1938 | Fantasy Literature: Fantasy and Science Fiction Book and Audiobook Reviews

Order [book in series=yearoffirstbook.book# (eg 2014.01), stand-alone or one-author collection=3333.pubyear, multi-author anthology=5555.pubyear, SFM/MM=5000, interview=1111]: 1938

The Cave of a Thousand Columns: The land down UNDER

The Cave of a Thousand Columns by T.E. Grattan-Smith

I have never been to the continent of Australia before, and after watching a number of videos, both online and on television, concerning the fauna and flora there, I am really in no great rush to go. Perhaps you’re familiar with some of the videos I mean? Australia, it would seem, is home to the inland taipan snake (the world’s most venomous snake), kamikaze magpies, the freshwater bull shark, the Australian honeybee (one of the world’s most poisonous insects), raining spiders,

May 10th, 2022. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 3.5 | T.E. Grattan-Smith | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |

The Bat Woman: A middling horror novel in a sloppy presentation

The Bat Woman by Cromwell Gibbons

As some of you may have discerned, my favorite type of reading matter these days has been the science fiction, fantasy and horror books from the period 1900 – 1950, and so I am always on the lookout for modern-day publishers issuing new editions of these often out-of-print works. Case in point: Bruin Books, from Eugene, Oregon, which, a few years back, made it possible for me to finally obtain a reasonably priced copy of Paul Bailey’s wonderful horror novel Deliver Me From Eva (1946).

The Thing: One of the few remakes that I prefer over the original

The Thing directed by John Carpenter

It is a debate that my buddy Jack and I have been having for decades now: Which is the better version of The Thing? The original classic from 1951, actually entitled The Thing From Another World and directed by Christian Nyby (and, it is conjectured, Howard Hawks), OR the 1982 remake directed by John Carpenter? People who know me, and of my love for all things pertaining to 1950s sci-fi, as well as my dislike of unnecessary remakes, will perhaps be surprised to learn that I have always been the champion of the latter film.

Who Goes There?: An influential, entertaining novella

Who Goes There? by John W. Campbell, Jr.

Three mad, hate-filled eyes blazed up with a living fire, bright as fresh-spilled blood, from a face ringed with a writhing, loathsome nest of worms, blue, mobile worms that crawled where hair should grow…

John W. Campbell’s novella Who Goes There?, first published in 1938 in the magazine Astounding Science Fiction, formed the foundation for the thrice-made movie The Thing. John Carpenter directed the 1982 film starring Kurt Russell and it holds a significant place in my childhood memories as it was the first horror movie I was able to watch all they way through.

Anthem: Inferior to the Big Three Dystopias

Anthem by Ayn Rand

It’s incredible, the number of thematic similarities between Ayn Rand’s Anthem (1938) and Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We (1924), as well as Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World (1932). While there’s no direct evidence that Ayn Rand plagiarized those earlier works, she owes an undeniable debt to their dystopian future societies where the individual has been completely sublimated to the needs of the state. Moreover, I believe that We and Brave New World are superior works,

The Once and Future King & The Book of Merlyn

The Once and Future King & The Book of Merlyn by T.H. White

There are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of retellings concerning King Arthur, Guenever, Merlin, Lancelot, the Knights of the Round Table and the Kingdom of Camelot, but only a few of them attain literary quality and even less become classics. T.H. White’s four-part masterpiece (or five-part, depending on what edition you have) definitely falls into the elite category.

With oddly chatty and anachronistic prose, which describes Sir Ector as drinking port and discussing Eton before explaining that he’s only using these terms because “by mentioning the modern it is easier to give you the feel,”

March 1st, 2010. Rebecca Fisher´s rating: 5 | T.H. White | SFF Reviews | 8 comments |

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July 2024

Sandy Ferber on Three-Bladed Doom: Howard’s only El Borak novelJuly 26, 2024
Don't know how to answer that, Andrew; I've only read the long. But when it comes to REH, more is…
Andrew on Three-Bladed Doom: Howard’s only El Borak novelJuly 25, 2024
Would you recommend the long or the short version of Three Bladed Doom?
Sandy Ferber on Almuric: Overwhelming storytelling gustoJuly 24, 2024
"A Gent From Bear Creek," originally a collection of short stories later cobbled together to make a novel, and "Three-Bladed…
Andrew on Almuric: Overwhelming storytelling gustoJuly 23, 2024
What were the 4 novels we wrote? Two were Almuric and Hour of the Dragon, what's the other 2?
Marion Deeds on Stonefish: Not your basic horror novelJuly 17, 2024
He has a new one just out (or being released soon) called DRILL. I'm interested, but I may need to…

Order [book in series=yearoffirstbook.book# (eg 2014.01), stand-alone or one-author collection=3333.pubyear, multi-author anthology=5555.pubyear, SFM/MM=5000, interview=1111]: 1938

The Cave of a Thousand Columns: The land down UNDER

The Bat Woman: A middling horror novel in a sloppy presentation

The Thing: One of the few remakes that I prefer over the original

Who Goes There?: An influential, entertaining novella

Anthem: Inferior to the Big Three Dystopias

The Once and Future King & The Book of Merlyn

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