Customer Reviews

Black Gods Kiss (Planet Stories Library)

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4 star:		(8)
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At the very outset it needs to be stated that I don't agree with all those reviewers who had thought that they were doing C.L.Moore and her fantastic creation a service by comparing her with Conan the Cimmerian. No, Jirel of Joiry is not a "Gal Conan", she is a lot more than that or any other Red Sonja types currently flooding the fantasy market. She is closer to Kull of Atlantis in sombriety and credibility. Her physical strength has limits, she knows fear and acknowledges its presence in the periphery of her landscape, but most importantly: she neither tries to hide her feminine identity, nor does she try to exploit it unnecessarily. She is haughty, vengeful, impulsive, but she is a human being who tries to be the sole determinant of her own destiny. These stories, written at least 70 years ago, are documentary evidence of the presence of such a realistic heroine in the pulps at a time when they were despised as little more than "boyish" fantasies.

Jirel is the ruler of the medieval French principality of Joiry at a time dominated by warlords and wizards. Six of her adventures (unfortunately that's all) are collected in this slim volume publoshed by Paizo Books in a nice format. These stories are:

1. "Black God's Kiss": After her kingdom is overran by a cruel antagonist, Jirel explores a land of evil & sorrow (accessible through a forbidden route under her castle) in search of a weapon that would avenge her humiliation at the hands of the antagonist.
2. "Black God's Shadow": Jirel's remorse for the extreme punishment effected upon the antagonist in the 1st tale forces her to return to her unique hell where she breaks an evil spell for ever.
3. "Jirel Meets Magic": After the dark and forebodingly Freudian descriptions in the first two stoies, this tale is simply Tolkienesque as Jirel crosses over to another state in search of a fugitive wizard and comes across a witch with ultimate powers.
4. "The Dark Land": This hauntingly beautiful and yet terrifying tale forces Jirel as well us to question ourselves about love.
5. "Hellsgarde": This straight-forward horror story (as well as Gothic romance) was a fun read after the oppressive first stories.
6. "Quest of the Starstone": This is obviously a product of popular choice as the author brings together two of her most famous creations in a simple plot leading to Jirel being relegated to the second-best position by North Wset Smith.

All-in-all, I heartly recommend this book to not only the readers of rip-roaring adventures, pulps, horror stories, etc. but also to those interested in the female heroines and their role-models.

This is a reprint of all of the stories found in the collection "Jirel of Joiry" plus one story where the main character meets her male counterpart from many of the author's other short stories. If you already have the original collection be aware that you are paying almost entirely for that one story, which is definately worth reading, in a new jacket with different artwork.

I just finished the book last night, and found it to be an enjoyable read.

The first thing that stood out to me is Ms. Moore's writing style. Despite being from an earlier era, it rarely felt dated, and made for a fast read.

Of the stories, "Hellsgarde" was definitely my favorite. "Jirel Meets Magic" and "Black God's Kiss" were great as well. "Quest for the Starstone" was fun, but it felt a bit disconnected from the rest.

Jirel is an interesting character...tough as most men of sword & sorcery, but with a definite female perspective which sets her apart from her contemporaries.

The atmosphere of these stories is fantastic! Well worth a read.

Catherine Lucille Moore was probably the first great female writer of pulp fiction. Moore could muster as much blood and thunder as her male peers, and had both better prose style and superior hand with characterization than many. The stories reprinted here as part of Paizo's Planet Stories line are about one of the first female protagonists in Sword & Sorcery. Jirel of Joiry is a warrior woman in medieval France, who's every bit as tough as her male compatriots in the genre.

The collection also includes a "crossover" story where Jirel meets Moore's other series character--the Han Solo prototype, Northwest Smith. This 1937 story was a collaboration with her future husband, Henry Kuttner.

C. L. Moore had in common with Robert E. Howard not his hero Conan but that rare quality of somewhat more nuanced and lyrical poetry commingled with a genre that at times has been given over to hack idiocy; certainly sword and sorcery has that reputation among mainstream readers. But the wonderful thing that emerges from discovering jewels like Moore beyond ones own love of the genre which can pardon an awful lot of writers is the conviction that good stuff is where you find it and not just where reputation's direct you to. To find diamonds amidst the garbage clues one in to ones own ability to know good and bad rather than being biased with an attitude that absolutely nothing can have the quality or gravitas of Jane Austen in the realm of fantastic literature; but there is a difference between serious and sober.

For those of you who enjoyed Jirel's pursuit into a mad land, there is Jack Vance's own similar episode in Vol. 2 of his Lyonesse triolgy, "The Green Pearl". There a mad realm called Tanjecterly is where a hero of sorts goes in hopes of a rescue. Perhaps this was Vance's nod to Moore - I honestly don't know. Lyonesse is one of the great triumphs of fantasy for me and I highly recommend it.

C.L. Moore was a wonderfully whimsical writer at times and the short story "Vintage Season" she wrote with her husband Henry Kuttner under the alias of Lawrence O'Donnell is in the SF Hall of Fame series as one of the best SF stories ever and it is heavily lyrical and redolent in a way where one can sense the exotic scents and speech. C.L. Moore is not good for a woman she is just plain good and in her artistry devoted to a genre without credibility, a mirror image of another great female SF/fantasy author, Leigh Brackett.

Reading Black God's Kiss made me realize what have I lost at not knowing Catherine Lucille Moore. The five histories (and the crossover with her husband's character) appearing in Black God's Kiss (which is both the first story's name in the volume and the one which marks Jiriel of Joiry as an extraordinaire and quite human character) let me taste something of what Moore really is.

There is no other way to begin talking about Black god's Kiss and C. L. Moore than analizing Jirel of Joiry, which can be defined with one word: Fire. Jirel is nothing if not passionate; rage and passion and love (in a sort of way) rule her live, more than once this deep rage, this lust for life is what lets her survive the ordeals she confronts; from dark gods, to evil men, to dark wizards and men from the future. But Jirel is not only fire in essence, but also in body, from her long red hair, her lion yellow eyes, to the passion present on the feminine curves of her body, to her expression of eternal defiance or her burly celebration after victory. That is what defines Jirel of Joiry, such passion that forces us, as it does to her men, follow her into battle and sometimes into the abyss and stranger lands.

Yet still, Jirel is quite human herself. She is pasional, courageous and sometimes barbaric... yet she is also honorable, naïve, superstitious, and human in her desires. More than once she has found herself vulnerable and afraid, but most of the time her fury gives her the upper hand... other times she is as much afraid as any other girl... but in the hells she has taken to visit, who would not be afraid.

From the first story to the last France, from where she reigns Joiry, is nothing but a background to give us a frame of reference to understand Jirel. As some say, "Jirel comes from a naiver era". From this background we rarely see something more than the walls of her castle and those of her enemies, we learn that she has a cousin with a fortress close to her land, an allies and enemies too, yet we heard nothing of her parents or suitors. She is a catholic and has god in high regard, yet she wouldn't think twice in damn her soul or leave the protection of the cross if that is what she needs to destroy her enemies.

That is France... but the true stories always take... well... elsewhere. From outlandish worlds what when seen in the plain light of day will take your sanity away, fiendish and esoteric worlds that can only be understood under the veil of illusions, fae-like worlds with doors to worlds unimagined by mortal minds, esoteric places between the worlds of reality and fantasy. They all are populated by strange versions of ourselves, or bizarre creatures we hardly imagined in our weirdest dreams, where Jiriel usually travels alone, moving between alien creatures, some of which from human, only have the appearance... and usually it's never the true one.

Reading Dark God's Kiss and many of Jirel's stories is like reading an story of a female medieval Conan crossing in between worlds that H.P. Lovecraft would have imagined. An interesting and dangerous mixture, where she understand the impossibility of what she lives, but only has her senses to guide her and her rage to impulse her to win against, sometimes, impossible odds. But as always, her rage is a two bladed sword, as much times saving her, as making imperiling her, or destroying what she loves... more than once taking her to death's door if not for outside forces.

So, what can I said about C. L. Moore and Dark God's Kiss? Simply, I enjoyed deeply her stories and fall deeply in love with Jiriel, so much that the last stories I drank them like sweet wine, unable to stop and taking myself a day to savor the aftertaste this story left me before beginning with something else.

If you have the chance... don't doubt it, and give Jiriel an opportunity, I am sure she will bewitch you as she did with me.

Black God's Kiss

C.L. Moore was perhaps the first female writer of "sword and sorcery", with her 1930's tales of heroine Jirel of Joiry. They are better classifed as "weird tales" - the name of the magazine in which they were published - full of evocative description rather than brutal action. This collection is the 6 Jirel tales, plus a crossover adventure in which Jirel meets Northwest Smith, Moore's other protagonist of 1930's weird tales.

Jirel is a warrior woman, a redhead striking rather than beautiful, capable with a sword and strong willed. To an extent however, the adventures happen around Jirel rather than to her: Moore's lush prose swirls around the reader and drags one in, and it is the descriptions and locations rather than the characters that truly drive the story.

Like Northwest of Earth, this book is not best read in a single sitting, but instead simply reading one tale at a time. Take a week or a month to finish the book. Moore's writing is rich enough to require a little time to settle in for best effect.

C.L.Moore was an elegant writer, especially compared to a lot of other pulp magazine writers of her era, and the Jirel of Joiry stories are elegantly written. After a while, however, (after reading several of the stories), I began to feel as though Jirel was the only actual character in any of these tales, that she was moving through a beautiful (sometimes horrifying), exotic dream peopled by her own solipsistic fantasies. The solutions/resolutions to the conflicts she faces are almost always unexpected, and perhaps less than totally satisfying if you're looking for a muscular, action-oriented type of fantasy. We are given to believe that Jirel is a warrior woman of remarkable prowess, but she never solves anything physically (don't let the long red hair fool you, this is not Red Sonja). I would overall recommend these stories, both for the phantasmagoric imagery, the psychedelic horror aspect (high fantasy meets dark fantasy), and the elegance of the writing. However, I prefer Ms. Moore's tales about the space outlaw/smuggler Northwest Smith. The Northwest Smith stories, though more science fictional, have a similar tone (beauty/horror), and much of the time a similar avoidance of direct action, but they do seem to open up to a slightly more populated reality: Northwest isn't the only breathing character in his stories.

I could talk about how nice Black God's Kiss is physically. I could thank Erik Mona and Planet Stories for bringing this historic piece forward so that I could discover it. I could talk about how Moore's writing saves me from enjoying story only and holding my nose when it comes to quality of writing, as is not uncommon for me when it comes to pulp stories. Instead, I want to focus on her enigmatic heroine.

Moore produces in Jirel, the sword-swinging Lady of Joiry, a character that left me hungering for more. To compare Jirel a moment to Moore's sci-fi hero, Northwest Smith, it is undoubted that with Northwest she achieves a much fuller explicit portrayal. But there is something magical in her characterization of Jirel. By hints, suggestions, and even absence, Moore somehow painted in my mind a picture of a compelling presence: Jirel is subtle, conflicted, and full-blooded. As I indicated, after reading pulp fantasy, I often feel a deep enjoyment of story beyond the quality of the writing. Just as rarely as I have satisfaction in the writing itself, do I feel the presence of the character as compelling and lingering. But in the Jirel stories, I felt as if a shadow passed me, of a powerful heroine, and I regretted that there were not more of them. Still, I am glad for those we have, and I recommend this volume as a must-read for the genre, both in terms of historic importance and--above all--for pure enjoyment.

Much more than a Gal Conan and written with equal skill, but in a totally different tone, than Howards most famous creation. Jirel of Joiry is an excellent example of what a pulp author could do when giving her imagination, and writing skills, free reign. Though largely forgotten these days, C. L. Moore deserves her time in the spotlight along with H. P. Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, and Robert E. Howard.