Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #56

Heroic Fantasy Quarterly #56 offers up three stories, two poems, a comic (!), and a couple of bits of interesting news.

“Red-Autumn Seeks His Father,” by the increasingly prolific Jonathan Olfert, sees the titular protagonist seeking some sort of communion with his long-dead father, a craftsman murdered by the king whose barrow he’d helped build. Red-Autumn is an elderly and infirm man at forty, a clue that this is a more primitive world, but he has trained himself for the rigors of the adventure he undertakes. A unique set of “monsters” and the through-line of questions about inheritance and familial duty make this an interesting story.

 

Robert Luke Wilkins offers “The Blade’s Bargain” (also appearing in audio as narrated by someone called “The Bard”). This story is a mostly satisfying exploration of desire for power and jealousy of those who possess it. Savander is a fine soldier and commander, and a minor magician, who desires to join the ranks of his (deftly limned) Empire’s powerful wizards. An interesting magic system and some fine characterizations are present, but the writer’s nerve failed him in the ending. Still worth a read for the world-building at the very least.

 

The third story in this issue is a longer one, coming in at over 10,000 words. It’s written by the Rev. Joe Kelly, who is fairly active on the sword and sorcery scene. “Pagan Fires,” is another adventure of Conor Dubh O’Brien, an itinerant, pistol-wielding combatant of dark and demonic things native to Ireland but here continuing his travels in 17th century England. This time, he faces a dandy who becomes something altogether different when his magical ally possesses him. There’s plenty of action and dark magic in this one, moving it propulsively forward to a somewhat predictable end.

 

I must admit I’ve forgotten most of what I learned about poetic forms as an undergraduate, so I cannot supply technical information about the seven eight-line stanzas of Oliver Smith’s poem, “The Unbitten Fruit” (which the author also reads in an audio presentation). The lines are mostly nine or ten syllables (there are odd exceptions) though I did not discern a pattern. I was really pleased with the rhythms (readily apparent even before one listens to the reading) and the imagery is particularly fine. A worthwhile effort.

 

The particulars of form may escape me, but I certainly recognize onomatopoeia when I see it. The eight stanzas of Aidan Redwing’s “The Gobbler Raid” are built on it, from the “pit-pat” of falling rain in the very first line, through “crashing” gates, flashing “clash-smash” weapons, through the closing “tee-hee” laughter of the titular goblins. Like the other poem, this one tells a recognizable sword and sorcery (or at least fantasy) story. Disturbing, but delightful.

 

Finally, in a new experiment for the magazine, the first two pages of Gary McClusky’s black-and-white comics adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s “Spear and Fang,” a prehistoric story that first appeared in Weird Tales in 1925, mark a very welcome addition and are promised to continue in serialized form. McClusky has a clean line and doesn’t over-ink the way many current b&w comics artists seem to. The writing is a fairly straight-forward adaptation, summarizing the opening pages of Howard’s tale.

 

In an editorial, the HQ team announces both an upcoming Kickstarter aimed at funding a couple of best-of anthologies drawing content from their archives and, intriguingly, a sword and sorcery specific writing workshop that will be conducted this Fall by some well-known editors. Details of the latter are here.

 

This was a good issue of an always dependable magazine.