the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler

March 15, 2017

HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE is a masterpiece

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew wheeler, excerpt, hap and leonard, hap and leonard: blood and lemonade, hap and leonard: mucho mojo, Joe R. Lansdale, not our kind, pamela scott, review, risingshadow, seregil of rhiminee, sundanceTV', the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler, the book lover's boudoir

With tonight’s premiere of SundanceTV’s HAP AND LEONARD: MUCHO MOJO and the recent publication of Joe R. Lansdale’s HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE, the Internet is a buzz.

Photo: Karen Lansdale

At RISINGSHADOW, Seregil of Rhiminee praises the book.

Joe R. Lansdale’s BLOOD AND LEMONADE is a masterpiece of addictive and stylistic storytelling. It’s satisfyingly pulpy entertainment to those who enjoy reading clever and vivid stories with memorable characters.

I was delighted to read this mosaic novel, because I enjoy Joe R. Lansdale’s Hap and Leonard stories. I find these stories amazing, because the author’s writing style appeals to my twisted taste in pulp fiction. I don’t normally read this kind of fiction very much, but Joe R. Lansdale’s stories are among the few exceptions that fascinate me.

BLOOD AND LEMONADE oozes steadily pulsing raw power that is rare in this kind of fiction. As experienced readers are aware of, there are way too many pulp and crime novels, in which the authors try too hard to reach for something fascinating, unique and wild, but fail miserably due to lack of vision and poor writing skills. Fortunately, this novel is something totally different, because it’s original and entertaining, and – what’s most important – it has style and substance that is lacking from other novels.

If you’re a newcomer to Joe R. Lansdale’s fiction, this novel may not be the best place to start reading his Hap and Leonard stories, but I see no reason why newcomers wouldn’t enjoy it. Because the stories are good and entertaining, they can be read and enjoyed without knowledge about the previously published stories.

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One of the main reasons why I love BLOOD AND LEMONADE is that it features excellent dialogue. I love reading the sharp, thoughtful and striking conversations between the protagonists, because the author excels at writing them in a lively manner. Another reason why I love this novel is the author’s sense of humour, because it’s delightfully amusing, insightful and twisted. It adds a nice flavour to the stories.

I give BLOOD AND LEMONADE full five stars on the scale from one to five stars, because it’s pure pulp goodness from start to finish.

I highly recommend BLOOD AND LEMONADE to Joe R. Lansdale’s fans, because it has everything you could ever hope to find in Hap and Leonard stories – style, substance, humour, insightful commentary, interesting happenings, fights etc. It’s a delightfully entertaining reading experience for those who love crime and pulp stories, but it will also appeal to horror readers.

Excellent and wonderfully vivid entertainment!

Pamela Scott of THE BOOK LOVER’S BOUDOIR enjoys her first Hap and Leonard book experience.

I’ve never really read Lansdale’s work before other than the odd story. I have seen some of the Hap and Leonard TV series and thought it was mad and brilliant so wanted to read BLOOD AND LEMONADE.

This is my first time reading a mosaic novel. I had no idea such a thing existed. I really enjoyed BLOOD AND LEMONADE which is really a series of stories delving into the past of Hap with occasional forays into Leonard’s past. I liked the way the book is structured with flashbacks of the past triggered by places Hap and Leonard visit or people they encounter. This works really well. I enjoyed all of the individual tales and how well they worked together. However, as I’ve not read anything about Hap and Leonard before I felt like something was missing or I missed something and didn’t get as much from BLOOD AND LEMONADE as a proper fan would. Nevertheless, I enjoyed BLOOD AND LEMONADE enough to read more of the author especially Hap and Leonard’s adventures. My favourite tales were Not Our Kind, Down by the Riverside, Blood Lemonade and The River of the Dead. The other stories were good but these appealed to me a bit more.

At THE ANTICK MUSINGS OF G.B.H. HORNSWOLLGGLER, GENT., Andrew Wheeler was thrilled to receive the book.

HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE is a follow-up to last year’s HAP AND LEONARD, which collected all of the stories about Joe R. Lansdale’s crime-fighting odd couple that had been published to that point. Well, Mamma Lansdale’s youngest son has been very busy this past year, because BLOOD AND LEMONADE contains thirteen more stories about Hap and Leonard (though I think one of them was the new story in last year’s book), all copyright 2016 or 2017.

You’d think there was a new season of a Hap and Leonard TV show hitting, or something!

SUNDANCETV is offering exclusive experts from HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE.

SundanceTV is heading back to Hap and Leonard’s teenage years in the exclusive digital release of “Not Our Kind,” a short story from Joe R. Lansdale’s most recent book HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE, which is now on sale via Tachyon Publications.

In the story, we meet up with Hap and Leonard back in high school, a time when their friendship is first blossoming. They join forces alongside Leonard’s Uncle Chester to defend themselves against some unsavory bullies.

This short story is the first of two stories to be featured exclusively on sundance.tv in anticipation of the Hap and Leonard: Mucho Mojo premiere, airing Wed., Mar. 15 at 10/9c on SundanceTV. The second release will be a never-before-seen Hap and Leonard adventure, “In the River of the Dead.” The story will first be available to those subscribed to the Hap and Leonard newsletter and doled out in weekly chapters throughout the run of the HAP AND LEONARD: MUCHO MOJO season.

For more info about HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

December 8, 2016

The highly recommended PIRATE UTOPIA is rich with surreal exaggeration and fantasy

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew wheeler, bruce sterling, ian campbell, john coulthart, neurovagrant, pirate utopia, review, science fiction, the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler

At NEUROVAGRANT, Ian Campbell praises Bruce Sterling’s PIRATE UTOPIA.

Just finished Bruce Sterling’s new novel PIRATE UTOPIA and it ended up being more than expected. I went into it naively expecting a post-modern, pre-millennium cyberpunkish politics romp. I instead received an absurdist realism novel, an alternative history constantly balancing romantic ideals, their execution and its evolution. It’s a book rich with surreal exaggeration and fantasy but using that to explore the more realistic and bleak practicalities of anarchism, communism and fascism – and democracy.

Ideals and actions are presented alongside each other constantly and both shift across the course of the story in interesting ways, as a sad exposition on how these things typically progress when people act as they do. It’s not a gradually sliding progress bar so much as Sterling slipping the characters and their organizations along the slippery, evolving surface of a self-justifying Moebius strip of power and violence. It’s hard to tell how or where one side became the other. A seamless transition in which all eyes are still on dragging the future towards them by way of the gravity of their personalities, but they’ve had time to polish their boots now and they’re the ones in control of the artillery on the hill.

PIRATE UTOPIA’s a short, fun read that doesn’t alternate between stark and wacky but manages to hold their continuing tension in exquisite and exacting fashion. It also comes with a great and timely introduction by Warren Ellis that came out before the election but seems spot-on after, and some supplemental materials at the end that explored Sterling’s writing of the book. This latter appealed directly to the process voyeur in me and I’d love to see it in more works.

PIRATE UTOPIA: Highly Recommended Reading.

Andrew Wheeler at THE ANTICK MUSINGS OF G.B.H. HORNSWOGGLER, GENT. previews the book.

I’ll start off, as usual, with the non-Yen books – first up is a new novella from Bruce Sterling, PIRATE UTOPIA. Chairman Bruce hasn’t been as active in fiction this last decade – with THE CARYATIDS in 2009, something I never heard of before named LOVE IS STRANGE in 2012, and now this book – but I hope this signals that he’s back; we could use the old Sterling from the ‘80s and ’90s to make sense of our new world. PIRATE UTOPIA comes to us from Tachyon, and is some kind of oddball historical SF, possibly steampunk – it’s set right after WW I, in the new futurist-dominated nation of Carnaro (which I keep reading as “Camaro”), and seems to be about their power struggles as they try to build a new nation with the aid of American visitors H.P. Lovecraft and Houdini.

For more info on PIRATE UTOPIA, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover and illustrations by John Coulthart

November 23, 2016

The stimulating NIGHTMARES engrosses

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew wheeler, Ann Monn, anthology, darkness, darkness: two decades of modern horror, elaine aldred, elizabeth story, Ellen Datlow, horror, nightmares, nightmares: a new decade of modern horror, nihil, review, strange alliances, the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler

Elaine Aldred at STRANGE ALLIANCES praises Ellen Datlow’s NIGHTMARES: A NEW DECADE OF MODERN HORROR.

Most short story anthologies feel like entrées, little more than a glimpse into an author’s work. Nightmares feels like an all-you-can-eat buffet where the palate is refreshed every time you go up for another helping. There is plenty here to keep a reader engrossed and stimulate interest in a particular author’s writing, and covers a wide range of styles.

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The stories range from the fantastical to the mundane which suddenly takes an unexpected turn. There is also plenty of a steady underlying sense of something not right until the awful truth finally dawns on the reader, or the anticipated shock moment arrives when they least expect it.

(credit: THIS IS HORROR)

For THE ANTICK MUSINGS OF G.B.H. HORSNSWOGGLER, GENT., Andrew Wheeler previews the anthology.

Ten years ago, Ellen Datlow had a big anthology called DARKNESS, collecting her picks for the best horror stories of the previous two decades. (Since, basically, she started working in that field and paying close attention to it.) But there was no reason that she had to wait two decades to do it again, and so Tachyon is bringing out Datlow’s NIGHTMARES: A NEW DECADE OF MODERN HORROR as a trade paperback.

Datlow is probably the best-known and highest-regarded horror editor out there, so if you have any interest at all in the form, you’ll want to take a glance at this.

For more info about NIGHTMARES: A NEW DECADE OF MODERN HORROR, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Nihil

Design by Elizabeth Story

For more info about DARKNESS: TWO DECADES OF MODERN HORROR, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Ann Monn

May 10, 2016

CENTRAL STATION is a world imbued with life beyond the service of a single narrative arc

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew wheeler, ars technica, central station, gary k wolfe, john denardon, kirkus, lavie tidhar, locus online, Marty Halpern, More Red Ink, rachel acks, review, sarah anne langton, science fiction, the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler

Today (6/10) is the official publication day of Lavie Tidhar’s beautiful CENTRAL STATION and the positive feedback keeps coming.

(Photo: Kevin Nixon. © Future Publishing 2013.)

At ARS TECHNICA, Rachel Acks praises the novel’s unconventionally, among other things.

The scope of Lavie Tidhar’s new novel CENTRAL STATION may be galactic, but each of its many, many co-existing layers of reality are connected by one locale: the ever-present space port of Central Station, an unimaginably massive building that joins the human past on Earth to its rapidly evolving future. Trying to summarize CENTRAL STATION is like trying to summarize an entire season of a soap opera, except there are no heroes or villains, and, you know, the plot’s mysterious baby scandal is about who engineered him in the vat and to what purpose. Adding to the drama is the Conversation: an inescapable, interconnected network that touches (almost) all people throughout the space-time continuum.

CENTRAL STATION grew out of 13 linked short stories, some previously published and some new, which is what grants World Fantasy Award-winning author Tidhar such a broad canvas. His interwoven mix of human and non-human lives is full of characters crashing into the world and sending out ripples like stones thrown into a pond.

Mechanically, Tidhar’s skill with prose adds to the organic riot. The world of the Central Station is vital with sound, smell, and color (with its mixture of the ancient and the speculatively new, Tel Aviv is the perfect address for Central Station). In just a few words, Tidhar can give every character and place a history. It would be nice, however, if he didn’t leave so many of his well-crafted paragraphs hanging from ellipses or severed in their prime by em dashes.

Yet CENTRAL STATION’s weaknesses add up to strengths. The episodic nature of the chapters may feel unsatisfying and unfocused, and the way story-spanning plot strands can finish mid-book might leave a reader unbalanced. On the other hand, the escape from more traditional (and commercial) story structure allows the Central Station to be a place where the extraordinary and alien are commonplace, its world imbued with life beyond the service of a single narrative arc. Messiahs come and go and don’t require a massive build-up and a crashing finale.

Characters live without rising and falling action, because life has never been a three-act narrative. The true main characters of the story, around whom the world revolves inscrutably—Central Station itself and the Conversation—are too expansive, new, and inhuman for traditional narratives to contain.

Gay K. Wolfe for LOCUS ONLINE lauds Lavie Tidhar and CENTRAL STATION.

In good linked-story tradition, minor characters in one story become major characters in another, and the overall tapestry that emerges attains a persuasive unity, even if it’s not quite a novel. The stories include some of Tidhar’s most beautiful prose, and his future Tel Aviv is among the most evocative settings in recent SF, not least because Tidhar, rather wisely, refrains from expanding the point of view to, for example, the Martian colonies (readers interested in checking those out might want to read Tidhar’s Martian Sands). Somehow, Central Station combines a cultural sensibility too long invisible in SF with a sensibility which is nothing but classic SF, and the result is a rather elegant suite of tales.

John DeNardo at KIRKUS, Andrew Wheeler of THE ANTICK MUSINGS
OF G.B.H. HORNSWOGGLER, GENT., and Marty Halpern on his MORE RED INK all recommend the then-forthcoming book.

KIRKUS:

WHY YOU MIGHT LIKE IT: As he stated in this interview, this collection is rooted in real-world history, serves as a love letter, and offers us a hopeful future.

THE ANTICK MUSINGS OF G.B.H. HORNSWOGGLER, GENT.:

I’m leading off with Lavie Tidhar’s CENTRAL STATION because I keep thinking I need to start reading his books. He’s won the World Fantasy Award, the British SF award, and he’s got one of the great names in modern literature. This one is his fourth novel, either a fix-up of some of his “Central Station” stories or a brand-new story set in the same world – I don’t know yet myself, since (as I noted) I haven’t actually read any Tidhar yet. But this is about some people at the base of what seems to be a beanstalk in near future Tel Aviv, and is available right now as a trade paperback from Tachyon.

MORE RED INK:

I included a couple excerpts from the book itself in that November 30 blog post; and you can access the publisher’s website – Tachyon Publications – to read the starred Publishers Weekly review and the starred Library Journal review.

What I want to include here this time around is some thoughts on the book from the author himself, from Lavie Tidhar’s own blog post on July 2, 2015, announcing the sale of Central Station to Tachyon Publications:

….In a way, [Central Station] both represents everything I have to say about the shape of science fiction – and a large part of it is a sort of dialogue with older (mostly, admittedly, quite obscure) SF – and a way of talking about the present. It is set in the old central bus station area in south Tel Aviv, currently home to a quarter of a million poor economic migrants from Asia, and African refugees, and I wanted to explore that area through the lens of science fiction (one of the weird things I found recently is that the fictional sort of “federal” political vision of Israel/Palestine I have in the book is now being touted as a real solution by a group of political activists). My other ambition was to write a book which was mostly about character interaction: about extended families, about relationships, in which the “shiny” science fiction future serves as a sort of background rather than taking centre stage. My other inspiration was that I always wanted to write a novel in short stories. Science fiction has a long tradition of doing this – from The Martian Chronicles to Lord of Light – but my inspiration was also partly V. S. Naipaul’s Miguel Street.

For more info about CENTRAL STATION, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover and poster by Sarah Anne Langton

April 19, 2016

HAP AND LEONARD is a great way to meet Joe R. Lansdale

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew vachss, andrew wheeler, crime, elizabeth story, hap and leonard, joe lansdale, Joe R. Lansdale, just a guy who likes to read, review, swamp noir, texas, texas noir, the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler

Photograph by LeAnn Mueller

JUST A GUY WHO LIKES TO READ enjoys Joe R. Lansdale’s HAP AND LEONARD.

This collection of short stories is a great way to get introduced to Hap and Leonard, two colorful characters that jump off the page and hit you like a ax handle the chops (read the book, you’ll appreciate the statement). They’re the private detectives who aren’t quite private detectives; rather a pair of daring and courageous hard men with a moral compass who moonlight for a PI firm when they’re not undertaking menial day jobs.

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Not being overly familiar with the series of books, having only read VANILLA RIDE, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Lucky I was treated to a novella and short stories that each read like a longer form of fiction. Author Joe R. Lansdale managed to pack a hell of a punch in each story. Well executed plotting, character depth, and a pleasant mix of humor and serious violence to balance things out.

I can’t name a favorite which is a rare thing in a collection such as this but each story was equally enjoyable. My advice to fans of the Hap and Leonard books – this is one you’ve got to have in your collection, and for those readers who aren’t familiar with the series, I strongly recommend checking this out as a great starting point.

Andrew Wheeler from his THE ANTICK MUSINGS
OF G.B.H. HORNSWOGGLER, GENT. mentions the book, even though it’s not SFF nor a graphic novel.

HAP AND LEONARD collects all of the short stories to date about the eponymous duo – also the heroes of about a dozen novels – by Joe R. Lansdale. It’s coming out at the same time as a TV series about the duo, for which I’ve been seeing a bunch of ads in the subway. So it collects six old stories (including one co-written with Andrew Vachss), one brand-new story, an “interview” conducted by Lansdale with Hap and Leonard, and an afterword by Lansdale about the series. How could you want more than that?

For more info on HAP AND LEONARD, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

July 2, 2015

Tachyon sightings and mentions

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew wheeler, brayan's gold, collection chuma hill, demon cycle, falling in love with hominids, fantasy, feminist, horror, jamie lee moyer, kate elliott, kelley armstrong, led astray, led astray: the very best of kelley armstrong, mind meld, nalo hopkinson, novella, paranormal romance, patricia a mckillip, peter v brett, science fiction, SF Signal, short stories, t. frohock, the antick musings of g.b.h. hornswoggler, the great bazaar, the great bazaar & brayan's gold, the very best of kate elliott, Thomas Canty, victoria hooper, wonders of the invisible world

Tachyon titles and authors attracted some recent attention around the web.

Over at THE ANTICK MUSINGS OF G. B. H. HORNSWOGGLER, GENT., proprietor Andrew Wheeler acknowledged two forthcoming releases.

FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS is the third short-story collection from Nalo Hopkinson, collecting eighteen stories from the last dozen years. It’s a trade paperback from Tachyon, coming on August 15th.

Also from Tachyon – but publishing sooner, on July 14th – is Peter V. Brett’s THE GREAT BAZAAR & BRAYAN’S GOLD, collecting two sidebar novelettes to Brett’s Demon Cycle novels that were each originally published as pricey limited-edition hardcovers in the UK.

(Tachyon seems to be concentrating on writers that I’ve met and feel guilty about not reading more of – probably not on purpose!)

For their recent MIND MELD, SF SIGNAL asked panelists “What Authors Are on Your Must-Buy List?” While only one Tachyon book was specifically mentioned, several of the authors were.

Mentioned by T. Frohock:

I shouldn’t have to justify Patricia McKillip to anyone, but if you love dark fairy tales told in beautiful prose, McKillip is your author.

Jaime Lee Moyer:

Kate Elliott, who proves that not only do women write epic fantasy, they write rich, well crafted and well thought out epic fantasy with amazing characters. I have her The Very Best of Kate Elliott collection sitting on my shelf making big eyes at me right this minute. Her books are an instant buy.

Victoria Hooper:

I’m now working my way through Kelley Armstrong’s Otherworld series, something I’ve wanted to do since reading Bitten and being immediately hooked by the voice of the main character. I have to admit, I hadn’t expected a werewolf story to seem so different and compelling. Her writing is exciting and a bit playful, while at the same time there is often a streak of quite macabre horror running through. They’re fun reads, and I’m happy I have plenty more to enjoy.

Catherine Lundoff:

Writer and editor Nalo Hopkinson is one exception to my series-reading pattern. I read Nalo’s first published novel, Brown Girl in the Ring, and got hooked on her work after that. I really enjoy her world building as well as the way that her books and stories make me think about the world we currently live in. I find her a compelling and memorable storyteller, one whose work I remember years after I read it. She’s also one of the few authors on this list whose novels and short stories I seek out; we aren’t all good at both lengths, but she is a definite exception.

Read the rest of the selections at SF SIGNAL.

For more information on FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover art by Chuma Hill

Design by Elizabeth Story

For more information on THE GREAT BAZAAR & BRAYAN’S GOLD, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover design by Elizabeth Story

For more information on WONDERS OF THE INVISIBLE WORLD, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Thomas Canty

For more information on THE VERY BEST OF KATE ELLIOTT, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover art by Julie Dillon

Design by Elizabeth Story

For more information on LED ASTRAY: THE VERY BEST OF KELLEY ARMSTRONG, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

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