2024: A Year's Reading

Since 2020, I've been keeping track of my reading for pleasure (as opposed to the substantial amount of reading I do in my job as a university professor). What follows are the books I read for fun in 2024. They are listed in the order I read them, with new favorites being indicated by asterisks (rereads are favorites by default):

Books

1. Serhii Plokhy, Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe
2. Elizabeth Bear, Range of Ghosts
3. Drew Williams, The Stars Now Unclaimed
4. Greg Egan, Scale
5. Lloyd Alexander, The Black Cauldron (reread)
6. Lloyd Alexander, The Castle of Llyr (reread)
7. Elizabeth Bear, Undertow
8. J. S. Dewes, The Exiled Fleet
9. Emily Tesh, Some Desperate Glory*
10. M. R. Carey, Infinity Gate*
11. Tana French, The Hunter
12. Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
13. Frances Hardinge, Unraveller
14. W. P. Wiles, The Last Blade Priest
15. Alastair Reynolds, Machine Vendetta
16. Lois McMaster Bujold, Penric’s Labors
17. Garth Nix, The Left-Handed Booksellers of London
18. Neal Asher, The Technician (reread)
19. Jack McDevitt, Infinity Beach*
20. Barbara Hambly, The Iron Princess
21. Steven Erikson, Gardens of the Moon (reread)
22. Ian C. Esslemont, Night of Knives
23. Steven Erikson, Deadhouse Gates (reread)
24. Steven Erikson, Memories of Ice (reread)
25. Steven Erikson, House of Chains (reread)
26. Steven Erikson, Midnight Tides (reread)
27. Steven Erikson, The Bonehunters (reread)
28. Steven Erikson, Reaper’s Gale (reread)
29. Steven Erikson, Toll the Hounds (reread)
30. Ian C. Esslemont, Return of the Crimson Guard
31. M. R. Carey, Echo of Worlds*
32. Ian C. Esslemont, Stonewielder
33. Bethany Jacobs, These Burning Stars
34. M. R. Carey, The Book of Koli
35. Peter S. Beagle, I’m Afraid You’ve Got Dragons
36. Ian C. Esslemont, Orb Sceptre Throne
37. Marko Kloos, Descent
38. James S. A. Corey, The Mercy of Gods
39. Ian C. Esslemont, Blood and Bone
40. J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings (reread)
41. Ben Aaronovitch, Rivers of London*
42. Richard Powers, Playground
43. Michael Mammay, Planetside
44. Naomi Mitchison, Travel Light
45. Miles Cameron, Artifact Space
46. Bethany Jacobs, On Vicious Worlds
47. Judith Tarr, Ars Magica
48. Seth Dickinson, The Traitor Baru Cormorant*
49. Adrian Tchaikovsky, Alien Clay
50. Ken MacLeod, The Corporation Wars: Dissidence
51. Diana Wynne Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle (reread)
52. Ken MacLeod, The Corporation Wars: Insurgence
53. Iain M. Banks, The Algebraist (reread)
54. Iain M. Banks, Look to Windward (reread)
55. Diana Wynn’s Jones, Archer’s Goon*
56. Iain M. Banks, Matter (reread)
57. Iain M. Banks, Excession (reread)
58. C. J. Cherryh, Cuckoo’s Egg
59. Seanan McGuire, Every Heart a Doorway
60. Adrian Tchaikovsky, Days of Shattered Faith
61. Barbara Hambly, The Ladies of Mandrigyn*
62. Robert Jackson Bennett, The Tainted Cup*
63. K. J. Parker, Saevus Corax Deals with the Dead
64. Garth Nix, Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz*
65. Alix E. Harrow, The Ten Thousand Doors of January
66. Moniquill Blackgoose, To Shape a Dragon's Breath
67. Patricia A. McKillip, The Bards of Bone Plain

I also read the following comics and manga series:

American Comics

1. Absolute Superman
2. Absolute Wonder Woman
3. Birds of Prey
4. Daredevil
5. Exceptional X-Men
6. Fantastic Four
7. Immortal Thor
8. JSA
9. Love & Rockets
10. Titans

Japanese Manga

1. Akane-Banashi
2. Asadora
3. Blue Period
4. Call of the Night
5. Hiryasumi
6. Kageki Shojo!!
7. Komi Can't Communicate
8. Mob Psycho 100
9. One Punch Man
10. Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-kun
11. Witch Hat Atelier

Merry (Lemurian) Christmas!

A slayer-iffic Santa by Conor Burke

A lot has happened since my last post (29 June 2021), much of it involving eldercare and heavy-duty adulting, but the impending release of Ludospherik's Barbarians of Lemuria Mythic+ Edition has got me thinking about sword and sorcery blogging again. So here I am with holidays wishes—and BoL stats for the Lemurian version of a certain jolly old elf!

KRINGAL OF VALGARD

Attributes
Strength 2
Agility 1
Mind 0
Appeal 1

Combat
Initiative 1
Melee 2
Ranged 0
Defense 1

Careers

Barbarian 1

Beastmaster 1

Mercenary 1

Thief 1

Resources
Lifeblood 10
Hero Points 5

Gear
Valgardian axe (d6, can be thrown 10')

Red gambeson (light armor, d6-3/1)

Large sack

Boons
Detect Deception

Stealthy

Trademark Weapon (Valgardian axe)

Flaws

Distinctive Appearance

Feels the Heat

Kringal grew up in frozen Valgard, helping his family herd the giant deer of the north. Lured south by mercenary company recruiters promising easy riches, Kringal soon grew tired of military life. He now dwells in Satarla, where he has acquired a reputation as a skilled second-story man, able to get in and out of houses without waking any of his targets ("he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake"). He has an uncanny ability to distinguish truth from falsehood ("he knows if you've been bad or good") and can be readily recognized by his obsession with wearing red garments. He plans to return home once he has acquired a sizable hoard—enough to challenge for leadership of his clan.

Digital Vision Cards 1: Vladimir Kush

Ever since the Everway RPG was published back in 1995, its fans have been supplementing the official Vision Card pictures with images found online. In that spirit (and because the recent Kickstarter has returned Everway to attention), I'm starting a series here on the blog to highlight artists whose work is both inspirational and suited to the assumptions about fantasy that Everway makes.

The first artist I'm featuring is self-described "Metaphorical Realist" Vladimir Kush. His work stems from the Surrealist tradition, but the line between the fantastic and the surreal has always been a thin one. Images like the one at the head of this post ("In Full Sails," my favorite of his oil paintings) make for perfect digital Vision Cards, and I recommend them to Everway players and GMs.

A similar painting ("Departure of the Winged Ship") suggests a realm in which all oceangoing vessels are powered by the wings of giant insects.

"Heavenly Fruits," on the other hand, conjures up the idea of a realm where trees are essentially floating arboreal "clouds," capable of being harvested by hand when the wind is quiet.

Finally, Kush's notes for a painting like "Dragon Defence" can be straight-up borrowed for an Everway game: what if a realm-spanning defensive wall is actually a slowly moving earth dragon?

Everway Silver Anniversary Edition Funded in 4 Hours

The Everway RPG has finally managed to draw the Spring card (upright meaning: "new growth") from the Fortune Deck: the Kickstarter for the Silver Anniversary Edition reached its funding goal in just under four hours. (I went in at the $120 level, picking up hardcopies and PDFs of both the players' and gamemasters' books.) Stretch goals have not yet been announced, but they have been strongly hinted at. If you're thinking about backing the Kickstarter but haven't decided yet, check out the free Gateway Book preview: it's an epitome of the two books and, at 62 pages, is rather thorough for a sample.

Everway Silver Anniversary Edition Kickstarter Live

I'm excited to report that the Kickstarter for the Silver Anniversary Edition of the Everway roleplaying game has just gone live. (Incidentally, so has this blog: surviving 2020 took a lot out of me, and blogging about RPGs wasn't part of the survival plan.) The new edition looks like a great improvement to an already lovely game, providing much more scaffolding for players and GMs to interact with the Thousand Worlds: for example, there are now guidelines for how to create the Boons that Everway Heroes receive as rewards, and the city of Everway has been given a setting overhaul, placing it into a regional context on its home Sphere (and thus making it more than just a waystop). The game's publishers (The Everway Company) have put together a more detailed guide to the revision, complete with some very enticing images of pages and rules material. Once I get a chance to look over the new books myself, I hope to publish more Everway-related material here.

Killing Magic Items

Last night, I was prepping for an upcoming class on Eirik the Red's Saga, and I suddenly realized I had material for a blog post that was more than just a link to gaming-related media. I was taking notes on the scene in the fourth chapter of the saga where Christian girl Gudrid Thorbjornsdottir gets roped into singing the "Weird-songs" (Varðlokur) for Thorbjorg, a pagan völva or "prophetess." The narrator is careful to describe Thorbjorg's gear, both her bag of "talismans" and her "staff ... with a knob thereon ... ornamented with brass, and inlaid with gems."

While looking for images of a völva's staff to show students, I came across the image reproduced above. It's a Norwegian grave good originally identified by British Museum curators as a spit or measuring rod—and since reclassified as a divination-staff. (Once you see some other examples of völva staves, this artifact obviously belongs to the same group of objects.)

The cool thing about the staff (and here's the payoff for GMs) is the curve in its one end: the curators believe that it was done in a smithy for the purpose of "ritually killing" the staff before burying it with its owner. With the staff bent, the dead völva could not use it against the living if she returned as a draugr. I'm not great with mechanics, so I can't come up with a "magic-item slaying ritual" off the top of my head—but I can immediately see the in-character possibilities for such slain items. At the very least, it's a nice bit of dungeon dressing: there's a wand in this sarcophagus, but it has been deliberately broken by whoever stuck the lich in there. It could be something more, though: how would the player characters go about "resurrecting" a dead magic artifact? Could that even be the focus of an entire campaign?

D&D & D&D Rules Lawyers

It's been a crazy busy September in the world of academic administration and university teaching, so this "advertisement" is a welcome laugh.

Eye of the Beholder Documentary

I just finished watching Eye of the Beholder, a new documentary about the history of D&D art. (It apparently premiered at GenCon 2018, but I completely blanked on its existence before now.) The film is wonderful to watch, not only for all the amazing art on display but also to see and hear the actual artists talking about their experiences working for TSR. The film is very ecumenical, celebrating art from all editions and eras of the game—a generosity of spirit I greatly appreciated. Definitely recommended.

P. S. Larry Elmore's Patronus has to—HAS TO—be Tommy Lee Jones.

P. P. S. I'm really thrilled to see one of my favorite pieces by Tramp make an appearance in the documentary:

Secrets of Blackmoor Documentary

I ended the month of August by streaming Secrets of Blackmoor, the 2019 documentary by Chris Graves and Griffin Mon Morgan III about Dave Arneson, the Twin Cities gaming scene, and the prehistory of roleplaying games. It was a pleasure to see and hear the people behind so many of the stories I've read—and I would love to have Dave Wesely as my game master. At the same time (and this may be a result of my turning 50 back on August 20th), I found watching the documentary a very bittersweet experience: two members of the Blackmoor group—Duane Jenkins and Pete Gaylord, respectively the first vampire and the first magic-user in RPGs—have passed away since being interviewed for the film. It's a mitzvah that Graves and Morgan got these men and women on film to talk about how they created the hobby we all love, and I definitely recommend watching Secrets when you get a chance.

P. S. Gary Gygax certainly gets a bit of stick toward the start of the documentary, but that quickly gives way to a celebration of Arneson and his friends.

[OSE] Core Rules, Rules Tome, and All Classic Fantasy Volumes Released

Because Necrotic Gnome doesn't mess around, it took just five days to release the rest of the PDFs in its Old School Essentials line: Core Rules, Rules Tome, Classic Fantasy: Genre Rules, Classic Fantasy: Cleric and Magic-User Spells, Classic Fantasy: Monsters, and Classic Fantasy: Treasures. Time for me to start prepping Stonehell Dungeon!

[OSE] Advanced Fantasy PDFs Released

Today Necrotic Gnome released PDFs of the first Advanced Fantasy books in its Old School Essentials line: Advanced Fantasy Genre Rules and Advanced Fantasy Druid and Illusionist Spells. These books effectively B/X-ize material from the AD&D Player's Handbook and Unearthed Arcana volumes. (I don't really have to say "advanced version of the original fantasy roleplaying game," do I?) In the case of Advanced Fantasy Genre Rules, that means new human classes (acrobat, assassin, barbarian, bard, druid, illusionist, knight, paladin, ranger), new demi-human classes (drow, duergar, gnome, half-elf, half-orc, svirfneblin), poison rules, and other rules new to B/X games (e.g., separating race from class, multi-classing, weapon specialization, etc.).

Advanced Fantasy Druid and Illusionist Spells is, well, it's a collection of spells for the Advanced Fantasy Genre Rules druids and illusionists to cast. But Necrotic Gnome has done a wonderful job of adapting the spells, and there's some particularly wonderful artwork to go along with the B/X translations of the AD&D spell entries.