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A Rendezvous in Averoigne: The Best Fantastic Tales of Clark Ashton Smith

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Like many people, I started off as a fan of the Old Gent himself, HP Lovecraft. But as I read Lovecraft collections, I turned more and more of my attention to one of his close personal friends, albeit one he never met in person. Clark Ashton Smith's prose and command of vocabulary sends your senses of sight and sound on a rollercoaster ride. His Zothique story cycle is astounding, set on the last remaining continent of humankind under a fading, dying sun of the far future. And the story "The Planet of the Dead", a love story seen as a vision experienced by a lonely antiquarian on a distant planet whose cities are built high into the air because the ground below them consists only of resting places for the dead on a planet on the verge of ruin, was my personal favorite for its sense of impending doom. This book remains the jewel in my book collection, which is ironic since only a handful of people who've perused my bookcase has ever even heard his name.

Though his name is usually associated with HPL's Cthulu mythos, CAS is one of the most brilliant and unique fantasists of the 20th century. Unlike his peers, who set about creating gargantuan, multi-volume tomes, CAS works entirely within the short story format. CAS is as adept at world creation as Tolkien, LeGuin or Dunsany. His stories fall into major cycles based on the imaginary settings in which they are placed, such as Zothique, the last continent of an ancient Earth where decadent emperors and omnipotent necromancers bask in the glory of a dying sun, Hyperborea, an advanced ice-age civilization frequently terrorized by nightmare gods, and Averoigne, a province in medieval France where sorcery is rampant. The Zothique tales are particularly good; displaying a morbid fascination with decadence and decay not to be found in the pastoral settings and simplistic Good Vs. Evil themes of Tolkien-influenced fantasists. CAS writes in a highly atmospheric and poetic style, often utilizing severly archaic vocabulary (you'll need a good dictionary at hand to read him) and beautiful metaphors to evoke richly detailed and decadently exotic settings. His grim irony and morbid sense of humor are refreshing in a genre populated with bombastically self-important authors.
This collection is a good intro to CAS's work, including 10 tales of Zothique and 4 of Hyperborea, as well as some of his outstanding work in the SF and horror fields. However, this volume really reveals its inadequacies in story selection. An overly large portion is devoted to Averoigne, Smith's weakest major cycle. Hyperborea, perhaps Smith's second greatest cycle, is slighted by its relegation to a tiny section of the book, and gems such as "The Testament of Athammaus," "The White Sybil," and "The Door to Saturn" are not collected in this volume. One of the best tales of Zothique, "The Weaver in the Vault," is not to be found, and there are other notable omissions, such as "A Night in Malneant," "The Double Shadow," and "The Plutonian Drug," which are all passed over in lieu of some questionable choices in the Lost Worlds section. Also, the edited Weird Tales versions of Smith's manuscripts (which excise some of the violence, sexuality, and atmosphere from the stories) are reprinted here. All in all, a good introduction to Smith and one of the few volumes of his stories in print, but I would recommend The Emperor of Dreams for the Smith neophyte. It is available from Amazon UK, and the selection of tales is far superior to Rendezvous. Also, be sure to visit the excellent CAS website at www.eldritchdark.com.

If you made a list of the most influential science fiction/horror writers of the 1930s, Clark Ashton Smith would rank in the top three. Along with his protégés H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard, Smith wrote bleak tales of mind bending horror set in weird, alien worlds. A man lacking an extensive education, he nonetheless made a name for himself writing poetry while living in a small cabin in California. In 1928, Smith contributed a short story to Weird Tales, that august publication that still influences writers of the macabre. Over the next decade, the author's stories gained legions of fans in love with Smith's opulent prose and lush atmospheres. After 1937 Smith, for reasons never adequately explained, suddenly dropped out of the limelight when he cut back on his dark fiction output. "A Rendezvous in Averoigne" gathers under one cover thirty of his Weird Tale stories, most from the 1930s but a few from the 1940s and 1950s as well, lumping them into five distinct categories: Averoigne, Atlantis, Hyperborea, Lost Worlds, and Zothique. No less a figure than Ray Bradbury wrote the introduction to the book, in which he credits Smith as a major influence in his decision to become a writer. Clark Ashton Smith passed away in 1961

The Averoigne, Atlantis, and Hyperborea stories could easily fit under one rubric as they are quite similar. Arguably the best Averoigne tale, "The Colossus of Ylourgne, describes what happens when an evil sorcerer seeks revenge against the residents of Smith's fictional French province. Probably the worst story in the book is unfortunately the first one, "The Holiness of Azedarac," where a monk in Averoigne travels back in time due to the plans of an evil officer of the church. The Atlantis stories, three in number, deal with activities taking place on the fabled lost continent. "The Last Incantation" and "The Death of Malygris" describe a powerful Atlantean sorcerer's quest to recapture his loved one and the men who wish to unseat him. "A Voyage to Sfanomoe" has as much to do with science fiction as it does with Atlantis. As the continent begins to sink beneath the seas, two super genius technicians build a spacecraft and fly to Venus. Finally, the Hyperborean tales explicate the unfortunate adventures of a greedy pawnbroker ("The Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan"), the horrific yet highly humorous circumstances of a hunting expedition gone horribly wrong ("The Seven Geas"), the inherent dangers of robbing a religious temple in a plague cursed city ("The Tale of Satampra Zeiros"), and the emergence of a Lovecraftian god on an icy rampage ("The Coming of the White Worm").

The Lost World stories, nine in number, are a cut above the Averoigne, Atlantis, and Hyperborea stuff. You get a Lovecraftian tale about an author stepping into another dimension long enough to witness a singing flame that enchants anyone who hears it ("The City of the Singing Flame"), a doomed expedition on Mars ("The Dweller in the Gulf"), a reincarnation yarn with horrific consequences ("The Chain of Aforgomon"), and one of the best stories in the collection, "Genus Loci," about a possessed pond's sinister machinations and the painter who discovers them. The second Mars tale, the short "The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis," reveals the inherent dangers of mucking around in a deserted alien city. "The Maze of Maal Dweb" is another evil sorcerer tale, this time involving the abduction of a young woman and the man who attempts to free her. "The Uncharted Isle" involves a shipwrecked sailor and the discovery of a civilization lost in time and space. The Lost World stories conclude with "The Planet of the Dead" and "Master of the Asteroid," about a futuristic civilization on the verge of destruction and a marooned spacecraft respectively.

Fans remember Smith most fondly for the Zothique cycle. All of these tales take place in the far future when the sun has changed into a red giant and the earth is about ready to take a permanent vacation. You get stories about sorcerers raising people from the grave, evil wizards taking terrible revenge on old enemies, an island full of torturers, and gardens full of human/plant hybrids. The best story included here is "The Dark Eidolon." In this magnificent yarn, we get a wizard whose revenge against those who wronged him as a child receive more than their just desserts. Imagine a magician so powerful that he calls forth demons powerful enough to level an entire metropolis. The story has an apocalyptic feel to it that doesn't appear in any of the other entries. With only ten stories in the Zothique section, you quickly wonder what the editors omitted. Sadly, "A Rendezvous in Averoigne" has been long out of print. I am not aware of any other collections of Smith stories available except for one in the United Kingdom. There is something fundamentally wrong about that.

The first thing you will notice with these stories, if you are lucky enough to find a copy, is the ornate language. Clark Ashton Smith writes on a level that may at first dumbfound the casual reader. Not to worry, though, as persistence allows you to absorb his writings fully without constantly plumbing the depths of an Oxford English Dictionary. If you've read Lovecraft before, you already have an idea of what you'll find prose wise in "A Rendezvous in Averoigne." Horror writers today simply don't write like this anymore, excepting someone like Charlee Jacob, perhaps. I just thank my lucky stars the local library had a copy of this book, in great condition, with which I could spend a few magical days. Fans of the masters of the 1930s already know about Clark Ashton Smith; new readers pondering Lovecraft for the first time would do well to check this author out as well.

Ideal for introducing a whole new generation to one of the greatest fantasy authors ever to set pen to paper, A Rendezvous In Averoigne is an impressive collection of the classically horrific fantasy writings by Clark Ashton Smith, a man who wrote for "Weird Tales" alongside such legendary and groundbreaking authors as H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard. The fantastic settings, the plottings of dire necromancers, the perilous quests, and the struggles to survive in mysterious and hostile worlds, fill the pages of this macabre yet inviting anthology. The short stories comprising A Rendezvous In Averoigne have superbly weathered the decades since their original publications.

There's nothing wrong with good reading that challenges your vocabulary. I think a lot of Lovecraft fans can make the jump over to Clark Ashton Smith; Lovecraft used verbiage to invoke an atmosphere, while Smith used his to evoke sensations. Neither one is stingy with their writing. I have been a Lovecraft fan for years but was never able to appreciate Smith - his work is hard to find. RENDEZVOUS IN AVEROIGNE collects representative stories from many of Smith's themes, perhaps as a sample of the Smith canon. From ancient Hyperborea to watery Atlantis to medieval Averoigne to decadent Zothique, Smith's prose does not disappoint. But don't expect to read it quickly - good writing is dense writing.

There may be better collections of Smith's writings still available - if so, I haven't found them. This collection has a real breadth of Smith's writing that isn't found in other collections; five different settings, and thirty stories total. I waited almost 6 months to get RENDEZVOUS IN AVEROIGNE and it was worth the wait. But I'd recommend that you get your copy while you can.

On a technical level as a writer, Clark Ashton Smith had no peers. His use of words, his sentence structure, and his vivid descriptions of alien worlds is always brilliant. Like his contemporaries Lovecraft and Howard, I enjoy his writing for the writing itself as much as for the actual stories.

What his stories in this collection often lack is the pay-off; that ironic twist at the end which brings the tale full circle. All to often , the story just falls flat at the end, leaving you wondering "what was the point?" A perfect example is the "The Seven Geas".

Still, when CAS gets it right, he knocks it out of the ballpark. "The Planet of the Dead" is both sad and poiniant, as is "Necrcromancy in Naat" where two seperated lovers are finally reunited and "live" happily ever after. I also enoyed "The City of the Singing Flame" and "Genus Loci", where the protaganists embrace the horror. "The Empire of the Necromancers" is very creepy. In my opinion, his Zothique stories are the most satisfying as a whole.

CAS is not as gifted a fantasy writer as Robert E. Howard, nor are his stories as horrific as H.P. Lovecraft's best. However, I would still highly recommend this collection. BTW, it is still in print, and available from Arkham House.

Well I wrote another, better review of this book, but it was over 1,000 words and subsequently not accepted.

CAS is one of the authors of the Lovecraft circle in 1930s on, along with people like Frank Belnap, Donald Wandrei, Robert Bloch, August Derleth, Lin Carter, etc. Smith is a better writer than Derleth, but, like Derleth, he doesn't always have the plots to match the moods. Stories like "Necromancy in Naat" and "Vaults of Yoh-Vombis" have the atmosphere down pat, but poor plots. Some stories survive on their fantastic language alone. "A Rendezvous in Averoigne" is a fairly straightforward vampire horror story, but the language is simply stunning, evocative, powerful, ethereal. Wow. Other stories like "The Charnel God," "City of Singing Flame," and "Genius Loci," are remarkable for their unique concepts on death and interrment, science-fiction wondrement, and Lovecraft-inspired spiral into otherwordly madness, respectively. Smith even manages to eke out a contemporary lamia story that is wonderful, the last tale of the book. Alas, for all of these great success, Smith makes rudimentary mistake upon rudimentary mistake. Sometimes his writings take on the juvenality of a 6th grader with a pulp mag in one hand and a thesauras in the other. About 70% of his stories are junk, but the other 30% are very good. Give it a try, but be prepared for a tough time reading it cover to cover (like I did.) Avoid "Chains of A___________" at all cost. What a terrible story

For those unfamiliar with Clark Ashton Smith's writing, this will be a huge surprise and pleasure. He had his own entirely unique style, with an enormous and picaresque vocabulary. Fantasy lost a great author when he quit writing in his forties. I highly recommend this anthology.

Ignore the reviewer below who said Chain of Aforgomon is a bad story. It's actually one of the best in this collection.