of the Goddess but they worked and propelled me through the writing of most of my review.