Jaqhama's page

Tyson wrote: "As far as the Ryder Hook books go, you'd be the only one that thinks they were any good. Getting published a lot is doing something right as far as getting published goes, yes. Obviously he must have written some work that was better than that tripe - and I've even read some."

Yeah, in the whole world I'm the only person who liked the Ryder Hook novels.
You really use a wide brush when you sweep don't you?

Listen, I'm kinda past dealing with egos on forums, so I'm out of here.

Erik: I wish you all the best with Planet Stories and I'll keep an eye out for those new authors and their books when you publish them.

Adios: Jaq.

Tyson

Just to make one thing absoulutely clear, old son...I've never pleaded for anything in my entire adult life, writing or otherwise.

You probably didn't mean any offence but your comment came across as pleading equals begging equals grovelling.

That's not the Aussie way as I'm sure you'd agree.

And Ken Bulmer's Ryder Hook novels weren't crap, it's just that you didn't like them, whereas I thought they were very good. The third book in the series was the weakest but the other three were good, fast paced sci-fi action reads.
Opinions are just that, an individuals likes and dislikes.
I like Ken's writing, you don't.
Doesn't mean Ken wrote crap. A bloke who had more than 200 novels published in his lifetime must have been doing something right.

And your reference to there only being one Leigh Brackett...Leigh's style isn't that hard to copy. Maybe other writers just don't want to copy her?
Or publishers don't want stories written in her style?

Cheers: Jaq.

Excuse the long response time, been on holiday for a few months.

I mentioned re-printing Ken Bulmer's novels and Erik asked me to recommend some.
That's a bit of a chore because he wrote about 200 novels and I've read about 100 of them and that was back when I was a teen. Most of them have been out of print ever since.
Writing as Tully Zetford his Ryder Hook novels, the first of which was Whirlpool of Stars...the Hook series was popular, people pointing out that Ken included a lot of sci-fi stuff we see on a regular basis today for the first time back then.
Only 4 Hook novels in English printed then by NEL (I still have my copies) but another 7 contracted and printed by a German publisher.

Now I have to say that I question the re-printing of a lot of books people have mentioned here that are freely available on the internet.
From a publisher's point of view why publish a novel that anyone can download and read off their computer or print out for free?
Doesn't make economic sense that I can see.

And Erik...I really believe that you should be printing novels by new authors as much as by those who have passed on.
I'm not sayimg this because I write...I'm saying this because the genre's of sword and sorcery and sword and planet and pulp style sci-fi will eventually die out if there are no new authors writing new books.
Wouldn't it be great to find people who could produce brand new adventure tales equally as good and well written as anything Leigh Brackett or ERB or E.E. Doc Smith wrote?
The only way to do that is to actively go looking for, and accepting subs from, new authors.

There's plenty of new writers out there that are quite capable of producing works just as good as the old masters, one just has to give them a chance.

Cheers: Jaq.

Hi there...been lurking a while, reading through this thread.
I've got to say that a lot (maybe the majority?) of authors and books mentioned here are available either new, or in used bookshops and online stores and even in some cases free to read and download from the internet.

On the other hand there's a whole lot of people writing new stories and novels...would it not make more sense to publish new authors alongside the old masters?
To be honest I've read most of the established sword/fantasy/planet authors many times. I'm guessing that's true for a lot of people who come here. I'd really like to see some sword and planet stories by new writers with new ideas.

But while you're digesting that might I suggest that British author (now sadly deceased) Kenneth Bulmer, wrote a few hundred novels in his lifetime and many of them are action/adventure based sci-fi and fantasy. I'm guessing a lot of people never got the chance to read them. I'm also guessing that it wouldn't be hard to get permission from his estate to re-publish many of them.
(He wrote the Dray Prescott series as Alan Burt Akers.) He wrote a great many novels novels under various names.
You can check out a lot of his books here:

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/b/kenneth-bulmer/

Cheers: Jaq.