Some Rambling Thoughts on Failure and the Mail Bag

Bossoli's Battle of Solferino

I haven't done one of these in a long time. I've been rereading - Glen Cook's Black Company and James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux books - so I haven't picked up any new fiction until today. Later on I'll show you what was in the mail bag.

On the other hand, a recent question from a friend about the unification of Germany sparked a flutter of a memory. Oh, yeah, my utterly failed Long Nineteenth Century project from a couple of years ago. You know, the one where I replaced the banner with Carlo Bossoli's awe-inspiring painting of the Battle of Solferino and claimed I was going to read a great big stack of history books. The thing I failed at almost completely. I only managed to review two books - Alistair Horne's Price of Glory about Verdun and Trevor Royle's The Great Crimean War - and make a few ancillary posts before getting distracted by others things.

3rd Bastion in Sevastopol

I really was distracted. I was getting bored with swords & sorcery (really, it can happen). In search of something to write about for Black Gate, my eyes fell on epic fantasy. It was fun, but the bigger books stole any extra time had for reading non-fiction. I mean it stole time if I wanted to keep writing for Black Gate AND spend hundreds of hours playing Civilization.

So I bailed. After all the hullabaloo I made about it I just ditched the Long Nineteenth Century like a hot potato - a dirty, smelly, hot potato. Later I did the same thing with the Western project. In the end I just signed off on blog projects, changed the name to Stuff I Like and started posting whatever caught my fancy. The thing is, I'm lazy, too lazy by half. It's really my greatest fault and I don't see myself overcoming it any time soon. I really do wish I'd succeed at the 19th century stuff. Heck, I've got something going on at my Staten Island blog I was really hoping I'd get a move on this summer, but you can guess how well that went.

I'm not proud of my laziness, but I really don't see overcoming it. Maybe if anything other than my reputation as a slacker depended on me accomplishing any of these things I would change. I'm am starting to discipline myself a little bit, so I'll see how that goes. Until some future better moment, though, I'll just keeping on keeping on the way I'v been going.

Now, I'm not saying I'm going to attempt anything like that. I am saying I'm going to finally finish Geoffrey Wawro's The Prusso-Austrian War and review my notes on Harold C. Wylly's Campaign of Magenta and Solferino. I'm really interested in fall of Austria and the rise of Prussia as the leaders of the German-speaking world.

Cavalry at Konnigratz

Between the clobbering by the French and Sardinians in 1859 and then the Prussians in 1866, Austria was knocked out of the running for control of the Germans. The Prussians, victorious in Denmark in 1864, against Austria in 1866, and finally against Germany's long-time nemesis, France, in 1870, became the natural leaders of the Germans. In 1871, under Prussian direction, save for Luxembourg, Lichtenstein, and Austria, the assorted German nations were finally united. How this heady moment of Teutonic triumph led to the cauldron of the First World War and then the Second is a story for another day.

Mail Bag

On my birthday, I always order a stack of stuff, mostly from Amazon. This year is no different.

I'm a huge Tim Powers fan, and he, along with Glen Cook, is one of only a few writers I still get in hardcover. Even though I'm like two books behind on his catalogue, there's a new one out and I'll get it on Friday.

Then there are the history books I bought (all ebooks). I envision having a significant library dedicated to the military insanity that shaped the last few centuries, particularly in the West. I think I'm pretty well along, but there's always more to go. Our history of slaughtering one another is lengthy.

I know a little about the English Civil War, mostly from a book, whose title escapes me, on the period's radical factions. This is the first full history of the whole period and I hope to actually read it soonish. 

Other than a vague idea of who the Duke of Marlborough was and that the Battle of Malplaquet was a important, I know little about the war. I vaguely recall it involved Louis XIV finagling to get his grandson on the Spanish throne, but beyond that, I've got nothing. These seems to be a solid treatment of the whole war and not just the British part as many other books do.

I've got a little cash left to spend but I'm going to sit on it for a bit. Ideally, I'd love to find a history of Russian imperialism in the Caucasus, but I haven't come across one yet. If you know of one, please, let me know. Imperial Russia appears to have been one of the most thoroughly militarized societies to have ever existed. There appear to have been wars going on constantly from mid-16th century straight up until the Revolution. Of course the Soviet Union had its own imperial period, but again, that's a story for another time.

A good one volume survey of the Latin American wars of independence would be a score too. If you know about one of those, drop me a line.

Movie Mail Bag

With some Christmas $s, I decided to fix a few holes in my Western collection. Some of them I specifically plan to review (Johnny Guitar, The Shooting, High Plains Drifter - a list that should make it pretty obvious I'm partial to the odder films). Others, I'm not sure about. I known I'll review at least one of the Jimmy Stewart/Anthony Mann movies, but which one I'm not sure of yet. If memory serves me right, they're all pretty good - maybe as good as the Randolph Scott/Budd Boetticher collaborations. 

The five Stewart/Mann pictures were Winchester '73, The Man from Laramie, The Naked Spur (which I already have), The Far Country, and Bend of the River. Now I'll have 'em all. Oh, and Night Passage was supposed to be directed by Mann as well, but he dropped out because he didn't like the casting of Audie Murphy.

Keith West reminded me of Clint Eastwood's fairly psychotic, nearly Gothic, supernatural revenge Western (enough adjectives for you?), High Plains Drifter. Clint has never had trouble playing an ambiguous "hero," and his gunslinger in this one might be the most so. There are scenes of psychological and moral degradation that might make the most jaded viewer's skin crawl.

And the set includes Stewart's early pairing with Marlene Dietrich, Destry Rides Again. 

Finally, low-budget genius Monte Hellman's two Westerns. Both feature young, yet-unmannered Jack Nicholson, and Millie Perkins. Ride in the Whirlwind also has Harry Dean Stanton. The Shooting is one of Warren Oates' best performances. The latter film was described thus:

Imagine a Spaghetti Western written by Rod Serling, adapted from a Samuel Beckett play. Throw in the following: the great Warren Oates, an evil Jack Nicholson, a bitchy Millie Perkins, some hellish desert locales, and a truly bizarre ending -- a definite must-see.

Christmas Books - Part One

Except for the Norton Critical Edition of The Pilgrim's Progress which only exists as a physical book, I put all e-books on my Christmas wish list. First, I just don't have room for anymore real books. Our shelves are packed, even doubled in a few places. Secondly, I've gotten really comfortable reading on my various kindles. Between changing the background/text colors and the brightness I'm pretty much able to read easily wherever I am.

I only got one actual book off my wish list, Howard Andrew Jones' The Bones of the Old Ones. Everything else I got was as generic Amazon kindle credits. So I had a few decisions to make. Some of my picks were things I've been too cheap to buy and others were things that caught my eye tooling around Amazon tonight.

I've been meaning to read this one and its predecessor for some time now. I was totally taken by the short story collection The Waters of Eternity. Now I can read the whole saga as it now stands.

I first read Ty's work in The Return of the Sword and really dug it. I've been meaning to read more and at $4.99 for an omnibus collection how could I not get this one?

I'm way too cheap to buy these collections most days of the week. With "free" Christmas credit things are different. I've been told this is the best overall introduction to Lamb's vivid adventure stories. We'll see.

I'm a big fan of Milton Davis, the ceaseless engine behind much sword & soul action. Nice to see this get a solid review on Black Gate last month.

If you gamed in the seventies and early eighties you should remember David Hargrave's utterly bonkers D&D supplement Arduin. For its sheer scale and crazed ingenuity the first volume of this series, Seven Princes, brought that to mind. I'm really looking forward to digging into these.

My first knowledge of this book was from Leo Grin's bracing essay "The Bankrupt Nihilism of Our Fallen Fantasists." I've read numerous other commentary attacking it as well as defending it in the years since Grin's article. It's reached a point where if I'm going to hold myself up as any sort of authority on heroic fiction
I've got to give Abercrombie a go at least once.

This one, well, lots of people have gone on about it being top notch, so, I figured I'd check it out. Sounds fun.







I have got so many freakin' books to read right now. I'm still in the middle of the second Gonji book with the third staring over my shoulder. Then there's a backlog of magazine short stories to plow through. Then, I just don't know. Maybe Carole McDonnell's Wind Follower. Or something else.

Mail Bag

   Cheap books from Amazon almost make up for lost used book stores my friends and I used to haunt. It took me several years to find a copy of K. W. Jeter's Morlock Night in a real store. Now, one-click and it's mine.
   The downside of not having physical book stores anymore is I don't just chance upon something and buy it because the blurb on the back makes it sound great or the cover calls out tome.
   Books at the now-closed Book Pit in Red Bank, NJ went for under $2. I always walked out with a bag of books at least half by people I had never read before. It was great when there were a dozen different stores I could visit regularly with similar results.
   Even with Amazon Prime, the cheapest a book at Amazon costs me is $4. At that price, if I'm going to buy something by an author I'm not familiar with I need to know a little about a book from reviews or recommendations before I spend my cash.

This I bought because Bill Ward recommended it. I'd been curious about Brust but never bought it. Now I have.

I read "Bones for Dulath", the first Ki and Vandien story in Amazons! and really liked it. This $.01 omnibus (plus $3.99 S/H) gets me the original trilogy.

Read some good things about this someplace I can't remember and that was good enough for me.

Bill Ward reminded me about first volume, The Oblivion Hand, which reminded me I never got these. So I did.

Finally, the Deep Down Genre Hound himself sent me some of his latest collections. I've already read the three Shan and Bao stories and they're a blast. Further proof of the ongoing S&S renaissance. Note the very cool colophon.

Vacation and New Books

  The luminous Mrs. V. and I just got back from a nice roadtrip through the South.  Mostly it was just driving around checking out some utterly beautiful scenery.  If anyone every asks why you'd go to Arkansas, tell them it's because it's gorgeous.  I'm still debating whether the mountains of Arkansas or West Virginia are prettier.  

 We only had a few specific destinations in mind and managed to hit all of them.  The first was the Perryville battlefield in Kentucky. I get so much out of walking the hills and fields of the places I read about and experiencing a 3-D reality to then apply to the maps and narratives.

   Perryville's an interesting and pivotal, if somewhat less well known, battle.  It was actually a little difficult to picture nearly 40,000 men fighting and dying over the bucolic green hills.  The visitors' center is well done and the presentation did a good job explaining a confusing conflict.

   The next planned stop was the Laura Ingalls Wilder Home in Mansfield, Missouri.  My wife is a major fan of the Little House books (and assuredly not the tv show).  When we traveled to Montana a few years ago we visited numerous Little House locations.  I'm not a particular fan but all site we've visited provided me great insights into the pioneer life of the nineteenth century.

   Our final historical destination was the Chickamauga battlefield in north Georgia.  Being one of the last major Civil War battlefields I haven't been to, this was my trip highlight.  

   Chickamauga was the only major victory the poor Army of

Tennessee managed to win over its various Union opponents. Strategically it led nowhere.  In fact, Union general Rosecran's defeat led directly to the introduction of U.S. Grant and W. T. Sherman to the region and the stunning defeat of Confederate general Bragg at Chattanooga a few months later.

   We also, really only as an afterthought, revisited Gettysburg on the second to last day of driving home.  We got there after the visitors' center closed so we just did the auto-tour.  I've been there twice before but it was the first time I drove up Culp's Hill.  There, we climbed the observation tower.  The vista was stunning and helped reinforce the difficulty of communications and simply seeing things across the battlefield.

   We did see other things (including Mammoth Cave, and Luray Caverns) but the above were the definite highlights.  If you never have, you need to get in your car and just travel around this country.  There's just so much to see and so many people to meet.  

   I just ordered and downloaded the new Morlock book, Wrath-Bearing Tree, by James Enge.  I still need to read the last one but hopefully soon.

   I also got the The Soul Within the Steel and Deathwind of Vedun, the last two books in T. C. Rypel's (and the man who called me an archaeo-bibliophile) Gonji series.  I think the first is next on my to-read list.

   Finally I've ordered and paid for Deepest, Darkest Eden, edited by Cory Goodfellow.  I was hoping to find it in my mailbox when I got home but no such luck.  As you can see it's got an amazing cover.  It'll look great alongside my copy of The Last Continent from a few years back.

   Swords & sorcery may not be as prominent as it was in the past, but dang, there is an overwhelming amount of great writing going on.  I really am going to try and stop buying anything new for the next few months so I can catch up a little bit.

Mail Bag

   With the summer months I get a little more reading done and am a little more apt to spend some money on books.  Sometimes even real, printed-on-paper books.  Of course that didn't mean I didn't buy a couple more e-books.

Swords & Dark Magic: I never bothered getting my own copy of this pretty good collection of new, original swords & sorcery.  I also never finished reading it. I figure it's important enough an anthology that i should have a hard copy on the shelf next to all the Flashing Swords! and Swords Against Darkness volumes.

Surrender to the Will of the Night: As huge a Glen Cook fan as I am, I'm actually surprised I haven't read this series yet.  With the fourth book coming out this fall I figured at least let me have the third one on hand should the urge to read them hit me. He's one of the few authors I still buy in hardcover.

Meji Book One:  Since discovering Milton Davis last year I've become a big fan. Between his sword & soul writing and his publishing efforts he's an inspiring guy.  Still, if his stories weren't fun it wouldn't mean as much, but fortunately they are a lot of fun.  

Wind Follower:  When I reviewed Milton Davis' and Charles Saunders Griots last summer, one of the two stories I described as my favorites was Carole McDonnell's "Changeling".  This is a book I'm particularly looking forward to and have high hopes.  

In Savage Lands: I'd seen this around and read the review by John O'Neil over at Black Gate last summer, meant to buy it then and promptly forgot all about it.  Now I've remember and the old one-click brought it to my Kindles.

Another Mail Bag

  I finished off Joe Hill's very good NOS4A2.  With its jaunts across unreal landscapes and an unnatural automobile, there's more than a hint (not unwelcome) of some of his father Stephen King's stories.  While not especially scary, and admittedly I find few spook-stories scary, it's chock full of unsettling moments and characters.
   Unfortunately, reading some reviews, I found out there's a extra ending buried in the "About the Typeface" section.  Amazon saw fit to leave that out of the kindle edition and it pisses me off.  It also means I have to "stir my sticks" and go read it in Barnes & Noble.
   I'm still working through John Fultz's Revelations of Zang.  It has the same extravagant world building of Seven Princes.  I'm about a third of the way through and it's lots of fun.
   One of the most insidious things about Amazon are the recommendations it makes based on the books you've bought already.  Once I bought Black Pulp a few weeks ago, all sorts of cool pulp stuff's popped up at the bottom of my Kindle Fire.

Monster Aces

   So I bought this just because it sounded cool.  Except for Fortier, I've never even heard of any of the authors.  Still, I figured, how much of chance can it be to buy it?

Doc Savage: Skull Island

   I've read a few Murray Cthulhu Mythos stories and enjoyed the heck out of them.  I know about his long association with Doc Savage and I love King Kong, so again, how much of a risk can this one be?