The landscape of Exmoor.
*
The white gulls wheeled above the cliffs, the air was slashed with foam,
The long tides moaned along the strand when Solomon Kane came home.
He walked in silence strange and dazed through the little Devon town,
His gaze, like a ghost’s come back to life, roamed up the streets and down.— Solomon Kane’s Homecoming
Robert E. Howard
*
Let’s toss a bumper down our throat
Before we pass to Heaven
And toast the trim-set petticoat
We leave behind in Devon.
— Butchered To Make A Dutchman’s Holiday
Harry Harboard “Breaker” Morant
*
I hear with envy that Captain Schwertfeger has trekked into the North Woods in search of The Whisper on the Night Wind. I hope he makes it back with a scouting report. I have not yet secured a copy — but I feel the need for a spooky yarn…
And what have we here? In my continuing explorations of the mythic territory of Fennario, I stumbled upon the work of one Joe Talon.
Having grown up on the edge of Exmoor, Joe has long been fascinated by the strange and spooky places and stories that dwell in the dark woodlands and quiet combes.
With the help of a vivid imagination, some real ales, and a passion for storytelling, Joe has created a world just a little sideways from ours. It is full of shadows moving on the edge of your vision when they shouldn’t and cold spots in warm places.
What spare time Joe has is spent with six dogs, lots of walks and exploring strange new worlds in all their forms.
Now, Devon may not be frontier territory, exactly, but the shades Frontier Partisans, real and imagined, from Solomon Kane to Breaker Morant, haunt its landscape. Along with many others…
Gotta love a tourist bureau that serves up haunted manors and creepy critters of the moors…
Talon’s protagonist is ex-SAS, which is plenty Frontier Partisan. Throw in a rural landscape that has never truly been tamed and it’s close enough to the x-ring to count.
Talon has served up a couple of novellas for free as samples of his work. you can download ’em from the website.
Forgotten Homeland: The Whispering of Exmoor’s Dead
Lorne Turner, a broken soldier, arrives home for the first time in twenty years to an empty, lonely farmhouse on Exmoor. The coming days reveal the despair of a farm drowning in debt. The coming nights reveal something far worse. Lorne doesn’t know if the noises, the crack, crack, crack, are the wind ravaging the moor, memories savaging his mind or the ghosts tearing the veil, begging for help.
A Meeting of Terrors
After ten months of being alone on his moor, Lorne Turner receives a panicked call. He needs to rescue some teenagers from an act of stupidity. Nice and simple. Fast rope down to a cave entrance, see if they are still alive, and get them out. Piece of carrot cake for an ex-operator.
When Ella Morgan is also ‘roped’ into helping, Lorne begins to understand the importance of friendship outside the military. The pair descend into the cave complex and that’s when Lorne realises the dead don’t always whisper. Sometimes the dead scream!
I reckon that a hot mug of tea and a pair of short, spooky yarns (just over 40 pages each) is an excellent way to spend a dark winter’s evening. One for Wednesday, one for Friday. And if I like ’em, I’ll spend a bit more time in Joe Talon’s Fennario Exmoor.
Matthew says
I think that the SAS is to Britain what the SEALS are to the US: The go to special forces unit to show how badass some is. One wonders when the Special Boat Service gets it’s due.
Still, it sounds like a cool book.
lane+batot says
My copy of “The Whisper Of The Night Wind” is on the way! I shore couldn’t resist THAT one…..As for what might constitute a “frontier”–that is most definitely a matter of perspective! As the Lakota Standing Bear said–they never thought of their homeland as “wild” or a wilderness. It didn’t become “wild” until the hairy white men from the East showed up!….And I think the view on ghosts presented above is entirely biased and incorrect(ahem!). To get a better balanced correct view of ghosts(and a lot of laughs!!!), watch the new comedy “Ghosts” on CBS on Thursday nights! Sorry for the cheap plug, but hey, it is a very appropriate one for the subjects of this blog! Among the fantastic ensemble of ghosts, there is a Viking, a Native American, a Revolutionary War era leader, along with a hippie girl, a Edwardian lady, an ’80’s business exec type. and a Scout Master–all trapped in the same mansion. Not to mention all the former cholera victims in the basement….It is a HOOT!
JimC says
Sounds like fun. More on the “F-word” coming up.
Norman+Andrews says
Exmoor is about an hours drive from me, the North of it stretches into Somerset ,while the south is in Devon, beautiful hunting country .
Norm.
lane.batot says
Seen any “beasts” in Exmoor? You know, like really big black cats, or the like?
Quixotic Mainer says
I’ll definitely crack into those novellas!
One of my childhood guilty pleasure films I’ve never fallen out of love with is the Costner Robin Hood. That’s a frontier outlaw story for sure, settled ground in the future UK or not. Anywhere that continues to have a juxtaposition between the city and the “woodsmen”, just shapes the story and the people in it.
lane.batot says
For me, ANY form of the “Robin Hood” legend is worthwhile “frontier” subject material/entertainment, be it film or bookwise! I am one of the few that does not knee-jerk/parrot the usual response to Kevin Costner’s film version–it is not my favorite, and though certain things in it are…well…rather awkward…I find much about it that is quite good! I’m still getting through the early 2000’s BBC TV effort(about halfway through at this point), that finally came down enough in price for me to afford! It is not my favorite either–but again, has certain elements that I think are quite good. MY ALL TIME favorite is the older BBC TV production of “Robin Of Sherwood”, circa 1980’s–just exceptional in so many ways! Or maybe just more sentimental to me because of the times and places it takes me back too… I also like better, and better, every time I rewatch it(and I love the Soundtrack, too–as I do the Clannad Soundtrack of “Robin Of Sherwood”!), is Ridley Scott’s fairly recent movie of “Robin Hood”, very cleverly COMBINING the former need to have Robin either the son of a Yeoman forester, or the deposed Earl of Locksley–his film had them BOTH! Yes, very clever! And entertwining the Robin Hood legend with actual British history(like the Magna Carta bit) was simply genius!
Quixotic Mainer says
The Scott Robin Hood wasn’t nearly as bad as some folks make it out to be, I’ll absolutely agree there! I did appreciate that they had Richard meeting his fate as history had laid it out, though I have to confess an affection for the Errol Flynn version too. I couldn’t muster enough interest to watch the computer animation “imitation lars anderson” version that came out recently.
I’ll have to try and hunt down that 80’s Robin Hood, I wonder if some interweb pirate has put it on youtube?
deuce says
Devon may not be a frontier NOW, but it certainly WAS for about half a millennium. Before that, it was never considered quite conquered by the Romans. Of course, you have all the ‘sea dog’ partisans like Drake from there.
JimC says
Yep.
Thought of you and our REH comrades last night watching Blood of the Clans. Alasdair MacColla is as Howardian a character as I’ve ever run across. OF COURSE I am headed down a bloody sidetrail.