{"id":1179,"date":"2021-11-11T11:25:32","date_gmt":"2021-11-11T11:25:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/?p=1179"},"modified":"2022-01-08T08:04:46","modified_gmt":"2022-01-08T08:04:46","slug":"rab-foster-clears-the-foliage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/2021\/11\/11\/rab-foster-clears-the-foliage\/","title":{"rendered":"Rab Foster clears the foliage"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jim Pitts \/ Parallel Universe Publications<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rab Foster, the pen-name under which I write fantasy fiction, has just had a short story published in the collection Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy, Volume 3<\/em>.\u00a0 This is the tenth piece by Mr Foster that\u2019s seen publication in recent years, which I\u2019m pleased, but also surprised about.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always enjoyed reading fantasy literature by the likes of C. L. Moore, Karl Edward Wagner, Fritz Leiber and Michael Moorcock, but for most of the 21st<\/sup> century I\u2019d assumed there were few outlets where you could get works in the genre published \u2013 at least, in its short-story form, which is my speciality.\u00a0 However, lately, there seems to have been a surge in the number of magazines, ezines and anthologies devoted to fantasy fiction, which has created many new opportunities.\u00a0 Maybe this is due to the popularity of the Games of Thrones<\/em> TV series (2011-19).\u00a0 If so, thanks for that, George R.R. Martin.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019m particularly happy to have a story published in this collection because it\u2019s been put together by David A. Riley<\/a> and Jim Pitts<\/a> at Parallel Universe Publications<\/a>.\u00a0 Lancastrian artist Jim Pitts has illustrated the volume and I well remember his artwork from 40 years ago when it appeared in a magazine called Fantasy<\/em> Tales<\/em>.\u00a0 As I said in a recent blog-entry, Fantasy Tales<\/em> was the first publication that I, as a young, aspiring and acne-ridden writer, submitted stories to.\u00a0 While they weren\u2019t accepted, one of Fantasy<\/em> Tales<\/em>\u2019 editors, Dave Sutton, was decent enough to write back and offer advice about how to make my work more organised and presentable.\u00a0 He told me to leave spaces after punctuation marks when I was typing my manuscripts, so that my sentences didn\u2019t turn into typographical pile-ups.\u00a0 Also, in an effort to build tension, I employed a lot of one-sentence paragraphs, which hit the protagonists with one revelation after another.\u00a0 Probably not a good idea, he pointed out, to have six or seven one-sentence paragraphs in a row\u2026<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I remember Fantasy Tales<\/em> as a gorgeous-looking little magazine, with Pitt\u2019s colour artwork adorning its cover and his intricate, atmospheric black-and-white illustrations on the pages inside.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a few examples.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jim Pitts \/ Fantasy Tales<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jim Pitts \/ Parallel Universe Publications<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Anyhow, I\u2019m chuffed that one of my stories is sharing a book with Jim Pitts\u2019 artwork at last.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rab Foster\u2019s story in Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy, Volume 3 <\/em>is entitled The Foliage<\/em>, and I suspect it\u2019s no coincidence that I started writing it soon after watching the movie In the Earth<\/em> (2021), a forest-set piece of sci-fi \/ horror eco-weirdness from filmmaker Ben Wheatley.\u00a0 The story also owes something to a 1976 Doctor Who<\/em> adventure called The Seeds of Doom<\/em><\/a>, which featured Tom Baker as the Doctor and a marvellously-deranged Tony Beckley<\/a> and John Challis<\/a> (who later became a much-loved comedy actor and who, sadly, died in September this year) as the villains.\u00a0 I know nerds between the ages of 15 and 70 will argue till the cows come home about what the scariest ever Doctor Who<\/em> adventure is, but for my money, The Seeds of Doom<\/em> is the one.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy, Volume 3<\/em> is currently available at amazon.co.uk here<\/a> and at amazon.com here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  \u00a9 Jim Pitts \/ Parallel Universe Publications   Rab Foster, the pen-name under which I write fantasy fiction, has just had a short story published in the collection Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy, Volume 3.\u00a0 This is the tenth piece by Mr Foster that\u2019s seen publication in recent years, which I\u2019m pleased, … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Rab Foster clears the foliage”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[1641,1637,1636,656,1612,347,1635,1642,1611,1640,6,948,1633,1632,1638,1639,1634],"class_list":["post-1179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing","tag-ben-wheatley","tag-dave-sutton","tag-david-a-riley","tag-doctor-who","tag-fantasy-tales","tag-game-of-thrones","tag-george-r-r-martin","tag-in-the-earth","tag-jim-pitts","tag-john-challis","tag-rab-foster","tag-sword-and-sorcery","tag-swords-sorceries-tales-of-heroic-fantasy","tag-the-foliage","tag-the-seeds-of-doom","tag-tony-beckley","tag-volume-3"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1179"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1276,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1179\/revisions\/1276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodandporridge.co.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}