#jim beard

Star Wars Tales #15 -March 2003- Dark Horse Comics

"Falling Star"

story: Jim Beard

pencils: Todd Nauck

inks: Jamie Mendoza

colors: Matthew Anthony

letters: Digital Chameleon

Steely Dan Keyboardist Jim Beard Dies at 63

- “The world has lost a real heavyweight,” Larry Goldings says

Keyboardist Jim Beard, a longtime member of Steely Dan’s touring band, has died at 63.

The news was first reported by Billboard magazine, which cited a Steely Dan rep who said Beard died March 2 “due to complications from a sudden illness.”

“He wrote, recorded, arranged and produced some absolutely stunning music, in its sophistication and beauty,” Larry Goldings said in eulogizing his fellow keyboardist.

“The world has lost a real heavyweight.”

Before joining Steely Dan in 2008, Beard toured and recorded with Pat Metheny, John McLaughlin, Wayne Shorter, Steve Vai, David Sanborn and others, while finding the time to work as a producer and record six solo LPs.

Beard was a “friend and mentor” to former Tedeschi Trucks Band bassist Tim Lefebvre, who had one word to describe the late musician: “Genius.”

“Jim was one of my all-time musical heroes,” said James Raymond, who frequently collaborated with his father, David Crosby.

“A wonderful pianist, synthesist, composer, arranger and producer. … Condolences and thoughts for his family”

Looks like I scored a first edition. The Casserole Cookbook, Jim (James) Beard, 1955

New Post has been published on https://esonetwork.com/the-nine-nation-book-one-the-sliding-world-book-review-by-ron-fortier/

'The Nine Nation Book One - The Sliding World' Book Review By Ron Fortier

THE NINE NATIONS Book One – The Sliding World By Jim Beard A Becky Books Production 192 pgs

The truth is we are not big fantasy readers. Oh sure, being involved with pulpdom, we’ve read our share of Robert E. Howard’s Conan and Charles Saunders’s African mythology books but not a whole lot more. In fact, we tend to avoid the genre these days in the place of masked avengers and noir mysteries. So why this one? Well, in all honesty, because the author is someone of unusual talent whose past efforts have always entertained us. We opted to give it a go.

At the start of the tale, we learn that things are rather bleak in the world of the Nine Nations. Apparently, the land mass upon which the varied countries are situated is actually sliding over the edge of a bottomless abyss. It’s as if Mother Nature has decided to destroy humankind and nothing can stop this slide to oblivion. Amidst this dismal predicament, something happens in the land of Complin that predicates an unusual quest. A notorious thief has stolen a pendant that is somehow mystically connected to the land and its retrieval becomes King Green’s singular goal. To that end, he assigns his General Ketch to put together a small group of warriors and take the Warrior’s Road through other nations on a quest to find the pendant.

Ketch chooses an odd assortment of male mercenaries and a group of fierce maiden Horse Wardens of Uzzlin.  As this is transpiring, the King orders his chief law enforcer, High Warrant Jon Torck to accompany a magician named Stoan and a separate mission. It is the King’s belief that the mage may be able to divine a way to end the slide and save civilization. Torck, who abhors any kind of idol worship and mumbo-jumbo, is reluctant but acquiesces due to his staunch loyalty. Their journey leads them to the mysterious uninhabited zone known as the Graylands where nothing lives; not animal, vegetation or human. There, Torck will meet his destiny head-on.

New Post has been published on https://esonetwork.com/sgt-janus-on-the-dark-trace-book-review-by-ron-fortier/

'Sgt. Janus On The Dark Trace' Book Review By Ron Fortier

SGT. JANUS ON THE DARK TRACK By Jim Beard Flinch Books 197 pgs

Six years after it was officially announced, book # 3 in the Sgt. Janus series by Jim Beard is at long last here. We are happy to report that the wait was a worthwhile one.

The adventure begins with Sgt. Janus and his companion, Mrs. Valerie Havelock-Mayer, on a train for home having just attended a conference for occult investigators.  Aboard the train is a politician named Clowers and his teenage daughter Laura. When Laura unexpectedly takes sick, Janus suspects she has been possessed by the ghost of another young woman whose own life ended tragically on that very train.

As his previous two books, Beard narrates the story from the first person accounts of the supporting players, never Sgt. Janus himself. Thus in the first half of the tale, Valerie’s diary entries share that task along with letters and notations by the other passengers including those written by the assistant conductor, Gabriel Butters. We soon learn that Butters has knowledge of an old African magic referred to as “the Dark Track.” Is the train itself haunted by the specter of a notorious outlaw and what was his connection to the ghost now controlling Laura?

To solve that mystery, Janus, Valerie and Butters decide to leave the train at a country station and proceed along the “Dark Track” on foot. This brings us to the book’s second half where becomes a whole lot more complex. The trio find themselves in what can only be described as an alternate timeline…as other people. If that wasn’t confusing enough, they are in Jordon, a small town dominated by the ironworks factory. It is the hometown of the dead girl; only here she is still among the living and the mystery of her actions and their repercussions to the events on the train only deepens.

Beard’s strength as a writer is his use of language to define his characters. It allows us an intimate glimpse as to their purposes and motivations. Sadly it is also his weakness as this attention to each individual flower fogs our view of the entire garden. Meaning quite simply that at the book’s conclusion neither the principle characters nor we readers are exactly sure what the actual resolution was. Much like H.P. Lovecraft, Beard is truly skilled at creating atmosphere and mood, which works beautifully in ghost stories but we would have appreciated a more defined conclusion. It is our one and only critique.