Studying the lost authors of early fantasy and science fiction is often a humbling lesson in the fickleness of fate. Authors who were just as talented and creative as Robert E. Howard, Isaac Asimov, H.P. Lovecraft, or Ray Bradbury have been largely forgotten by later generations. Nor can their modern anonymity be explained due to a lack of influence or popularity — in many cases they were more influential and popular during their publishing careers than contemporaries who remain well-known today.

I first became aware of this phenomenon in the mid ’90s when Kurt Busiek pointed me towards Mutant, a collection of stories written by Henry Kuttner that had played a major influence in the creation of the X-Men by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Kuttner, I discovered, had influenced an entire generation of science fiction authors. In 1946, at the height of the Golden Age of Science Fiction, fans were asked to choose between Isaac Asimov, Theodore Sturgeon, A.E. Van Vogt, and a dozen others to name one of them as the World’s Best SF Author. They chose Kuttner. Kuttner married C.L. Moore, who had already become known as the First Lady of Science Fiction. The two of them writing together created an amazing corpus of work at such an incomprehensible pace that it required more than twenty pseudonyms to publish it all.

Kuttner died in 1958. Moore retired form writing. And for half a century their works slowly faded into obscurity. Discovering these lost jewels of speculative fiction (including Fury, which remains one of my Top 10 Science Fiction Novels of all-time) was a real wake-up call.

In the past 10 years or so the information-deluge of the Internet coupled with global access to catalogs of used books and small press collections have started to return many of these Lost Authors to the light. Among them is Clark Ashton Smith.

I originally encountered Smith’s writing about a decade ago when I found a collection of his Zothique stories (set on the last continent of a dying Earth). These stories made me want to read more, but it proved devilishly difficult to find more of Smith’s writing in print. (At reasonable prices, anyway.)

So when I heard several years ago that Night Shade Books was planning to publish a five volume series collecting all of his stories, I immediately signed up for a subscription. Unfortunately, the series has proven to be absurdly lethargic in the pace of its releases. In fact, it has yet to be completed (although there is great hope that the last volume will appear later this year).

This has not prevented me, however, from sitting down recently to enjoy Volume 1: The End of the Story.

The series presents Smith’s writing in the chronological order of its composition, starting in 1925 with “The Abominations of Yondo”. This was a story that I had read before, but had no idea that it was Smith’s first stab at speculative fiction. It is a remarkable freshmen work, effortlessly conjuring forth an alien and fantastical environment of an utterly unearthly character. This, in fact, becomes Smith’s defining strength as an author. The alien planets, alternate universes, and ancient epochs in which he sets his stories are not merely distant in time or space; they are utterly alien in their character.

The sand of the desert of Yondo is not as the sand of other deserts; for Yondo lies nearest of all to the world’s rim; and strange winds, blowing from a pit no astronomer may hope to fathom, have sown its ruinous fields with the gray dust of corroding planets, the black ashes of extinguished suns. The dark, orblike mountains which rise from its wrinkled and pitted plain are not all its own, for some are fallen asteroids half-buried in that abysmal sand. Things have crept in from nether space, whose incursion is forbid by the gods of all proper and well-ordered lands; but there are no such gods in Yondo, where live the hoary genii of stars abolished and decrepit demons left homeless by the destruction of antiquated hells.

“… the gray dust of corroding planets, the black ashes of extinguished suns.” Could anyone mistake such a place as merely being the analog of some Earthly wasteland?

The strength of “The Abominations of Yondo” aside, however, Smith’s talent did not spring forth fully formed from the brow of Zeus. And this volume, containing as it does Smith’s earliest efforts, has a fair share of formulaic work: “The Ninth Skeleton”, “Phantoms of the Fire”, and “The Resurrection of the Rattlesnake”, for example, are paint-by-number horror “shockers”. “The Last Incantation” and “A Night in Malneant” are thin and predictable morality tales.

But even in these weaker tales there is a vividness of description and a poetic quality of verse which raises them, however slightly, above similar fare. (With the exception of “Phantoms of Fire” which is simply a bad story by any accounting.) The dead streets of Malneant, in particular, continue to echo through the chambers of my mind many long nights after I finished the tale.

There are, similarly, far too many tales starring self-inserted writers of pulp fiction and poverty-stricken poets. But here, again, Smith manages to use this weak conceit to good effect from time to time. For example, “The Monster of the Prophecy” is the tale of a struggling, poverty-stricken poet who is plucked off the street by an alien visitor from a distant planet. Not only does the poet’s writing become famous, but he himself is given the opportunity to adventure among the stars. In synopsis, the tale sounds like ripe fodder for a Mary Sue. But, in practice, Smith sidesteps the abyss and produces a memorable (if somewhat flawed) tale.

If Smith suffers from a consistent flaw throughout this volume, it is the weakness of his plots and the forgettable quality of his characters. In some ways, however, this flaw stands in complement to his strengths: His tales often read as travelogues of the bizarre, featuring cipherous everymen who serve as the readers’ empty avatars as they wander through the alien vistas.

In many ways, the stories reveal Smith’s true passion as a poet: Many read like tone poems, and I found the book most enjoyable when I chose to sample its contents instead of trying to barge from one tale to the next from front cover to back.

I am curious to see, as I continue to work my way through Smith’s oeuvre, whether his poetic mastery of language and his mind-blowing descriptions of fantastical landscapes will become wedded to plots of substance and characters that you can care about.

On the other hand, I feel this review will be read as more negative than it perhaps should be. In addition to “The Abominations of Yondo” and “The Monster of the Prophecy”, this collection also contains “The Venus of Azombeii” (in which the characters do explode off of the page with a surprising passion), “Thirteen Phantasms” (in which a morality tale is twisted and turned into something unpredictable and beautiful and special), “The Tale of Satampra Zeiros” (which could be described as capturing all the vigor and spirit of Howard’s Conan stories and wedding it to Smith’s fantastical vision, except for the fact that it was written three years before Conan appeared), “The Metamorphosis of the World” (which, although flawed in parts, is majestical in its scope), “Marooned in Andromeda” (an excellent entry in the travelogue category), and “The Immeasurable Horror” (featuring one of the most memorable depictions of the jungles of space opera Venus). And these are all excellent tales which anyone might be well-advised to read.

Perhaps more importantly, Smith’s eye for the fantastic is utterly unique. The influence of his writing has been widely felt, but if you haven’t read his own work, then you’ve never read anything quite like Clark Ashton Smith.

GRADE: B+

Clark Ashton Smith
Published: 2007
Publisher: Night Shade Books
Cover Price: $25.00
ISBN: 1597800287
Buy Now!

More startling even than that diabolic chuckle was the scream that rose at my very elbow from the salt-compounded sand – the scream of a woman possessed by some atrocious agony, or helpless in the grip of devils. Turning, I beheld a veritable Venus, naked in a white perfection that could fear no scrutiny, but immersed to her navel in the sand. Her terror-widened eyes implored me and her lotus hands reached out with beseeching gesture.

The Abominations of Yondo, Clark Ashton Smith

The honeytrap is a roper-like creature which relies on deceit and camouflage to trap its prey. The upper half of its body bears the appearance of a beautiful young maiden, but this beauty is wrapped around a mass of tentacular horror. The honeytrap’s favored tactic is to secrete a corrosive chemical capable of rendering even solid rock into a quicksand-like liquiesence.  When its prey draws near, the honeytrap will cry in terror and plead for their aid. It will wait until they are at their most vulnerable before striking: Its sternum will part into a ravenous maw, exuding a half dozen coiled tentacles which will burst forth and wrap themselves lethally around the honeytrap’s would-be saviors.

The honeytrap prefers to lure its victims into a danerous mixture of complacency and chivalry before striking, but those seeking to flee a ravenous honeytrap may be shocked as it wrenches itself free from its muck-ridden hunting grounds and pursues them with great speed upon a second tumultuous mass of tentacles extruding from its “maiden” waist.

HONEYTRAP                                                     CR 8
CE Large Magical Beast
Senses: darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, Listen +13, Spot +13
Init: +5 (+1 Dex, +4 Improved Initiative)
Languages: Common, Elven

AC: 24, touch 10, flat-footed 23 (-1 size, +1 Dex, +14 natural)
Hit Points: 85        HD: 10d10+30
Fort +10, Ref +8, Will +8

Speed: 40 ft.
Melee: bite +13 (1d6+6)
Ranged: 6 strands +11 ranged touch (drag and weakness)
Space: 5 ft.            Reach: 5 ft. (30 ft. with strand)
Base Atk: +10      Grapple: +14
Special Actions: quicksand liquiesence
Metamagic Feats: (spontaneous casters only)

Str 19, Dex 13, Con 17, Int 12, Wis 11, Cha 17
Special Qualities: darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision
Feats: Alertness, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Weapon Focus (strand)
Skills: Climb +12, Hide +10*, Listen +13, Spot +13
Treasure: Standard
Advancement: 11-15 HD (Medium); 16-30 (Large)
Level Adjustment: —

Drag (Ex): If a honeytrap hits with a strand attack, the strand latches onto the opponent’s body. This deals no damage, but drags the struck opponent 5 feet closer each subsequent round (provoking no attack of opportunity) unless that creature breaks free, which requires an Escape Artist check (DC 23) or a Strength check (DC 19). (The DCs are Strength-based, and the Escape Artist check includes a +4 racial bonus.)

Drag and Bite: A honeytrap can draw a creature within 5 feet of itself and bite with a +4 attack bonus in the same round. A strand has 10 hit points and can be attacked by making a successful sunder attempt. However, attacking a honeytrap’s strand does not provoke an attack of opportunity. If the strand is currently attached to a target, the roper takes a -4 penalty on its opposed attack roll to resist the sunder attempt. Severing a strand deals no damager to the honeytrap.

Drag and Drown: A honeytrap who has drawn a victim into its quicksand will often try to drown them. A honeytrap can draw a creature 5 feet and attempt to drown them by making an opposed grapple check. If the check succeeds, the victim is pushed below the surface of the quicksand.

Strands (Ex): A honeytrap can extrude up to six strands at once, and they can strike up to 30 feet away (no range increment). If a strand is severed, a honeytrap can extrude a new one on its next turn as a free action.

Quicksand Liquiesence (Ex): A honeytrap can turn a 10 ft. radius of earth, dirt, or stone into quicksand in 1d4 minutes by excreting a powerful, acidic chemical. If a honeytrap is slain, moves, or stops excreting the chemical, the ground will re-solidify within 1d4 hours.

Quicksand requires a Survival check (DC 8′) to spot. The momentum of a running or charging character will carry them 1d2x5 feet into the quicksand. Characters in quicksand must make a Swim check (DC 10) every round to simply tread water in place, or a DC 15 check to move 5 feet in whatever direction desired. If a trapped character fails this check by 5 or more, he sinks below the surface and begins to drown whenever he can no longer hold his breath (see Swim skill). Characters below the surface of a bog may swim back to the surface with a successful Swim check (DC 15, +1 per consecutive round of being under the surface).

Pulling a trapped character out of quicksand often requires a branch, spear haft, rope, or similar tool to reach the victim with one end of it. The character performing the rescue must make a Strength check (DC 15) to pull the victim out, while the victim must succeed at a Strength check (DC 10) to hold onto the branch, pole, or rope. If the victim fails to hold on, he must immediately make a Swim check (DC 15) to remain above the surface. If both checks succeed, the victim is pulled 5 feet closer to safety.

Weakness (Ex): A honeytrap’s strands sap an opponent’s strength. Anyone grabbed by a strand must succeed on a Fortitude save (DC 18) or take 1d8 points of Strength damage. The DC is Constitution-based.

Skills: *Honeytraps have a +8 racial bonus to Hide checks if they are submerged in quicksand or similarly concealed.

This material is covered by the Open Gaming License.

From “The Tale of Satampra Zeiros” by Clark Ashton Smith:

The basin, I have said, was very large; indeed, it was no less than six feet in diameter from the floor. The three legs that bore it were curved and massive and terminated in feline paws displaying their talons. When we approached and peered over the brim, we saw that the bowl was filled with a sort of viscous and semi-liquescent substance, quite opaque and of a sooty color. It was from this that the odor came — an odor which, though unsurpassably foul, was nevertheless not an odor of putrefaction, but resembled rather the smell of some vile and unclean creature of the marshes. The odor was almost beyond endurance, and we were about to turn away when we perceived a slight ebullition of the surface, as if the sooty liquid were being agitated from within by some submerged animal or other entity. This ebullition increased rapidly, the center swelled as if with the action of some powerful yeast, and we watched in utter horror while an uncouth amorphous head and dull and bulging eyes arose gradually on an ever-lengthening neck, and stared us in the face with primordial malignity. Then two arms — if one could call them arms — likewise arose inch by inch, and we saw the thing was not, as we had thought, a creature immersed in the liquid, but that the liquid itself had put forth this hideous neck and head, and was now forming these damnable arms, that groped toward us with tentacle-like appendages in lieu of claws or hands!

I’m going to have to start using more water elementals!

If you wanted to get fancy, you could certainly pimp out the stats of a large water elemental to represent some of the creature’s other abilities from the story (knicking the stench ability from the troglodyte as we go):

Speed: 40 ft., swim 90 ft.

Frightful Presence (Ex): Characters with less than 8 HD who perceive the malignant shape-shifting of the elemental water terror must succeed at a Will save (DC 14) or become either panicked (50%) or paralyzed with fear (50% chance) for 2d4 rounds. Even characters who succeed on the saving throw are shaken, but those who succeed on their saving throw are immune to the creature’s frightful presence for the next 24 hours.

Stench (Ex): The sooty admixture of the elemental water terror’s primordial form exudes an unsurpassably foul odor. All living creatures within 30 feet of the elemental water terror’s must succeed on a Fortitude save (DC 18) or be sickened for 10 rounds. Creatures that successfully save cannot be affected by the same elemental water terror’s stench for 24 hours. A delay poison or neutralize poison spell removes the effect from the sickened creature. Creatures with immunity to poison are unaffected, and creatures resistant to poison receive their normal bonus on their saving throws.

But even this isn’t really necessary: All you need is a water elemental’s stat-block and that beautifully lurid description and you’ll have an encounter far more terrifying than that provided by any ordinary water elemental..

(Tip for adapting the description: Insisting that the characters stand stock still for more than 6 seconds watching the slow, inexorable emergence of their doom is, quite rightfully, frustrating to the players. You’re taking control of their characters away. But if you simply prelude with “time seems to slow for a long moment as” then you can achieve the same effect without taking control of the PCs away from the players.)

I also recommend “The Tale of Satampra Zeiros” quite highly. It reads like a prototypical D&D adventure with a couple of thieves for the main characters and is a little like reading a mash-up of Lord Dunsany’s lyricism and Robert E. Howard’s primitive adventurism. It can be found in The End of the Story, which is Volume 1 of The Collected Fantasies of Clark Ashton Smith. Smith deserves a place alongside Lovecraft and Howard, but is oft forgotten. Although he is not listed in AD&D’s Appendix N of recommened reading, Smith’s influence feels immense.