The Wizard of Lemuria

The fantasy community has always had a schizophrenic response to Lin Carter. Mention his stint as the editor of the justly renowned Ballantine Adult Fantasy series and you’ll hear plaudits (from readers of a certain generation at least.) Carter was the man responsible for bringing a bunch of neglected classics back into print. He had a hand in kickstarting the great fantasy boom of the 1960s. Mention his own fantasy writing, on the other hand, and you’ll be greeted with much shaking of heads. It has to be said that the head-shaking is, for the most part, justified. The overwhelming Read more…

A Wizard of Earthsea

I read Ursula K. LeGuin’s A Wizard of Earthsea again recently when I was on holiday. I have read it every few years since I first came across it in the children’s section of Stranraer public library at the end of the 1960s. I encountered it in my first surge of enthusiasm for SF and Fantasy. Indeed it was probably responsible for it. I am convinced it is one of the enduring classics of 20th Century fantasy. It has stood the test of time and repeated rereading. No matter what decade of my life I have read it in, I Read more…