Books | Karavansara

16 November 2015
by Davide Mana 2 Comments

Eating the Dragon

I’m having lots of fun reading “Heroika – Dragon Eaters”, a massive, highly entertaining collection of fantasy stories edited by Janet Morris and published by Perseid Press.

I like very much the central concept of the anthology – collecting stories in which men (and sometimes gods) pit their strength, spirit and wits against the power of dragons.
This is a welcome return to stories in which the dragon was the adversary, an expression of power hostile (or alien) to our mindset and civilization.
After so many stories of good dragons portrayed as an endangered species¹, it’s good to have the dragon back as the bad guy.

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9 November 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Samarkand

I was quite happy to discover that recently launched British publisher Venture Press is going to reissue, in ebook format, a fair chunk of Graham Diamond‘s catalog.

Born in Manchester in 1949, Diamond started in fantasy and science fiction, to move later to many other genres.
But I am really interested in his earlier works.
I mentioned his quite entertaining Captain Sinbad when I read it last year.
And now, thanks to the Venture reprints, I’m having lots of fun with another of the earlier works of Graham Diamond – Samarkand.
Could I resist a book with such a title?

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12 October 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

War & Peace in Afghanistan

I got an advance reader copy of Melissa Burch’s My Journey through War and Peace.
I got it not by some strange chance, but because I requested it.
What caught me was the tag-line: Explorations of a young film-maker, feminist and spiritual seeker.
For the uninitiated, Melissa Burch was a young camera operator and reporter during the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s.
So I expected the book to be about the sort of exploration that I like – a first-hand account of a war-torn sector of the map that has been war-torn for most of our history.
What I got was much more.

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3 October 2015
by Davide Mana 5 Comments

The sort of women that would look at us and consider us gnats

There this meme doing the rounds – and yes, I already told you that I can’t see why they call’em memes, but anyway…

The idea is to list five (or ten, depending on what version you find) women writers that have somehow influenced you and your world-view.
And there’s a lot of people listing fiction writers – and indeed I think I will do a women fictioneers post, maybe next week.
Right now, though, I think I’ll do my own list of authors that were and are indispensable to me… and I’ll focus on nonfiction.
But I think I’ll do six – just to be my usual wayward self.
And as a bonus, I’ll also give you a book title to check out.

Here goes, in random order…

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1 October 2015
by Davide Mana 5 Comments

Used books

I love used books.
But then, I always spent hours browsing used books stalls.

I started buying used books regularly when I realized I could get university textbooks for a fraction of the price.
A typical student’s strategy to save money.
Old monographies were a special treat – I still remember some of my teacher’s surprise at the discovery that I owned a copy of a precious monographs about stratigraphy – a gift from my mother, that had found it used for ten bucks (compared to the two hundred of the retail price).

Later, I started buying used books independently of the subject – why pay more, after all?
Before the coming of the ebook, it was the easiest way to save on reading matter – and to get a cheap sample of some new or unknown writer.
Also, and again, before the advent of ebooks, some old books could only be found second hand – on used-books stalls, or through Amazon vendors (Amazon UK is my main purveyor of used books).
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22 September 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Discovering Blood’n’Thunder

I’m having a lot of fun – and I’m learning a lot – with the first of the two reprint volumes of Blood’n’Thunder.

For the uninitiated – but then, why are you here? – Blood’n’Thunder is one of the most respected, if not the most respected fanzine dedicated to the world of pulps, serials, radio dramas and related topics.

Edited by Ed Hulse (whose Guide to the Pulps is the definitive resource on the subject), and published by Murania Press, the magazine has always been a sort of Sacred Grail for me here in the back of beyond.

The red-covered trade paperback volume called The Best of Blood’n’Thunder collects articles from the long lost first ten issues of the magazine, and it is a veritable treasure trove of information, analysis and surprises. Continue reading →

14 September 2015
by Davide Mana Leave a comment

Delta Green: Extraordinary Renditions

And so it is out.
Extraordinary Renditions, the latest collection of stories set in the Delta Green lovecraftian conspiracy universe, is available through RPGNow¹, and various other platforms.
The volume was edited by Shane Ivey with Adam Scott Glancy, and it includes the following tales, covering the story of Delta Green through the 20th century …

“The Color of Dust” by Laurel Halbany.
“PAPERCLIP” by Kenneth Hite.
“A Spider With Barbed-Wire Legs” by Davide Mana.
“Le Pain Maudit” by Jeff C. Carter.
“Cracks in the Door” by Jason Mical.
“Ganzfeld Gate” by Cody Goodfellow.
“Utopia” by David Farnell.
“The Perplexing Demise of Stooge Wilson” by David J. Fielding.
“Dark” by Daniel Harms.
“Morning in America” by James Lowder.
“Boxes Inside Boxes” and “The Mirror Maze” by Dennis Detwiller.
“A Question of Memory” by Greg Stolze.
“Pluperfect” by Ray Winninger.
“Friendly Advice” by Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan.
“Passing the Torch” by Adam Scott Glancy.
“The Lucky Ones” by John Scott Tynes.
“Syndemic” and an introduction by Shane Ivey.

Extraordinary Renditions was developed as part of a very successful Kickstarter campaign – and I’m extraordinarily proud of being part of this project.
I love the Delta Green setting, and being one of the contributing authors feels like going home.
I made my first sale in the gaming business with a contribution to Delta Green: Coutdown.
I started writing stories in English on the Delta Green Mailing List.
The line up of this collection features a group of excellent writers, some of them good old friends, and some personal icons of mine.

So, yes, I’m extremely happy – and hope you’ll be happy to read this book, too.
It’s a killer.