New Edge Sword & Sorcery is a magazine dedicated to inclusivity

My first introduction to the genre of sword and sorcery came through Mike Mignola’s comics The Chronicles of Corum and Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Following this taste, I was surprised to find it in 2020 with the series premiere of Primal by Genndy Tartakovsky. His take on sword and sorcery, which he cites as being pulp, was inspired by the stories of Conan the Barbarian penned by the pioneer himself, Robert E. Howard.

However, in reading stories from the 1900s with Conan, and more modern takes via Michael Moorcock and Fritz Lieber, I did feel the times with these stories. Especially the fact that our main characters were token white males with machismo and being wrought with some of the depictions of “savages”. I’ll give Moorcock and Lieber this, though their stories were at least deconstructionist breakdowns of the archetype of Conan, bringing a new dimension to the genre with their characters being disabled and sickly or at least a regular human being.

In looking for something more inclusive, I managed to discover a wonderful magazine that is striving to be more inclusive and diverse in their storytelling. The magazine is called New Edge Sword & Sorcery. It debuted back in the Fall of 2022 and has been publishing through crowdfunding and even managing to publish some novellas and books along their journey. For this review, I’d like to highlight their issue #0, which is completely free to read.

“New Edge Sword & Sorcery takes the genre’s virtues—outsider protagonists, thrilling energy, wondrous weirdness, and a large body of classic tales—then alloys inclusivity, mutual creator support, a positive fan community, and enthusiastic promotion of new works into the mix.” – New Edge Sword & Sorcery mission statement

The magazine itself is divided into two halves: fiction and non-fiction. The fiction stories are:

• The Curse of the Horsetail Banner by Dariel R.A. Quiogue
• The Ember Inside by Remco van Straten and Angeline B. Adams
• Old Moon Over Irukad by David C. Smith
• The Beast of the Shadow Gum Trees by T.K. Rex
• Vapors of Zinai by J.M. Clarke
• The Grief-Note of Vultures by Bryn Hammond

For non-fiction:

• The Origin of the New Edge by Howard Andrew Jones
• C.L. Moore and Jirel of Joiry: The First Lady of Sword & Sorcery by Cora Buhlert
• Interview with Milton Davis by Oliver Brackenbury
• The Outsider in Sword & Sorcery by Brian Murphy,
• Gender Performativity in Howard’s “Sword Woman” by Nicole Emmelhainz
• Review: The Obaanax by Robin Marx
• What Is New Edge Sword & Sorcery? by Oliver Brackenbury

The short stories are themselves episodic moments in an outsider character in a historical context, morphed with some high fantastical elements mixed with inclusivity and modern sensibilities. For this current outing, I wanted to highlight, as someone whose ancestry is Mongolian, the two unique perspectives of sword & sorcery stories set in Mongolian culture in The Curse of the Horsetail Banner by Dariel R.A. Quigue and The Grief-Note of Vultures. I cannot emphasize how gratifying it was to see my own ancestry depicted in such awesome and delicate stories that made me want to go and read up more into my culture. The non-fiction essays are also opening the door to the grandeur of this genre while still holding a mirror to itself. The interview Sword & Soul with Milton Davis was a highlight to read in that Oliver Brackenbury elicits the definition of this subgenre of a subgenre through it being about pre-colonial Africa, which really caught my imagination. Alongside this is C.L. Moore and Jirel of Joiry: The First Lady of Sword & Sorcery, which really grabbed my attention because this character is rife with potential stories to be told and is currently being written about in this magazine.

What I want to emphasize here is the passion for this genre. It’s been a forgotten genre that managed to be cultivated by those who loved it. Brackenbury posits that there is a third age of sword & sorcery upon us, and he is clearly a beacon of that with the work he has done to be more diverse and progressive in our modern day.

I hope you’ll consider checking out this magazine, and hey, the first issue is out for free digitally. But I highly recommend picking up a copy of the physical magazines because they go by the design philosophy of books as pretty objects and they are exquisite editions to be held.

While you’re at it, there is currently a BackerKit out for the new Jirel Joiry novella called Blue Fire. Go back it; I already did.