fantasy – Page 2 – Examining the Odd

H.P. Lovecraft Covers through the Years

Published on 4 Mar 201622 Jan 2016 by oddspecs7 Comments

I thought it would be fun to find H.P. Lovecraft book covers that span the decades and put them in order here. Enjoy the terror!

Astounding Stories – At the Mountains of Madness, 1936

The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, Livros do Brasil, 1941 (I think this is my favourite!)

Weird Tales (featuring The Shadow Over Innsmouth), 1942

The Weird Shadow Over Innsmouth, Bart House, 1944

Best Supernatural Stories, The World Publishing Company, 1946

The Survivor and Others, 1957

Dreams and Fancies, Arkham House, 1962

The Colour Out of Space – and Others, Lancer Books, 1964

The Colour Out of Space and Others, Lancer Books 1969

The Lurking Fear and Other Stories, 1970

Dans L’abime du Temps, 1973 (or maybe this is my favourite…)

Watchers Out of Time and Others, Arkham House, 1974

The Colour Out of Space, Zebra Books, 1975

El Caso de Charles Dexter Ward, Alianza/Biblioteca de Fantasia y Terror, 1998

An H.P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, Hippocampus Press, 2004

Beyond the Wall of Sleep (Complete Works), CreateSpace Indie, 2013

Sidney H. Sime

Published on 3 Feb 201623 Jul 2016 by oddspecs7 Comments

I’ve stumbled upon a wonder!

Sidney H. Sime (sometimes referred to as the Master of the Mysterious) was a gifted English painter, cartoonist and illustrator, often compared to Aubrey Beardsley and Arthur Rackham.

I’ve put together some images for this post, as well as a YouTube video at the end which showcases a Tarot deck featuring Sime’s work.

Many of Sidney H. Sime’s illustrations were for the beautifully odd stories of Lord Dunsany (Edward J.M.D. Plunkett, 1878-1957). You can read a collection of his shorts, The Last Book of Wonder (1916) for free over on archive.org. Titles include Why the Milkman Shudders when he Perceives the Dawn, The Bird of the Difficult Eye, The Long Porter’s Tale, The Loot of Loma, The Secret of the Sea, A Story of Land and Sea and The Exiles Club. archive.org also has Dunsany’s The Gods of Pegana, featuring Sime’s illustrations, Time and the Gods and The Sword of Welleran, and other stories, originally published by G. Allen & Sons, it’s 290 pages of wonder.

“The partnership of illustrator Sidney H. Sime and fantasy writer Lord Dunsany (also poet, dramatist, and grand chess master and pistol champion of Ireland) is without peer in the annals of fantasy illustration. It is almost inconceivable to imagine a Dunsany story – with its exquisite fusion of elements from Greek and Celtic myths (Dunsany was friendly with Yeats and the writers of the Celtic Twilight), Arabian Nights adventure, and the solemn harmonies of the Old Testament – without the drawings of Sidney H. Sime. Sime has been called the “greatest imaginative artist since William Blake,” and aside from their fin-de-siecle elegance, and delicacy of line recalling Persian miniatures, Sime’s drawings manifest that rare faculty of being able to give definitive, and often uncanny, form to the poet’s merest suggestions.” – from ArtRenewal.com

Sime’s work was largely unrecognised during his lifetime. There have however been recent exhibitions of his drawings and paintings and there is a Sidney Sime Gallery in Worplesdon, Surrey.

The Weird West

Published on 7 Nov 2015 by oddspecsLeave a comment

I’ve been reading Dead Man’s Hand, an anthology of Weird West short stories put together by John Joseph Adams. Adams has previously collated a book of fantasy short stories Epic: Legends of Fantasy.

Dead Man’s Hand includes work from Mike Resnick, Beth Revis, Alastair Reynolds, Hugh Howey, Kelley Armstrong, Jeffery Ford, Fred Van Lente, Christie Yant and others. Published last year by Titan Books, this genre is new to me.

I’m familiar with Weird Fiction, but this Western niche has escaped my attention until now. During the introduction Adams explains that the phrase “dead man’s hand” refers to the poker hand held by the gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok when, in 1876, he was shot and killed by the coward Jack McCall.

It was the third story, David Farland’s Hellfire on the High Frontier, that prompted this blog post. Farland manages to pack a ‘skinwalker’, a stranger who “turned into an oily shadow and wafted away”, a box of beating black hearts, a plague merchant, a steam-punk airship with a balloon of golden silk, and so much more into just eighteen pages.

Despite this huge heap of fantasy, he manages to create a despairingly honest story with (in my opinion) no hero and no hope. Farland (also known as David Wolverton) hails from Utah and is the New York Times Best Selling author of The Runelords and YA fantasy thriller Nightingale.

Need more Weird Westerns? I’m intrigued by this recommendation from Fred Van Lente (whose short story Neversleeps appears in Dead Man’s Hand): “my absolute favorite is this rarity from 1989, Secret of San Saba, in which early conquistadors from early Texas discover an unearthly Lovecraftian horror beneath the sagebrush that poops gold. (Yes, really.) It’s been out of print forever, like most of Jackson’s work, so if you see it in some dusty bookstore shelf–grab it!”

To quote Adams: “So that’s the game, pard. Pull up a chair, ante up, and I’ll deal you in. The game’s “Weird West,” no limit, and everything‘s wild.”

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