Category Archives: Essays
The Story Behind Monsters of the Earth
Written for Upcoming4.Me [online magazine] Posted 30 October 2013. The Books of the Elements combine Roman culture with regional myths, but I don’t mean regional religions. I’m building on African backgrounds and folktales in Monsters of the Earth, but there … Continue reading
A Hard Look Back
Written for Bull Spec: a magazine of speculative fiction, September 2012 ON A PANEL AT The Escapist Expo in September [2012], my friend Mark asked for a show of hands from people who hadn’t been born in 1966 when I … Continue reading
Voyage Across the Stars
“Two incandescent novels of journey and battle across the stars set in David Drake’s best-selling Hammer’s Slammers universe together for the first time in one mega-volume.” –Amazon Book Description. Baen’s combined volume due out January 3 2012 reprints Cross the Stars … Continue reading
Another Method of Plotting
Written for the Tor/Forge July 2011 Newsletter Last year when Tor asked me for an essay to accompany the publication of The Legions of Fire, the first of my Books of the Elements fantasy series, I explained that riding a … Continue reading
Essays
Essays and Miscellaneous Writings updated March 2015 “Accidentally and By the Back Door” The New York Review of Science Fiction, 2004. 17:3(195): p. 17-18. ——— The Complete Hammer’s Slammers v.1. 2006, San Francisco CA: Night Shade Books. ——— The Complete … Continue reading
The Motorcycle Way to Complex Plotting
Written for the Tor/Forge May 2010 Newsletter THE MOTORCYCLE WAY TO COMPLEX PLOTTING Writers use various tools in their work. One of my tools is my motorcycle. Well, plural: my motorcycles. Bikers learn quickly that if they expect to … Continue reading
A Belated Thank-You
Dave’s Introduction to a volume of August Derleth short stories titled That is Not Dead: Black Magic and Occult Stories, volume 3 of 4 being produced by The August Derleth Society in conjunction with Arkham House Publishers, February 2009. A … Continue reading
The Forgotten Planet
Written August 2009 for posting at SF Signal’s web page MIND MELD: Books That Hold Special Places in Our Hearts and On Our Shelves THE FORGOTTEN PLANET When I was 13 in 1958, I was enrolled in the Teen-Age Bookclub … Continue reading
Cross the Stars
AFTERWORD: WHERE I GET MY IDEAS If you decide to write about far-famed Achilles, make him active, hot-tempered, inexorable, and fierce; let him deny that laws were made for him, let him think his sword rules all. –Horace, The Art … Continue reading
Vietnam
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition. And gentlemen in England now abed Shall … Continue reading
Five Firebases
Dave’s original introduction to the Hammer’s Slammers Role-Playing game rules for Mongoose. The version as printed drops the title and was edited for length. FIVE FIREBASES I was very pleased when I got the materials for the Hammer’s Slammers role-playing … Continue reading
Grimmer Than Hell
COMING HOME BY THE LONG WAY A few years ago I collected my humorous stories in All the Way to the Gallows.” In my introduction I admitted that I wasn’t best known for writing humor. This is what I’m best … Continue reading
Trip to England, April 2004 – Travel Narrative
Dave’s Trip to England April 2004 Accompanies Photos of England and Photos of Salute War Gaming April 18: We left for RDU Airport at 3 PM for a 6 PM flight. Better safe than sorry, and I was nervously reading … Continue reading
The Reaches: Igniting the Reaches, Through the Breach & Fireships
INTRODUCTION: THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY I’m a very organized writer–insanely organized, one might say, and we’ll get back to that in a moment. I take extensive notes before I start plotting, and I do very detailed plots (usually in … Continue reading