iRead: The Blue Lamp by Robert Zoltan
Feast your eyes on this:
The sickeningly talented Robert Zoltan has created a special audiobook extravaganza with his great fantasy sword & sorcery piece, The Blue Lamp. Not only can he write, but he can draw, and compose, and produce. Here is the full-monty extravaganza.
I first read the story in Heroic Fantasy Quarterly (here’s a link to his original publication, it’s free), which is a market I hope someday to crack. Well, Robert set the bar high in this fun tale. I would describe it as Fritz Leiber meets Robert E. Howard. If you are into S&S, you will know what that means and that it is a very good thing.
It’s a rousing tale, fun and colorful, with magic, exotic setting, thrills, and good buddy chemistry between the two leads. I get a strong sense that I’m reading a classic story while immersed in this one. I think it’s because it really brings me back to the characteristics that made the best S&S stories fun, and eschews the grimdark ethic that is more common today.
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One Comment
Robert Zoltan
I’m flattered by your words, especially by the statement that you think you’re reading a classic. And the comparison to Fritz Leiber and Robert E. Howard is just fine with me.
Regarding the overall fun atmosphere of the story: despite the fact that serious things happen, I try very much to create a meaningful entertaining story while having only as much violence as necessary. Real violence is not entertaining, and I seldom find it entertaining in literature, though sometimes it happens. In my opinion, a warrior hoping to survive in a dangerous world would, like most animals in the wild, avoid conflict whenever possible. Dareon and Blue tend to survive or succeed in my stories far more often by Luck (Dareon’s metaphysical mistress), wits, intuition, chance, synchronicity, or by the intervention of forces greater than they (which usually have their own mysterious motives).
Lastly, I don’t think I’ve ever been called “sickeningly talented” before! Haha! Thank you.