SPIRAL TOWER PRESS

Spiral Con 1

Artist: Jake Kelly. Click image to enlarge.

Date and Location: Saturday, July 30th at the Freeman Center, Christopher Newport University, in Newport News, Virginia.

Overview: SpiralCon is a not-for-profit, quasi-academic fan convention celebrating the genres of the unreal: science fiction, fantasy, and supernatural horror. It is organized by Spiral Tower Press, a small independent amateur press that publishes two free e-zines: Whetstone: Amateur Magazine of Sword and Sorcery and Witch House: Amateur Magazine of Cosmic Horror. SpiralCon is a recreational enterprise meant to inspire intellectual discussion of pulp fiction and popular culture.

Scope: SpiralCon is a small one day convention that begins at 8a and ends at 6p. It is uncatered and the guest speakers do not receive financial remuneration for their appearances. It is held in two rooms in the Freeman Center at Christopher Newport University. One room will be dedicated to panel presentations featuring academics, writers, artists, and fans; the other room will be dedicated to gaming, workshopping, socializing, and genre-related crafts. Admission is free but RSVP is requested.

Organizers: Dr. Jason Ray Carney, Department of English, Christopher Newport University; Dr. Nicole Emmelhainz-Carney, Department of English, Christopher Newport University

Volunteers/Guests: If you are interested in volunteering for the event, please contact the organizers as jason.carney@cnu.edu

Parking: Parking is free at CNU on the day of the event. We recommend the visitor lot near the Paul Trible Library.

Saturday, July 30th, Freeman Center, CNU

8:30a-8:50a: Gathering. No registration necessary. Name tag stickers will be available for those who want them.

9:00-9:50a: Opening comments and Trigon Awards, Dr. Jason Ray Carney, CNU Department of English, followed by presentation on Edgar Rice Burroughs and "Sword and Planet" by Henry Franke, Editor, The Burroughs Bibliophiles

10:00a-10:50a: Lecture. Chris Semtner, Curator of the Poe Museum, "Pandemic and Poe: The Masque of the Red Death in Context"

11:00a-11:50a: Panel discussion. "Robert E. Howard and Sword and Sorcery." Moderator: Dr. Jason Ray Carney. Panelists: Dr. Nicole Emmelhainz, Chase A. Folmar, and Dr. John Baldari.

12noon-12:50p: Break.

1:00p-1:50p: Dr. Kyle Garton-Gundling, CNU Department of English, "Science Fiction's Audacious Religion"

2:00p-2:50p: Dr. Maxwell Tfirn, CNU Department of Music, "The Music of Science Fiction and Horror," featuring a theremin, synthesizer, and audio/laser demo

There is a room with approximately five tables set aside for socializing, gaming, and other uses. They are first come, first serve.

Join our New Discord Chat Server to discuss the event: https://discord.gg/kk3t6eZQRE

This is our first time doing this so please manage your expectations. Thanks for the support. 😊📚☕️

UPDATED: 7/27/2022

Tanith Lee is the Empress of Dreams

Empress of Dreams by Tanith Lee

DMR Books (2021)
675 words

Empress of Dreams is an anthology collecting a selection of Tanith Lee’s short sword and sorcery fiction, published by indie publisher DMR Press in January 2021. The sixteen short stories collected here, originally published in a variety of anthologies, span the majority of Lee’s forty year writing career, ranging from Demoness (1976) to A Tower of Arkrondurl (2013, just two years before her death).

The title of the anthology, Empress of Dreams, is taken from a letter in praise of Lee by renowned SF&F editor Donald A Wollheim, who was the co-founder of DAW and who published Lee’s first S&S novel, The Birthgrave. Given the contents of this collection, it certainly serves as a fitting sobriquet.

While all these stories fit within the realms of sword and sorcery, they are happy to stretch and broaden that genre. The reader will find no ‘clonans’ within this collection, no barbarian heroes flexing their thews for riches and glory. There is often little combat to be found in these stories. Lee writes sword and sorcery as gothic fable: the mood is mysterious and macabre with the logic of the world serving the motif of the story. This helps lend her work a timeless quality, as if they were lost legends or folk tales, complete with dreamlike horror, luxuriant language, and often wry or cruel humour, though at times the poetry of the story can come at the expense of clarity.

Lee touches on many themes in the stories collected here. Some that recur with regularity are the desire to make one's own destiny, the repercussions of wrongdoing, and the capriciousness of human nature. Stories such as "The Three Brides of Hamid-Dar," "Mirage and Magia," and "The Pain of Glass" could slip almost without comment into a copy of 1001 Arabian Nights, while tales such as "Southern Lights" would have been appreciated by the Brothers Grimm.

My favourite of the anthology, "Winter White," is a horror tale. The basic set up, that of a haunted object, is reminiscent of the works of M.R. James (in particular, "Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come for You, My Lad"). In Lee’s hands, this is no mere ghost story. This is a tale of dark passions and darker happenings, a story set in a land which may be ancient Britain, or maybe somewhere stranger. Lee’s passion for the gothic and the fantastic shine here, creating a story that lingers long after the pages are turned.

Another highlight is the story that closes the anthology, "Evillo the Uncunning." This tale originally appeared in Songs of the Dying Earth, an anthology honouring the work of Jack Vance, and in it, Lee (a writer who counted Vance among her inspirations) tells the story about Evillo, a youth living upon the Dying Earth, who is inspired by stories he is told of Cugel (Vance’s protagonist in several Dying Earth stories). Here Lee nails the tone of Vance’s work. The story is full of adventure, weirdness, irony and magic, yet she brings enough of her own sensibilities to make the story stand out as a joy to read, whether or not the reader is conversant with Vance’s oeuvre. The reader may not look at snails the same way again.

Tanith Lee remains an author whose large body of work is less well known or well-read among fantasy fans than her gift for writing or the regard in which her work is held should warrant. With this anthology, DMR has made her sword and sorcery work available to a new audience, and the tales within do well to demonstrate the breadth and scope possible within the genre. For anyone whose appetite has been wetted by it, her Birthgrave trilogy remains available from DAW (in the U.S.). However, this anthology’s appeal is not restricted to those of an S&S persuasion, but has much to offer any fan of fantasy and gothic horror. Lee’s exotic prose and gifted imagination, on display here, demonstrates that she truly deserves her title. She is the Empress of Dreams.

About the Reviewer: Hailing from the UK, George Jacobs is a railway industry worker by day and short story writer by night. He lives with his wife and pets, is a fan of all things adventurous and spooky, and enjoys spending his time in nature. His fiction can be found at:

https://georgejacobsauthor.wordpress.com/

About Spiral Tower Reviews: The authors who maintain the pulp genres of sword and sorcery and cosmic horror merit support. Financial support is key but there are other ways the cash-strapped can show support: engaged reading and thoughtful analysis. Literary movements emerge through the interactions of editors, authors, publishers, and amateur literary journalists. Learn more about contributing your review here. We are happy to work with first time reviewers.

The Razor Sharp Prose of Howard Andrew Jones' For the Killing of Kings

For the Killing of Kings by Howard Andrew Jones

Published by St. Martin's Press (2019)

660 words

Howard Andrew Jones's For the Killing of Kings, published by St. Martin's Press (2019), stands out not only as a superb fantasy novel, but also one that fully embraces the sword and sorcery influences of the genre. This is the first book in his recently concluded Ring-Sworn trilogy, and with prose that is razor sharp and succinct as a blade, Jones readily distinguishes himself from the crowded contemporary field. While phone-book sized epics have become the standard convention for fantasy stories these days, Howard instead utilizes a style and brevity mostly relegated to the serialized adventure pulps of the past, and does so to marvelous effect.

We are introduced to a world still reeling from the effects of a past war, and with the shadow of a new conflict fast approaching. Thrown directly into the narrative in media res, the reader never feels bogged down by the languid drip-feeding of exposition. Within the first pages, there begins a mystery from which the rest of the narrative flows: a conspiracy that reaches all the way up to the highest positions of authority within the kingdom. From early on the reader is forced to wonder: what dire consequences are in store for those who happen to get too close to this mystery? Action builds upon action, threat builds upon threat, until the true machinations working in the shadows are briefly revealed--but only for a moment, and only to foreshadow the horrifying scope of things to come.

This tantalizing momentum is carried across the novel all the way to the conclusion. Backstory, both in terms of the setting's history and that of the characters, is woven naturally into the progression of the plot, and is delivered precisely when needed or when appropriate, so as to not arrest the story's forward momentum. Action scenes are especially visceral in their construction as well. Each set piece is highly detailed and intricately choreographed, without ever becoming too ponderous in length, and Jones' rendering of hand-to-hand combat was a particular highlight.

Shining equally bright are the characters. Each one of them are instantly memorable and endearing in their own unique way. The standout for me was probably Kyrkenall, an irreverent and jaded warrior who seeks solace at the bottom of a wine bottle, yet is a ruthless force to contend with on the battlefield. His quippy recitations of poetry or lines from various stage plays were both enjoyable and offered a striking degree of verisimilitude to the world, a hint of the everyday and the normal in contrast to the high-stakes, world-altering conflict on display. Elenai was equally likeable as the wide-eyed, initially idealistic squire thrust into a role far larger than anything she could have ever conceived of, and who is then forced to drastically mature by the necessity of survival against powers conspiring against her. Almost all the primary characters can be described in the same richness and textured layer of dynamic growth, and it makes me incredibly excited to see where their journeys take them in the subsequent books.

One minor point of contention with this otherwise fantastic novel is that the dialogue and banter between characters is sometimes a little too close to contemporary, modern-day speech. Admittedly, this is more a personal preference than an outright critique; nevertheless, some of the character interactions might have benefited from a brushstroke of antiquity to separate it from our present, everyday style of conversation. This was especially notable with Rylin, who at one point, when talking about the friendship between two other characters, describes them as being "tight" with one another.

This quibble aside, For the Killing of Kings is an excellent introduction to a unique and compelling fantasy series that I'm excited to finish. There's a lot this book has to offer, both for fans of modern epic fantasy and of the sword and sorcery niche alike, and I'm very eager to see where the series goes!

About the Reviewer: Chase A. Folmar is an aspiring writer of speculative fiction and weird fantasy, with an avid interest in the craft of storytelling. He lives in Virginia with his wife and their horde of rescued pets. His writing and other collected thoughts can be found on his website, chaseafolmar.com