Customer Reviews

The Maker of Moons

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In 'The Maker Of Moons' three hunting buddies in 1896 are going on a hunting holiday. They are Billy Pierpont, pampered rich kid and snotty playboy; Col. Franklyn Barris, a secret service man; and Roy Cardenhe, the story's central character.

On the way to the hunting trip to New York's Cardinal Woods near Starlit Lake, after a very particular shopping trip by Roy, Barris lets it known that the real reason for his trip. It seems that somebody is flooding the local market with counterfeit gold and Barris is heading up a government posse to capture or kill the counterfeiters. On the first day of the trip though, Barris takes Pierpont and goes off to trap one the gang's more notorious members. This leaves Roy by himself, so he decides to go hunting. As he tramps through the woods, and after bagging some game, he decides to take a nap. When he awakes he finds that the glades have taken a different slant to them. As he gets up walks about he comes to lovely, and fantastically carved fountain, and sitting near it is the beautiful Ysonde. During the ensuing conversation Ysonde confesses that she is the sculptor behind the fountain's sculptures, and that she is an expert in gold working.

It also turns out that she is the step-daughter to the gold counterfeiter. It seems that her step-father may be Yue-Laou, a high sorcerer of "the terrible Kuen-Yuin, a murderously diabolical sect" from China. Yue-Laou and Ysonde are both from the magical city of "Yian of the thousand bridges", although both now occupy a house near the fountain so that Yue-Laou can manufacture his gold and Ysonde can sculpt it.

It may seem that I've given much of the story away, but there is so much more to this story, and while the characters often seem to have come out central casting, the story ranges from that of a pulp crime story, to horror, to an early example of the paranormal romance. I honestly don't know anything about Fantasy House, but they choose to reprint the small-press pamphlet printing of the 1954 Shroud Publications version which edits the ending, an editing which gives the story a whole `nother slant to the story than the original ending did. The whole complete unexpurgated version can be found in the complete fantastic fiction of Robert W. Chambers collection The Yellow Sign and Other Stories: The Complete Weird Tales of Robert W. Chambers (Call of Cthulhu Fiction).

This pamphlet also contains the short story 'The Demoiselle D'ys'. Philip, another hunter is hunting on the cliffs of Kerselec with Goulven in France. Philip decides that he doesn't need a guide and can't get lost, so . . . After tramping about the countryside trying to find his was back he becomes exhausted and sits down to rest. He is then startled when a falcon suddenly swoops down and kills a hare. The falcon belongs to the charming Jeanne d'Ys who has lived, and has never ventured, in her entire life off of her parents isolated properties.

After making an innocent, but rather stupid comment to her, she decides to prove his wrong and escorted by her two servants asks him back to her compound.

Both of these stories are early examples of what is now called the paranormal romance. Both have different approaches to them however. "The Maker Of Moons" is clearly a pulp thriller while "The Demoiselle D'ys" is more of a romance. The first story also ends on a chilling, but an almost melancholy/optimistic note, and often reads like it could have been a series, while the second story is clearly a tragedy, although it does have a heavy dose of droll humor in its telling.

Both have their similarities however. Their approaches towards the female sex are similar as both women of the two stories are perfect examples of the Victorian ideal woman. They are both innocent, fragile, overly-protected girl-childs, superficially independent, talented in their own upper class way, but easily damaged and hurt due to their isolation and protection. Both stories also deal extensively with the concept of "lost geography", and couldn't exist without this concept.

This is a very odd looking pamphlet as it is 8¼ inches high and 4 inches wide, is 72 pages, has a color cover by Rick Hoppe (of whom I know nothing about) and has five interior black and white illustrations by one-time small press staple Jim Garrison. It is saddle-stitched and is #4 of 7 pamphlets of the Fantasy Reader series published by Fantasy House/Shroud Publications. Anything with a * have also been reviewed by me for this site.

Here are the other books in this series of pamphlets:

Fantasy Reader #1: Alien Carnival: Fantasy Reader No. 1 by Walt Liebscher.*
Fantasy Reader #2: FOOD FOR DEMONS by E. Everett Evans.*
Fantasy Reader #3: The Great God Pan: Fantasy Reader 3 by Arthur Machen.
Fantasy Reader #5: The Man Eater [Fantasy Reader-5] by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Fantasy Reader #6: Kings of Horror: Fantasy Reader 6 by Arthur Machen & Robert W. Chambers
Fantasy Reader #7: The Fearsome Island by Albert Kinross*

I plunder the past for your pleasure:

I have also reviewed the following pulp anthologies for Amazon:

The Devil's Children edited by Michel Parry
Hauntings and Horrors: Ten Grisly Tales edited by Sam Moskowitz
The Nightmare and Other Tales of Dark Fantasy (Bison Frontiers of Imagination) by Francis Stevens
The Vampire Archives: The Most Complete Volume of Vampire Tales Ever Published (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard) edited by Otto Penzler.