08/28/06 MON:
---Here today from Midnight House:

Russell, Eric Frank DARKER TIDES: The Weird Tales of…, Midnight House '06, one of 500 numbered copies, (contains all of the elusive tales in the fabulously rare Dark Tides and doubles their number with a selection of similar stories from sources such as Weird Tales, Fantastic, Strange Stories, and Science Fantasy; Pelan & Stephensen-Payne [eds]; Pelan & EFR intros), new in dj 45.00

---Here today from TOTU Ink:

TALES OF THE UNANTICIPATED: The Anthology of TOTU Ink #27, aut/06, (Monsters Issue; Twentieth Anniversary!), new 8.50

---Here today from PS Publishing:

Kilworth, Garry MOBY JACK and Other Tall Tales, PS, 7/06, 1st edn, one of 700 SIGNED copies, (if you like weird stories, dark comedy and stories where characters get into impossible situations and only occasionally extract themselves, then you’ll probably enjoy this volume; Holdstock intro), new in dj 45.00

---A $90 slipcased edition, also signed by Holdstock, is available, by special order.

08/24/06 THU:
---Books here now from PGW:

Di Filippo, Paul THE EMPEROR OF GONDWANALAND and Other Stories, Thunder's Mouth ('05), 1st, (more than just a pyrotechnics show, these stories offer profound, often biting insights; each story introduced by the author), new 16.95
---SHUTEYE FOR THE TIMEBROKER: Stories, Thunder's Mouth, 5/06, 1st, (a caffeinated collection to jolt your senses), new 15.95

Fenner, Cathy & Arnie Fenner (eds) SPECTRUM 11, Underwood '04, 1st, (The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art; moves to slightly larger fromat to better showcase the artists), {hc in dj available @ $39}, new 29.00
--- & ---(eds) SPECTRUM 12, Underwood '05, 1st, {hc in dj availalbe @ 39.95}, new 29.95

Jones, Stephen (ed) THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST NEW HORROR: Volume 16, Carroll & Graf '05, 1st US, (the world’s premier horror anthology series; also contains comprehensive overview of the year), new 12.95

Kotzwinkle, William THE AMPHORA PROJECT, Grove Press '05, 1st edn, (wildly inventive rip-roaring ride through the future of the universe; transcends the boundaries of both science fiction and fantasy), as new in dj with small ding in back spinefold corner 15.00

Shepard, Lucius ETERNITY and Other Stories, Thunder's Mouth ('05), 1st, (seven globe-spanning tales that defy reality; 442 pages), new 15.95

Sterling, Bruce VISIONARY IN RESIDENCE: Stories, Thunder's Mouth, 2nd, (13 new stories from the leather-jacketed high druid of cyberpunk; published 1999-2005), new 15.95

---Back in stock:

Frazetta, Frank ICON, Underwood, 10/03, 1st thus, (art book; completely revised & updated with more art; retrospective of artist’s work; edited by the Fenners), new 29.95
---TESTAMENT: The Life & Art of…, Underwood, 10/01, 1st trade edn, (features all the remaining major oils not in the first two volumes of this trilogy [Icon and Legacy]), new in dj $35
---I do have Legacy still in stock as well.

Hirshberg, Glen THE TWO SAMS: Ghost Stories, Carroll & Graf '03, (an International Horror Guild Award winner; Ramsey Campbell intro), new 14.00

Sturgeon, Theodore AND NOW THE NEWS…: Volume IX: The Complete Stories of…, North Atlantic '03, 1st, (Foreword by David G. Hartwell), new in dj 35.00

Wilson, Gahan THE BEST OF…, Underwood, 10/04, 1st, (cartoons; frighteningly funny collection of artist’s best work; features numerous anecdotes and observations), new 15.00

---Once again, these are all discounted 30%, whether or not your “membership” in the Discount Plan is current or not.

08/21/06 MON:
---Here today from PS Publishing:

POSTSCRIPTS #7, sum/06, (The A to Z of Fantastic Fiction; Jack Dann, Lucius Shepard, Howard Waldrop, T.M. Wright and Others), as new $10

08/16/06 WED:
---Word from Golden Gryphon:

Greetings from the Gryphon:

MAD DOG SUMMER, by Joe R. Lansdale, is now available!

Originally published by Subterranean Press as a hardcover
edition (now out of print), this short story collection represent the third
in the series (with High Cotton and Bumper Crop) of Lansdale
collections of his best short work. Mad Dog Summer showcases
Lansdale’s more recent stories, such as the title story which won the
1999 Bram Stoker Award for Long Fiction, about a serial killer in ’30
Texas, as seen from the point of view of a boy that finds one of the
victims. Weirdness and horror abound in “The Steam Man of the
Prairie and the Dark Rider Get Down,” set in a world that resembles
our Old West. A colorful group of lawmen tracks a vampire in a forty-
foot tall, steam-powered robot, with nods to Jules Verne, Tom Swift,
Edgar Rice Burroughs, and H. G. Wells. “Veils Visit” is a courtroom
drama featuring Lansdale’s popular series characters Hap Collins
and Leonard Pine, written in collaboration with Andrew Vachss. The
original novella form of “The Big Blow” is a riveting account of Jack
Johnson, the first black heavyweight boxing champion set during the
1900 flood of Galveston, Texas. “The Mule Rustlers” and “Screwup”
are classic Lansdale, where the incompetent perpetrators are their
own worst enemies. In the original 20,000 word novella, “Way Down
There,” a trio of superheros must descend into Hell in their ’57 Chevy
to confront Beelzebub. In “O’Reta, Snapshot Memories,” Lansdale
reminisces about his mother in a touching story. Each story has its
own introduction, in which Lansdale relates the background for the
idea of the story.
The collection was nominated for the Best Collection Award by
the World Fantasy Association.

Golden Gryphon Press

MAD DOG SUMMER, by Joe R. Lansdale
Cover art by J.K. Potter
ISBN 1-930846-42-8 / $14.95 (Trade softcover)
261 pages

08/14/06 MON:
---Stark House keeps cranking them out. Here today:

Whittington, Harry A NIGHT FOR SCREAMING / ANY WOMAN HE WANTED, Stark House Noir Classics, 7/06, 1st thus, (two thrillers from 1960-1; David Laurence Wilson intro), new 19.95

08/12/06 SAT:
---Word from Golden Gryphon:

Greetings from the Gryphon:

THRESHOLD SHIFT, by Eric Brown, is now available!

Threshold Shift is a collection of science fiction stories about people in
fantastic situations, focusing on the effect of science, technology, and change on
the lives of ordinary individuals.
The collection features two stories which won the British Science Fiction
Award, “The Children of Winter” and “Hunting the Slarque.” The first is a moving
tale of a hopeless love affair between alien kinds on a remote ice-bound world in the
far future. In the second, Hunter is resurrected from death by the owner of an
extraterrestrial zoo and sent off to the dying world of Tartarus in search of the
vicious beast that killed him, the Slarque.
Three stories are set in Brown’s Kéthani universe. The Kéthani are aliens
who arrive on present-day Earth and offer immortality, creating moral and ethical
dilemmas for the humans who chose to accept—or reject—the alien gift. Particularly
touching is “Thursday’s Child,” the story of parents whose daughter is dying; one
wants the Kéthani to ‘save’ their daughter, while the other is convinced that such
restoration is wrong.
These stories confirm Brown’s reputation as a writer of quiet, thoughtful stories
which, in the words of Bob Shaw: “. . . are the essence of modern science fiction
and yet show a passionate concern for the human predicament and human values.”

Golden Gryphon Press

Literary and non-scientist SF is a necessity for any library; move over, Tom Swift
and Roamers, make room for the Kéthani.

THRESHOLD SHIFT, by Eric Brown
Cover art by Bob Eggleton
ISBN 1-930846-43-6 / $24.95 (Trade hardcover)
218 pages

08/11/06 FRI:
---Here today from Ash-Tree:

Scrymsour, Ella SHEILA CRERAR, PSYCHIC INVESTIGATOR, Ash-Tree '06, 1st, (Occult Detectives Library #6; stories first appeared in The Blue Magazine in 1920; Jack Adrian [ed & intro]), new in dj 44.00

08/08/06 TUE:
---Cataloguing the few things that came in while I was away last week. From Stark House:

McCarthy, Kevin & Ed Gorman (eds) INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS: A Tribute, Stark House Film Classic, 6/06, 1st, (essays by King, Koontz, Breen, etc.), new 17.95

---From Tachyon:

Beagle, Peter S. THE LINE BETWEEN, Tachyon '06, 1st ltd hc edn, one of 250 SIGNED copies, new in dj 45.00
---I don’t have the $14.95 trade paperback edition here yet, but I hope to soon.

---From Wheatland Press:

Aguirre, Forrest & Deborah Layne (eds) THE NINE MUSES, Wheatland ('05), (features original stories by fourteen women writers who are breaking new literary ground in speculative and experimental fiction; with an essay by Elizabeth Hand), new 19.95

Lake, Jay (ed) TEL: Stories, Wheatland ('05), (elegant, erudite and strange; dedicated to the notion that great style makes great literature; a book for you to enjoy or hurl across the room as you see fit), new 17.50

POLYPHONY #5, ('05), (fifth volume in critically acclaimed cross-genre series; 418 pp), new 18.95

Rogers, Bruce Holland THE KEYHOLE OPERA, Wheatland ('05), (email subscription stories), new 19.95

08/07/06 MON:
---Received Earthling Newsletter 08/07/06:

Jeff Strand's new novel PRESSURE was published last week and has started shipping! Yes, this is the novel that has been getting the tremendous amount of advance buzz, the latest being from Insidious Reflections Magazine: 'An outstanding novel of nail-biting tension. 5 out of 5 stars. Strand's debut in the genre of suspense is about as top notch as it gets.' There has already been interest from Hollywood, and you will read many more wonderful things about this book on message boards and in reviews over the next several months as word continues to spread. The signed numbered and lettered editions are almost gone, but there are plenty of unsigned trade hardcovers. And a SPECIAL OFFER only for current Earthling Newsletter subscribers: if you buy a copy of the trade hardcover and don't feel it's a helluva good read, you may send it back to me for a full refund. How's that for fair?
Glen Hirshberg's AMERICAN MORONS will be going to the printer this week, and the finishing touches are being put on THE UNBLEMISHED by Conrad Williams. I'll be starting preorders for three titles in our next newsletter, including two titles that are not yet announced.
That's it for now. I hope everyone enjoys PRESSURE!
Thanks and all best,
Paul Miller, Earthling Publications

08/05/06 SAT:
---Made it back from camping trip in Northern Minnesota, with the only negative the usual sore back from lugging the cooler in and out of the car and sleeping on hard ground, etc. etc. The ten-hour car ride probably didn’t help much either. At least it is cooler here now than when we left, and although north of Duluth was hardly better off than anywhere else during the Big Heat Wave, by the time we got there temps had ameliorated somewhat and the only rain was a storm during our first night that obligingly held off until our tent was safely up and we were in it. I dreaded the prospect of all the rigamarole associated with a camping trip, trying in vain to wriggle out of it. But when we were finally ensconced there it was sort of okay. Now back, though, I have to figure out where to start getting to work again.

08/04/06 FRI:
---Picked up big pile of mail at post office, including packages from Stark House, Wheatland, and Tachyon, which I will catalog ASAP. But still nothing from PGW. I guess I will have to check on the status on that one.

---Word from Hippocampus:

Dear Bookseller,
The first ever full-scale critical anthology on Clark Ashton Smith is now available in hardcover and paperback from Hippocampus Press! A blurb is below; please advise quantities desired. Now is also a good time to stock up on our backlist titles by Smith, THE BLACK DIAMONDS, THE SWORD OF ZAGAN and THE LAST OBLIVION.

Thank you for your interest in Hippocampus Press!

Best regards,
Derrick Hussey
---------------------------------------------------------------

THE FREEDOM OF FANTASTIC THINGS
Selected Criticism on Clark Ashton Smith
Edited by Scott Connors
July 2006
376 pages
Hardcover : ISBN 0976159244: $49.95
Paperback: ISBN 0976159252: $20.00

As poet, fiction writer, and artist, Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961) has left an indelible mark on the fields of horror, fantasy, and science fiction. But criticism of his bountiful and varied work has been surprisingly scanty, and oftentimes ill-informed. The Freedom of Fantastic Things represents the most substantial volume of criticism of Smith’s work ever published, and includes both original and previously published work by the leading scholars on Smith.

Among the notable contributions are Donald Sidney-Fryer’s exhaustive discussion of Smith’s relations with his early mentor, George Sterling; Brian Stableford’s brilliant analysis of Smith’s cosmicism; Fred Chappell’s sensitive treatment of Smith’s fantastic poetry; S. T. Joshi’s essays on The Hashish-Eater and on Smith’s prose-poetry; Scott Connors’s penetrating study of Smith’s relations to literary Modernism; Lauric Guillaud’s rumination on fantasy and decadence in Smith’s work; and other essays by Carl Jay Buchanan, Charles K. Wolfe, Steve Behrends, Stefan Dziemianowicz, Ronald S. Hilger, and other leading authorities.

At the conclusion of the volume is Steve Behrends’s exhaustive chronology of Smith’s work and a comprehensive primary and secondary bibliography. All in all, a feast for devotees of the necromancer from Auburn!

Scott Connors is the coeditor of Smith’s Red World of Polaris and of a forthcoming five-volume edition of Smith’s fiction. He is also working on a full-scale biography of Smith.

Table of Contents:

Introduction by Scott Connors
“The Centaur” by Clark Ashton Smith
Klarkash-Ton and “Greek” by Donald Sidney-Fryer
Contemporary Reviews of Clark Ashton Smith
Eblis in Bakelite by James Blish
James Blish versus Clark Ashton Smith; to Wit, the Young Turk Syndrome by Donald Sidney-Fryer
The Last Romantic by S J Sackett
Communicable Mysteries: The Last True Symbolist by Fred Chappell
What Happens in The Hashish-Eater? by S T Joshi
The Babel of Visions: The Structuration of Clark Ashton Smith’s The Hashish-Eater by Dan Clore
Clark Ashton Smith’s “Nero” by Carl Jay Buchanan
Satan Speaks: A Reading of “Satan Unrepentant” by Phillip A Ellis
Lands Forgotten or Unfound: The Prose Poetry of Clark Ashton Smith by S T Joshi
Out the Human Aquarium: The Fantastic Imagination of Clark Ashton Smith by Brian Stableford
Gesturing Toward the Infinite by Scott Connors
Clark Ashton Smith: A Note on the Aesthetics of Fantasy by Charles K Wolfe
Fantasy and Decadence in the Work of Clark Ashton Smith by Laurie Guillaud
Humor in Hyperspace: Smith’s Uses of Satire by John Kipling Hitz
The Song of the Necromancer: “Loss” in Clark Ashton Smith’s Fiction by Steve Behrends
Brave World Old and New: The Atlantis Theme in the Poetry and Fiction of Clark Ashton Smith by Donald Sidney-Fryer
Coming in from the Cold: Incursons of “Outsideness” in Hyperborea by Steven Tompkins
As Shadows Wait Upon the Sun: Clark Ashton Smith’s Zothique by Jim Rockhill
Into the Woods: The Human Geography of Averoigne by Stefan Dziemianowicz
Sorcerous Style: Clark Ashton Smith's The Double Shadow and Other Fantasies by Peter H Goodrich
Loss and Recuperation: A Model for Reading Clark Ashton Smith’s “Xeethra” by Dan Clore
“Life, Love, and the Clemency of Death”: A Reexamination of Clark Ashton Smith’s “The Isle of the Torturers” by Scott Connors
An Annotated Chronology of the Fiction of Clark Ashton Smith by Steve Behrends
Bibliography
Contributors
Index