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Post by sean on Apr 4, 2008 17:17:33 GMT
Creepy stuff here. From the Macbeth quote title onwards, its all pretty damn good. leiber was a great all-rounder - he wrote some great SF, as well as fantasy and horror, and these early examples of 'urban horror' show that the ideas and style that would later be used to such good effect in the novel 'Our Lady of Darkness' were already very much in place. One minor quibble would be that the two fantasy stories at the end (which take up over a third of the book) render this collection a tad lopsided, but that is probably me just being overly picky. First published by Arkham House in 1947. Cover of the 1977 Sphere edition: (and Wormy - I thought it was time for you all to meet him) Track listing: Foreward Modern Horrors:Smoke Ghost The Automatic Pistol The Inheritance The Hill and the Hole The Dreams Of Albert Moreland The Hound Diary in the Snow Transition:The Man Who Never Grew Young Ancient Adventures:The Sunken Land Adept's Gambit BLURBABILITY: "Fritz Leiber is author of the most frightening and thoroughly convincing of all modern horror stories"
- Damon Knight
Here at last in paperback is the premiere collection of fantasy and horror fiction which has long been a coveted collectors' item in hardback. The first part of the anthology includes unsurpassable horror tales of the modern city. The second exemplifies the best in Leiber's 'Ancient Adventures' and features those two world-famous characters of sword-and-sorcery fiction, Farfrd and the Grey Mouser. These are colourful, exciting fantasies in the great tradition of fantastic adventure.
The collection which fantasy and horror readers have all being waiting for!
Story-by-story breakdown to follow later...
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Post by dem bones on Apr 4, 2008 17:38:24 GMT
Great stuff, Sean. I've never had a copy although I think i've read all the modern horrors via a variety of anthologies and he's never dull. Not to keen on the Grey Mouser and F**khead, you'll doubtless be surprised to learn ...
Oh, and wotcher, Wormy! Didn't you used to be in Squirm?
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Post by sean on Apr 5, 2008 10:17:18 GMT
Nah, that was Squirmy, his cousin. Incidentally, Wormy's favourite book is 'Dune' by Frank Herbert, and, in his opinion, the greatest film ever made is 'Tremors'.
Anyway...
"Have you ever thought what a ghost of our times would look like, Miss Millick? Just picture it. A smoky composite face with the hungry anxiety of the unemployed, the neurotic restlessness of the person without purpose, the jerky tension of the high-power metropolitian worker, the uneasy resentment of the striker, the callous opportunism of the scab, the aggressive whine of the panhandler, the inhibited terror of the bombed civilian, and a thousand other twisted emotional patterns. Each one overlying and yet blending with the other like a pile of semi-transparent masks..."
- Fritz Leiber
Smoke Ghost Mr Wran is having problems with modern city life. He wonders what kind of supernatural creatures would inhabit his world. Events begin to come to a head when he begins to see a mysterious shape moving closer to him day by day across nearby rooftops. Then, as he hides away in his office late one night, his secretary shows quite a different side to herself. The Automatic Pistol Three former bootleggers hide up after a colleauge is murdered. One of them has the gun which the dead man had treasured in life, and there is something very strange about it. For instance, it has a habit of moving by itself, trying to point at the man whom may know more about its former owners murder than he is letting on...
The Inheritance A man inherits the remainder of the time pre-paid in rent for his dead uncles apartment, so he moves in for a couple of months. It quickly becomes apparent that the dead man, a former police officer, had an obsession with a spate of unsolved local murders. In fact he may have taken a more active role than just following the news of the latest 'Phantom Slayer' murders.
The Hill and the Hole A land surveyor has problems with the instruments of his trade when what is clearly a hill insists on being measured as a pit. A local girl, oddly enough, holds similar opinions - and she has once seen the creatures that inhabit the invisible hole in the ground. Then there is the fact that the last surveyor to come to these parts two years back died at this very spot...
The Dreams of Albert Moreland A chess player dreams that he is playing a far more complex game against invisible forces, a game that may have very real consequences in this world.
This has got to be my favourite story from this collection. Funny, spooky and a touch Lovecraftian.
The Hound A shop worker is pursued by a werewolf, although an urban example of the breed. The city is its natural habitat and its hunting ground...
Diary in the Snow Two writers holed up for the winter get on with their work, although the novel one of them is writing appears that it could have more to do with reality than he suspects.
Telepathy, mysterious radio broadcasts, strange beams of light, half seen creatures - this is a prime example of a story that effortlessly mixes SF with horror. Nice.
The Man Who Never Grew Young A gentle, moving piece in which time runs backwards. An idea later used by Philip K Dick in 'Counter Clock World', Brian Aldiss in 'Cryptozoic' (aka 'An Age' - I've got a spare copy of this one and can higly recommend it, so if anyone wants it just give me a shout) and J.G. Ballard in a story I can't remember the name of at the moment.
The Sunken Land The first of two fantasy tales starring the Grey Mouser and Fafrd. Not my cup of tea really.
This one tells of a sunken city which re-emerges from the sea and contains something terrible. Again, a touch of Lovecraftiness about this one, although stylistically the two writers are a million miles apart.
Adept's Gambit Again, the Grey Mouser and Fafrd go a'questing. A longish tale, clocking in at around 80 pages, this one is at least a lot more fun than the previous one, and contains several genuinely disturbing scenes.
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Post by carolinec on Apr 5, 2008 18:29:57 GMT
Ah, it's thanks to Des' eBay sales that I have a copy of this (signed!) - thanks Des. ;D "Smoke Ghost" is a superb story - a brilliant example of just how creepy a story can be with the merest suggestion of something nasty lurking out there. I haven't read the entire book yet, as I have a tendency to switch from one anthology to another - eventually getting round to finishing them off. I did try one of the fantasy stories in there but it did absolutely nothing for me.
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Post by dem bones on Apr 5, 2008 19:17:37 GMT
Another day, another cannibalization of an old post .... . The ones I'm especially interested in getting hold of are the Ballantine editions of Nights Black Agents and Shadows With Eyes, not just for the stories but also Richard Powers' cover art which I've grown very fond of. Fritz Leiber - Night’s Black Agents (Ballantine, June 1961) Smoke Ghost, The Automatic Pistol, The Inheritance, The Hill and the Hole, The Dreams of Albert Moreland, The Hound, Diary in the Snow, The Man Who Never Grew Young, The Sunken Land.. Fritz Leiber - Shadows With Eyes (Ballantine,1962) A Bit of the Dark World, The Dead Man, The Power of the Puppets, Schizo Jimmie, the Man Who Made Friends with Electricity, A Deskful of Girls. . Apart from the supernatural novels Our Lady Of Darkness and Conjure, Wife!, Leiber is most likely better known for his Sword & Sorcery and Sf work. Whenever I've read any appraisal of his ghost and horror stories, it's usually The Girl With The Hungry Eyes and Smoke Ghost which deservedly draw the plaudits, but he also was responsible for some brilliant out-and-out pulp horror romps. Spider Mansion: The head, its golden hair disarranged, lolled backward. The arms stretched taut to either side. Then I began to see the thin opalescently grayish strands that twined around her wrists and arms, and wrapped around her skirt, drawing it tight against her legs. The strands seemed to radiate off in all directions. My flashlight roved out across the glimmering network. Horror and revulsion rooted me to the spot where I stood. The thing was a gigantic spiderweb. Tom and Helen Egan drop in on the old Orne House to escape a storm. The last time Tom met Malcolm Orne he was a midget, but now the guy's seven foot tall and married to the beautiful, if strangely terrified Cynthia. Orne is a maniac and a sadist who has avenged himself on all who he considers to have disparaged him when he was Johnny no-legs, including his brother and the surgeon responsible for his startling transformation. He keeps everyone in check with the help of his pet, a murderous giant spider. Weird Tales, Sept. 1942The Phantom Slayer: The narrator, down on his luck, is remembered in the will of an uncle, David Rhode, an ex-police officer, who leaves him free board for three months. Rooting through the dead man's effects, he discovers stacks of press clippings and ephemera relating to a Ripper-like serial killer. The unnamed hero suffers from terrible nightmares - in which he witnesses two of the murders - accompanied by worrying OOB experiences. Slipping into his uncles uniform, he sleepwalks down town and approaches a little girl .... Weird Tales, Jan. 1942Schizo Jimmie: Also known as The Warlock if you're Peter Haining. Reminiscent of The Girl With The Hungry Eyes. Those close to Jimmie Walsh wind up either incurably alcoholic, hopelessly insane or taking their own life. The narrator takes it upon himself to rid the world of his friend, but once Jimmie's gone it transpires that whatever he had was contagious... The Saint, Feb, 1960The Spider: I really messed up on the notes for this before. I had Gibby Monzer down as "a Zacherley-style horror host whose stand-up routine is a demolition job on Dracula, the Invisible Man, the Bride and all the great monsters of the silver screen". He isn't. He's a cartoonist who's made a career from "presenting them in a series of comic books as louts, lugs, zanies, morons and stumblebums". That's where reviewing from memory gets you. Thank Christ nobody reads my junk. Anyhow, three of these, the beautiful people, rendezvous on the corner below his house, waiting to pay Gibby a late night visit. And with them, the spider ... Rogue, 1963The Girl with the Hungry Eyes: "There are vampires and vampires and the ones that suck blood aren't the worst ..." The lethal beauty at the centre of this acknowledged classic is the Monroe-like projection of man's desires made flesh. Dave, her photographer, finally learns her secret when he finally ignores her warning never to follow her when she leaves the studio ... 1949
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Post by sean on Apr 6, 2008 12:47:51 GMT
Below are a few more collections by Leiber that are worth snapping up if you ever bump into them. Each contains a mixture of SF, fantasy and horror, and all of them contain at least a couple of classics. The Secret SongsFirst published 1968 (Panther 1975 edition, illustration by Anthony Roberts): Contents:Introduction The Winter Flies The Man Who Made Friends With Electricity Rump-Titty-Titty-Tum-Tah-Tee Mariana Coming Attraction The Moon is Green A Pail of Air Smoke Ghost The Girl With Hungry Eyes No Great Magic The Secret Songs BLURBINESS: ELEVEN CLASSICS FROM A MASTER
Here are eleven outstanding short stories by Fritz Leiber, a master of the genre who has won two Hugo Awards and countless critical accolades in the 30 years he has been writing top science fiction. The Secret Songs represents the best of Leiber's work - ranging in style from sophisticated hardcore SF to fantasy and horror in the classic style. It is a tribute to Leiber's versatility and permanence, and a must for any science fiction bookshelf. Night MonstersFirst published 1974 (Panther 1975 edition, illustration by Bruce Pennington): Contents:The Black Gondolier Midnight in the Mirror World I'm Looking for Jeff The Creature from Cleveland Depths The Oldest Soldier The Girl With Hungry Eyes A Bit of the Dark World BLURBOLOGY: GALLERY OF HORROR
In this collection of grisly and terrifying stories you will find your darkest fears depicted - a phantom seen in a mirror reflection at midnight which becomes only too real... a weird girl who practices a rather different kind of vampirism... a malignant, inexorable intelligence which lurks in murky oil deposits beneath the earth's bony crust... These and other black gems of the fantasist's art await your discovery - if you dare to look within...
"Should send your goose-pimples squawking" - The Times
"Leiber's imagined fragments of dark have a tactile quality about them such as only the best writers in the genre achieve" - Times Literary Supplement Ship of ShadowsFirst published 1979 (Granada 1982 edition): Contents:Ship of Shadows Catch that Zeppelin! Gonna Roll the Bones Belsen Express The Big Time BLURBIFEROUS: FABULOUS VOYAGER...
Fritz Leiber, America's finest fantasist, is the winner of six Hugo Awards and three Nebula Awards. In this award winning new collection you can be transported to a shadowy alternate reality where Germany won the Second World War; watch a man play dice with the devil; sail in the farthest realms of dark imagining, or observe a war being fought back and forth across time on a shuttle of shifting and uncertain reality...
These are tales of humour and horror, invention and enchantment, conjuring us into the incomparable universe of Fritz Leiber, a fabulous voyager in the incandescent world of his own imagining.
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Post by dem bones on Apr 6, 2008 14:58:28 GMT
Ah, thanks for posting these, Sean. When I get to updating the Panther and Sphere tentacles of the Vault 'site', I'll snag the scans and give you a credit if that's OK?
Somehow I overcame my loathing of that rotten spaceship cover to pick up the same edition of Ship Of Shadows on the strength of the title story, Gonna Roll The Bones and Belsen Express. I wasn't disappointed. Some of his Night Monsters are familiar, too because, as with so many of the Weird Tales regulars, the guy must have been an anthologist's dream.
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Post by sean on Apr 6, 2008 16:29:33 GMT
Help yourself to any and all scans that are of use, Dem. Glad to be a part of the Vault project.
Brave of you to get past the Ship of Shadows spacecraft. Talk about a cover that does no justice to the stories inside.
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Post by Calenture on Apr 6, 2008 17:56:54 GMT
John Jude First published 1984; this Ace edition, 1991 Byron Preiss Visual Publications, Inc. This thread seems to have become one for Fritz Leiber cover scans. The Ghost Light is a collection with stories illustrated by different artists. Introduction by Fritz Leiber The Ghost Light (illustrated by Jude Palencar) Coming Attraction (illustrated by Brian Humphrey) A Deskful of Girls (illustrated by Jo Ellen Trilling) Space-Time For Springers (illustrated by Pat Ortega) Four Ghosts in Hamlet (illustrated by Thomas Cantry) Gonna Roll the Bones (illustrated by David Wiesner) Bazaar of the Bizarre (illustrated by Robert Gould) Midnight by the Morphy Watch (illustrated by Steve Leiahola) Black Glass (illustrated by Paul Rivoche) Not Much Disorder and Not So Early Sex: An Autobiographic Essay Fritz Leiber photographed by Ben Asen
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Post by dem bones on Apr 6, 2008 22:16:28 GMT
Help yourself to any and all scans that are of use, Dem. Glad to be a part of the Vault project. Brave of you to get past the Ship of Shadows spacecraft. Talk about a cover that does no justice to the stories inside. Much appreciated! I tend to update it in splurges when I've ten or so covers/ contents to add, so we're almost there!
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Post by doug on Jan 28, 2013 7:26:03 GMT
Hey all! My bed time reading for the past week or so has been "The Black Gondolier and other Stories" by Mr. Leiber. So last night I read "Lie Still, Snow White" and this has to be one of the greatest "WTF!" stories from a MAJOR writer that I've ever read. I did a little checking and discovered that it was originaly published back in 1964 in "Taboo: Seven Short Stories which No Publisher Would Touch from Seven Leading Writers"! "Snow White" has to be the "best" Necrophilia story that I've ever had the "pleasure" to read! To be honest though, the only other ones that come to mind are Eddy's "Beloved Dead" and possibly Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily". The story is so audaciously in your face that I had to laugh out loud. It goes so far that it almost slides into Richard Laymon territory. Respect Mr. Leiber! Respect! Is anyone elso familiar with this story? And has anyone actualy ever seen/read the original anthology? Take care. Doug UPDATE!! Here's the complet contents to "Taboo" Contents: Second coming / Robert Bloch -- The neighbors / Charles Beaumont -- The daddy of them all / Nelson Algren -- Battle without banners / Harlan Ellison -- Take a deep breath / Ray Russell -- Lie still, Snow White / Fritz Leiber -- The lovers / Paul Neimark
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Post by dem bones on Jan 28, 2013 10:11:33 GMT
No, but am certainly going to try find one. We've a thread devoted to If it ain't stiff - sex with dead people. Throw in Fritz's contribution, there's enough of the blighter's for a truly creepy anthology. From the Taboo book, I can vouch for Charles Beaumont's tireless thrill-seekers, The Neighbours, whose increasingly dubious antics provide perhaps his finest horror story.
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Jan 28, 2013 15:06:27 GMT
By coincidence, I just read The Black Gondolier and Other Stories this weekend (the e-reads reprint, not the fabulously expensive Midnight House original edition). I'd already read most of the stories, but I bought it to read "Game for Motel Room," "Lie Still, Snow White," "The Secret Songs," "The Repair People," and "Black Has Its Charms." I liked "Lie Still, Snow White," though I thought the title was the best part of it; I saw the ending as something of a cheat. The other four were disappointments--all are among Leiber's lesser works.
Here are the contents:
Introduction: Fritz and Me (by John Pelan) The Black Gondolier The Dreams of Albert Moreland Game for Motel Room The Phantom Slayer Lie Still, Snow White Mr. Bauer and the Atoms In the X-Ray Spider Mansion The Secret Songs The Man Who Made Friends with Electricity The Dead Man The Thirteenth Step The Repair People Black Has Its Charms Schizo Jimmie The Creature from Cleveland Depths The Casket-Demon Mr. Adams' Garden of Evil Afterword or My Own Thank You to Fritz Leiber (by Steve Savile)
I've been looking for a copy of Taboo for several years without luck.
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Post by doug on Jan 28, 2013 16:07:17 GMT
By coincidence, I just read The Black Gondolier and Other Stories this weekend (the e-reads reprint, not the fabulously expensive Midnight House original edition). I'd already read most of the stories, but I bought it to read "Game for Motel Room," "Lie Still, Snow White," "The Secret Songs," "The Repair People," and "Black Has Its Charms." I liked "Lie Still, Snow White," though I thought the title was the best part of it; I saw the ending as something of a cheat. The other four were disappointments--all are among Leiber's lesser works. Here are the contents: Introduction: Fritz and Me (by John Pelan) The Black Gondolier The Dreams of Albert Moreland Game for Motel Room The Phantom Slayer Lie Still, Snow White Mr. Bauer and the Atoms In the X-Ray Spider Mansion The Secret Songs The Man Who Made Friends with Electricity The Dead Man The Thirteenth Step The Repair People Black Has Its Charms Schizo Jimmie The Creature from Cleveland Depths The Casket-Demon Mr. Adams' Garden of Evil Afterword or My Own Thank You to Fritz Leiber (by Steve Savile)I've been looking for a copy of Taboo for several years without luck. I have the paperback reprint of the Midnight House editon. Take care Doug p.s. I didn't find "Snow White" to be too much of a cheat. Remember it was published in 1964 and he did do his dead sister while his mom was passed out on the floor downstairs.
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Jan 28, 2013 17:02:49 GMT
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