Secret Asia’s Blackest Heart

FROM THE PUBLISHER...
To many westerners, Asia might be considered an entirely different planet right here on earth. The ancient wisdom of its many cultures — some of it esoteric and fantastic — has been described by travelers like Alexandra David-Neel (Magic and Mystery in Tibet) and Madame Blavatsky (Isis Unveiled and The Secret Doctrine), who invited Westerners to imagine the existence of Asia’s deepest and most sinister secrets. Sax Rohmer, Talbot Mundy, John Taine, E. Hoffman Price, and so many others attest to this. Nor was H.P. Lovecraft immune to the lore of this fictive Orientalism. For example, the hidden Plateau of Leng was likely another name for Tibet. August Derleth set up his lemonade stand right next door, creating the shunned Plateau of Sung in Burma, where the terrible Tcho-Tcho People planned their mischief. Lin Carter joined the game, contributing his own Plateau of Tsang. There seemed to be room in the vastness of Asia for all of them and more. The title of the present volume is a phrase taken from one of Carter’s Mythos tales, and it nicely sums up the general theme.

Some of these stories are set here in the West, but they derive their horrors from imported Asian traditions. Others actually take place in Asia. All are fascinating and full of wonder and dread. Our gurus of gore and and lamas of lore include the likes of Ann K. Schwader, Stephen Mark Rainey, Don Webb, Michael Fantina, Joseph S. Pulver, Laurence J. Cornford, and Pierre Comtois.

Secret Asia’s Blackest Heart, edited by Robert M. Price and published by Sweden’s Timaios Press, features my story, “The War Lords of Leng.” Check it out at Amazon.com here.