Weird Tales Books-The Spell of Seven

The Spell of Seven edited by L. Sprague de Camp

SEVEN

• heroes in hot water
• malicious magicians
• trials by terror
• superb stories of swords and sorcery

That's the blurb inside the front cover of The Spell of Seven, L. Sprague de Camp's 1965 companion volume to Swords & Sorcery. The format was the same as before: cover art and interior art by Virgil Finlay, introductions to the book and to each story by de Camp, and a collection of tales from Weird Tales and other magazines, all in the genre of heroic fantasy. Dunsany, Howard, Smith, and Leiber are here, but so are then-younger writers Jack Vance and Michael Moorcock. There are seven stories in all, only two of which originally appeared in Weird Tales.

The Spell of Seven edited by L. Sprague de Camp

(Pyramid Books, 1965, 192 pp.)

"Introduction: Wizards and Warriors" by L. Sprague de Camp

"Bazaar of the Bizarre" by Fritz Leiber (Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, Aug. 1963)

"The Dark Eidolon" by Clark Ashton Smith (Weird Tales, Jan. 1935)

"The Hoard of the Gibbelins" by Lord Dunsany (The Sketch, date unknown; The Book of Wonder, 1912)

"The Hungry Hercynian" by L. Sprague de Camp (Universe Science Fiction, Dec. 1953)

"Kings in Darkness" by Michael Moorcock (Science Fantasy No. 54, 1962)

"Mazirian the Magician" by Jack Vance (The Dying Earth, 1950)

"Shadows in Zamboula" by Robert E. Howard (Weird Tales, Nov. 1935)

The Spell of Seven (Pyramid Books R-1192). Cover art by Virgil Finlay.

Text copyright 2012, 2023 Terence E. Hanley