Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived in the mail here at the Geek Compound.
Elric In the Dream Realms (Chronicles of the Last Emperor of Melniboné, Vol. 5) by Michael Moorcock
Promo copy:
Kinslayer. Soul reaver. Sorcerer. Thief. And last emperor of a cruel, decadent race. Elric of Melniboné is all of these–and more. His life is sustained by drugs and magic–and energy sucked from the victims of his vampiric black sword, Stormbringer, a weapon feared by men and gods alike. Denied the oblivion he seeks, poised between a tragic past he cannot escape and a terrifying future he is doomed to bring about, Elric is a hero like no other.
Del Rey is proud to present the fifth installment in its definitive collection featuring the immortal creation of Michael Moorcock, named Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. Highlights include an epic novel of Elric’s early years, The Fortress of the Pearl; the script of the graphic novel Elric: The Making of a Sorcerer; a previously unpublished proposal for a new series; and Hugo Award—winning author Neil Gaiman’s moving fictional tribute to Elric, the short story “One Life, Furnished in Early Moorcock.”
Gorgeously illustrated by Michael Wm. Kaluta, Elric: In the Dream Realms is a dream come true for sword-and-sorcery fans.
This Crooked Way by James Enge
Promo copy:
Morlock Ambrosius returns! Travelling alone in the depths of winter, Morlock Ambrosius (bitterly dry drunk, master of all magical makers, wandering swordsman, and son of Merlin Ambrosius and Nimue Viviana) is attacked by an unknown enemy. To unmask his enemy and end the attacks he must travel a long crooked way through the world: past the soul-eating Boneless One, past a subtle and treacherous master of golems, past the dragon-taming Khroi, past the predatory cities of Sarkunden and Aflraun, past the demons and dark gnomes of the northern woods. Soon he will find that his enemy wears a familiar face, and that the duel he has stumbled into will threaten more lives than his own, leaving nations shattered in its chaotic wake. And at the end of his long road waits the death of a legend.
Black Blood by John Meaney
Promo copy:
In John Meaney’s follow-up to the much-acclaimed Bone Song, a cop in a morbidly lush necropolis crosses the barrier between life and death to avenge the murder of his lover—a woman whose heart now beats in his chest.…
Tristopolitan police lieutenant Donal Riordan returned from the dead for one purpose: to stop the killer who took not only his life but his reason for living it. But first he must penetrate a secret cabal known as the Black Circle, whose stranglehold on the city’s elite is preparation for a magical coup d’état fueled by a sacrifice of unprecedented bloodshed. At the center of this ring of evil is the man responsible for his lover’s murder—a man Donal has already had to kill once before.
El Borak and Other Desert Adventures by Robert E. Howard
Info and story list from The Cimmerian:
El Borak:
– The Daughter of Erlik Khan
– Hawk of the Hills
– Swords of the Hills (aka “The Lost Valley of Iskander”)
– Blood of the Gods
– Sons of the Hawk (aka “The Country of the Knife”)
– Son of the White Wolf
– Three-Bladed Doom (short)
– Three-Bladed Doom (long)
Kirby O’Donnell:
– The Curse of the Crimson God
– Sword of Shahrazar (aka “The Treasure of Shaibar Kahn”)
– The Treasures of Tartary
Francis X. Gordon
Gordon is called “El Borak” — the Swift — by the untamed tribesmen of Central Asia and the Middle East. The nickname describes his speed with sword and revolver, the latter skill perfected in an earlier career as a Texas gunman. A freelance adventurer who occasionally hires on with the British Secret Service to foil Russia’s imperialistic designs north of the Khyber Pass, Gordon sometimes rides into trouble alone, sometimes with a small band of dedicated friends. In the fearsome Land of Ghouls, he infiltrates and shatters a resurgent band of outlaws who have attempted to revive the brotherhood of the Assassins. In the corpse-choked Pass of Swords, he throws off his disguise as “Shirkuh,” a killer for hire, to foil the sinister Black Tigers. When WW1 explodes, he follows the call of duty southward to fight alongside Lawrence of Arabia.
Kirby O’Donnell
Like Gordon, Kirby O’Donnell is a restless American who has found his true home on the far borders of High Tartary. Armed with the fighting-knife called the kindhjal and cloaked in the assumed identity of “Ali El Ghazi,” a Kurdish soldier of fortune, O’Donnell follows a legend of vast treasure to the forgotten city of Shahrazar. He finds the fortune, then consigns it to destruction so as to prevent it from igniting a conflagration across Central Asia. But another fabulous hoard awaits, the ruby-encrusted idol known as the Blood-Stained God; it is O’Donnell’s for the taking, in the rugged hills beyond the Crag of Eagles — if he can survive multiple double-crosses to claim it!
I’ve also been told by Rusty Burke (editor for this book and all others in the Del Rey series) that the original, non-supernatural version of “The Fire of Asshurbanipal” will appear in this volume.
Tim Bradstreet and the artistic team of Jim and Ruth Keegan illustrate this volume, though sadly the images were not included with the ARC I received.
Disclaimer as mandated by the goons at the FTC: All the books mentioned in this blog entry were sent free of charge by the publishers for the purposes of review. That’s all folks!