short stories only, although in a wide variety of forms
including military science fiction, sword and sorcery,
and horror. His early horror fiction includes several
notable pieces such as “The Barrow Troll” (1975)
and “Blood Debt” (1975), and his collection of su-
pernatural stories, From the Heart of Darkness(1983)
is of very high quality, although Drake has subse-
quently written very little horror.
His first full-length fantasy was The Dragon
Lord(1982), a retelling of the story of King Arthur,
but with a very unconventional take on the main
characters and with a genuine fire-breathing
dragon added to the mix. He was also a regular
contributor to the Thieves’ World shared world
anthology series and used his recurring character
as the protagonist of Dagger(1988), a fairly routine
fantasy adventure. The Sea Hag(1988) was equally
conventional but much better written and was
originally planned as the first volume in a series,
but no further volumes have appeared to date.
Drake’s short fantasy fiction largely fell into two
series. One was collected as Vettius and His Friends
(1989), the story of a Roman soldier who defeats
various magical opponents, and the other as Old
Nathan(1991), set in an alternate version of early
19th-century America where magic works.
Drake apparently enjoys working in the uni-
verses created by other writers and has written The
Enchanted Bunny (1991) and To Bring the Light
(1996), both sequels to works by L. Sprague DE
CAMP, and collaborated with Janet MORRISfor Ex-
plorers in Hell(1989), set in the shared universe
created by Morris and C. J. CHERRYH. He finally
started a major sword and sorcery series of his own
with Lord of the Isles(1997), a complicated story of
intrigue involving a mysterious and evil magical
force and the survivors of a drowned kingdom.
Drake has produced five more volumes in this
series to date. Queen of Demons (1998) is a
straightforward quest story with a party of adven-
turers searching for information that can help
them oppose the encroachment of an evil queen.
They are diverted by a trip back through time to
rescue a kidnapped woman in Servant of the Dragon
(1999). Just when it appears that they are out from
under the shadow of evil, an army of monsters ap-
pears on the horizon in Mistress of the Catacombs
(2001), they are scattered among myriad realities
in Goddess of the Ice Realm(2003), and evil sorcery
proves too tempting for some in Master of the Caul-
dron(2004).
Drake’s remaining fantasy novel is The Tyrant
(2002), written with Eric Flint, set in a fantasy
world that resembles ancient Rome and that faces
many of the same problems and palace intrigues
and the danger of a slave rebellion. In recent years
he has written very few short stories, of which only
“Elf House” (2004) is particularly interesting. He
has proven himself to be a reliable and entertain-
ing writer, but the intensity and powerful charac-
terization of his earliest short stories is largely
missing from his more recent work.The DreamersRoger Manvell(1958)
A frequent criticism of modern horror fiction is
that it draws almost exclusively on Christian
mythology and the legends of Western civilization.
Vampires are repelled by crosses, and the devil
made them do it. Although this is understandable
since that is the tradition of most active horror
writers as well as their audience, it leaves a great
number of resources untapped. There have been
exceptions, of course. Henry Hocherman’s The
Gilgul(1990) invokes a Judaic form of possession,
Dan Simmons investigates native Hawaiian leg-
ends in Fires of Eden(1995), African legends are
central to The Stickman(1987) by Seth Pfefferle
and The Living Blood(2001) by Tananarive Due, a
Filipino folk tale is the basis for The Bamboo
Demons(1979) by Jory Sherman, and Japanese
myths create the tension in Tengu(1983) by Gra-
ham MASTERTON, but they are a decided minority.
Voodoo is probably the major exception, but even
there one often sees a blending of voodoo ritual
with Christianity.
Roger Manvell wrote only one horror novel,
but he drew his inspiration from an African legend
and developed it into a chilling, suspenseful story
using a supernatural device that has largely been
ignored by other genre writers—the contagious
dream. Using the principle of six degrees of separa-
tion, an African witch doctor plots to exact his re-
venge by communicating a dream, disturbing at
first but not dangerous, which is so vivid and
frightening that the dreamer feels compelled to94 The Dreamers