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Can you talk a little bit about your personal background, and how you got into writing?

I am the youngest of five children. By the time I grew up, most of them had already moved on to their adult lives. We lived in a brand-new housing development so there weren’t many kids. Consequently, I turned to reading for entertainment. I read anything and everything I could get my hands on … to my occasional detriment. Eventually I was so comfortable with the written word and storytelling that becoming a writer was a natural progression I didn’t even need to think about.

What exactly is the whole Bad Ass Faeries phenomenon, and how did it come about?

This series is our attempt to de-Disneyfy the faerie. Basically the concept came out of a chance encounter with an artist and a failed author event. I met Ruth Lampi at Albacon, where she showed me her sketches for warrior faeries. They were just pencil drawings, many of them on lined paper, but they were really good. I ended up commissioning Ruth to work on a number of projects with me. We had a local event at a friend’s store and the timing was bad. It conflicted with some other event going on and not many people showed up. We sat there for most of the day entertaining each other. During the conversation the question came up of how we met. That topic lead to speculating about the sad state of faeries in fiction, which lead to an anthology proposal of tough faeries that were more in line with the actual legends. From that, Bad-Ass Faeries was born!

Do you feel you’re correcting some mistaken perceptions people have about faerie lore? And could you talk a little bit about that lore?

Oh, most definitely! Up until very recently … say the last ten years, faeries had for the most part been pacified by popular media. Not by everyone, but by the majority. See, in traditional faerie lore and legend the fae were mischievous, malevolent, or warriors. Very few were kind or sweet. They were known for stealing children and tormenting livestock, for tricking travelers and murderous deeds. Yes, a few did helpful things, but the fae were to be respected because you never knew which way things would go. Literature and the media had for the most part lost respect for them.

What’s the reaction been to the Bad Ass Faeries books?

Oh my … talk about can-of-worms. They either love it or hate it … I get broad smiles or disapproving frowns, but seldom anything in between. It is by far our best-selling anthology to date, with thousands of copies sold just in the first year. It is the first book of mine that has a public awareness all its own.

In recent years, it seems fairies have become kind of a hot topic. There are festivals and even magazines devoted to them, and they’re popping up all over the place in speculative fiction. Do you think there’s any particular reason for this renewed interest?

Well, all things go in cycles and I think this just the faerie cycle. The primary genre characters never do go away, really, but the audience gets tired of it and moves to the next one in a perpetual circuit. The same goes with vampires and shapeshifters and zombies … anything with a cult following eventually gets another shot at the spotlight. Besides, people are rediscovering their sense of magic and wonder, and where best to turn than to the fae?

I know that some fairy aficionados prefer their wee folk on the benign and cuddly side. Has the Bad Ass series drawn any appalled responses from that crowd?

You know, I get more negative comments about it being too tame. Of course, I already mentioned those disapproving looks we get from time to time strictly in reaction to the title. But for the most part people either pick it up because it’s fun, or because it promises something they are looking for, so there has been a lot more positive response. Even the children’s education director at my church just thought it was funny, more than anything else.

When you’re writing about the nature and capabilities of the fairies, about how much of that is invention on your part, vs. elements lifted directly from the folklore?

For me it depends on the series. A lot of my fiction deal with the faerie folk. The Eternal Cycle series, which are my Irish novels, stick pretty close to the legends, with the inventiveness coming in just to fill in the gaps left by lost knowledge since the Celts had an oral tradition. On the other hand, my biker faerie novels, the Halfling’s Court and the Redcaps’ Queen, based on my short stories in the Bad-Ass Faeries series, are a bit more inventive since I’m not drawing on any particular legends there. Of course, I do use details from the myth and legend when I mention something specific, like Avalon. With everything I write, though, I tend to extrapolate from the information available and get creative from there. You would be surprised how often I find research later that substantiates things I thought I made up!

What are some of the things you’ve done to market your books?

Well, for the Bad-Ass Faeries anthologies specifically I commissioned faerie themed art for raffles I held at the launch party for each book. I also made faerie wings by hand for my street team to wear as they passed out flyers and tons of pixy styx. Eventually I created a dedicated website and a blog specific to the series and grab every promotional opportunity I could get. In fact, for about the last five years I’ve volunteered as a story teller at the Maryland Faerie Festival and I was a part of the very first Faeriecon, Faerieworlds annual East Coast convention.

Do you have any upcoming projects you’d like to discuss?

Dark Quest Books just released The Redcaps’ Queen, the second of my Bad-Ass Faerie Tale novels, as well as Three Chords of Chaos, by James Chambers, the third book in the series that originated from stories that appeared in the Bad-Ass Faeries anthologies. Speaking of which, in the beginning of June we will resume production on the fourth Bad-Ass Faeries anthology, titled It’s Elemental, where the theme is all faeries affiliated with one of the five elements: Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Spirit. That should be out sometime in 2014.

The book has a chapter on the pulp magazines from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which mentions “Doc Savage.” The Doc Savage adventures were really popular back in the heyday of pulp. They featured the titular square-jawed hero who traveled the world with a cadre of brainy tough guys, putting a stop to various evil-doers.

The author, “Kenneth Robeson,” was actually a rotating stable of writers. I read a few when I was a kid. They weren’t great in retrospect, in the manner of other pulp material from writers such as H.P. Lovecraft or Ray Bradbury. But they were a fun read. And to be fair, that’s no more and no less than what they aspired to.

But the books did have a lasting impact on me as a reader, in the form of one important lesson.

See, when I was about 13, I was reading one called The Sargasso Ogre. It features a scene where Doc Savage is interrogating a couple of criminals.

At one point, one of them defiantly answers Doc Savage’s questions with “Phooey on you!”
As a kid, I thought that was hilarious. This is a dangerous criminal. A very bad man, the story makes clear. And he says “phooey on you?”

When I thought about it at greater length, though, I realized what was really going on. The words “phooey on you” might as well have an asterisk indicating a footnote from the author. And that footnote would read as follows:

“Look. Both you and I know that the guy didn’t really say ‘phooey on you.’ What he said was ‘fuck you.’ But I’m writing this in 1933, and there’s no way in hell I’d get away with writing that. So I’m going to ask you, the reader, to use a little effort and fill in what he actually said in your mind, OK?”

That moment of realization comes back to me whenever I’m reading a book from a bygone era, and the writer has to obliquely hint at what’s going on.

I’m not one of these people who subscribes to the idea that graphically presenting something is akin to bad writing. I find that attitude naïve and a bit childish. Good writing is good writing, whether a faithful film adaptation would merit a rating of G or NC-17. And if the material calls for a lot of F-bombs, by all means get ‘em in there.

Still, there’s something impressive about reading – or watching, in the form of screenplays – writers from the past managing to convey through subtle suggestion what they can’t state overtly.

Case in point. I’m in the process of reading Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, published in 1898, for the first time. (SPOILER ALERT!) And the scene where Mrs. Grose reveals Quint’s nature as a sexual predator and pedophile is all the more disturbing for her unwillingness – and James’ inability, given the time he was writing – to state it overtly.

It’s all a bit more subtle than “phooey on you” in lieu of … you know. Still, I thank whichever incarnation of Kenneth Robeson penned “The Sargasso Ogre” for giving me that early lesson in reading between the lines.

Just goes to show that you can glean insights into literary interpretation from just about any source. Don’t agree with me? Go phooey yourself.

In 1999, with far more advanced technology and a shit-ton more money at their disposal, the special effects team for “The Haunting” created a CGI ghost. And it looked like this:

Any questions?

Dope Thief

Except it’s really not.

I mean, yeah, that’s the basic plot. But the book is really about how our past has a way of haunting us at every turn, and our attempts to escape from that. It’s also about the question of whether we can shed our family history. And whether — for all the emotional baggage and misery it can bring us — we’d really want to.

The protagonist, Ray, and his partner are a couple of bottom feeders in a criminal community extending into Southeastern Pennsylvania and South Jersey. They make their living disguising themselves as DEA agents, ripping off small-time drug dealers, and making off with their money and dope.

In a clever twist, they’re able to get away with it because they provide a kind of service to the larger operations — getting rid of small-time dealers who might eat into profits.

Yet Ray isn’t a violent man. Or a bad guy, for that matter. He had an alcoholic father and a troubled youth that included some jail time. He just kind of went along with where his life was taking him, much the way another young man might go the college-and-career route without even considering other options. For him, the whole theft operation represents the path of least resistance — a chance to get money for a minimum of effort.

But he’s not getting any younger, and knows he can’t keep it up forever. Inevitably, that wake-up call comes when a job goes bad, people get killed, and he and his partner end up the unwilling possessors of some New England bikers’ money.

It starts out in pure thriller territory. An initial car chase from the scene of the original botched operation is particularly suspenseful.

From there, the story takes some unexpected directions. And I’m not talking about plot twists — though there are a few of those — so much as emphasis and pacing.

Tafoya doesn’t let up on the suspense. But for stretches, the central plot fades into the background as Ray comes to grips with the chain of circumstances that led him into this predicament. Sure, he knows he’s made some bad decisions. But he finds himself facing the question of whether his life experiences left him equipped to make any better ones.

More importantly, does he have it within himself to rise above those experiences and decisions, and make something better of his life?

Tafoya addresses those questions in a surprising extended coda, where minor characters and circumstances that would merely serve as color in another crime thriller turn out to be vitally important.

Crime thrillers often get criticized for piling on the slam-bang action, at the expense of characterization and deeper insights. With Dope Thief, fortunately, it’s not an either/or proposition.

Remember the 1979 Walter Hill film “The Warriors?” The one about all the street gangs? Yeah. Well, in my misspent youth, I was a member of the Hi Hats. The street gang that dressed up like mimes. If you watch this trailer, you can catch us at the 34-second mark.

Look, I know what you’re thinking. Whenever anybody finds out about this element of my past, they ask the same questions. “Mimes? You were trying to come up with a concept for your street gang and you went with freakin MIMES? Was, like, every other conceivable possibility in the entire world already taken or something?”

The answer is … I genuinely don’t know. Look, this was the 1970s. There was a lot of pot around, and people didn’t always make the most rational decisions. I think when we were just sitting around and brainstorming ideas, somebody might have thrown out the word “Mayans” and it got misheard. Then it just turned into one of those decision-by-committee-that-takes-on-a-life-of-its-own type of deals. Next thing you know, we’re walking around the streets dressed like mimes.

And no, I’m not going to pretend that it’s easy to establish a reputation as badasses under those circumstances. In fact, there was really only one other gang that found us intimidating. They were called the Interpretive Dancing Needlepoint Enthusiasts. For a while, we used to go into their neighborhood and pick on them, just to feel better about ourselves. Then their parents got wind of it. They called our parents, and … well … that was the end of that.

It was back to hanging out and listening to the other gangs laugh at us. Then at night we’d go home, wash off the greasepaint and cry ourselves to sleep.

So I don’t read a lot of poetry – a literary form than doesn’t lend itself to depictions of shootouts or kung fu fights. That might change, though, since I’ve discovered a wonderful poet named Linda Addison.

I recently read a volume of her poetry called Being Full of Light, Insubstantial. When the very title of the poetry collection is gorgeous, I figure that’s a good sign.

She was a recent guest speaker at a group I belong to called the Garden State Speculative Fiction Writers, which is made up of writers of lots of different genres, but tends to skew toward horror and science fiction. (Great group, by the way. If you’re a writer anywhere in the vicinity of New Jersey, you ought to consider joining.)

I missed that meeting, unfortunately, because of a computer-related crisis. But I met the group for their customary lunch afterward, and had a chance to talk to Ms. Addison.

Man! Describing her as “charming” doesn’t do her justice. VERY cool person.

I was blown away when I found out the extent of her genre fiction creds. Her first poem was published in the seminal “Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine,” and her poetry’s won not one but three Bram Stoker Awards.

And I’ll admit, Philistine that I am, to being a little bit puzzled as to how poetry could be considered genre fiction. Horror poetry? How does that work?

But then I started thinking about it. How about Charles Baudelaire? How about Edgar Allan Poe? How about “The Erl King” by Goethe? Couldn’t they all be considered “horror poetry?” Hell, if I really dove into it, I could probably come up with a list a mile long.

Anyway, keep in mind that the poetry I’m describing is from “Being Full of Light, Insubstantial.” I haven’t read her other stuff (yet).

Don’t get the wrong idea when I describe the poetry as genre-based. We’re not talking rhyming tributes to the Starship Enterprise or Freddie Krueger.

The poetry is more impressionistic, invoking a mood, a feeling, than any kind of concrete imagery or narrative.

I recently interviewed a former small press publisher who won a World Fantasy Award a while back. I asked him what he thought made for good speculative fiction. His answer was simple: “a sense of wonder.”

And that’s what comes through in “Being Full of Light, Insubstantial.”

When I was there in the diner, I leafed through the book and my eye settled on one of the poems. It was only six lines long. I’m no poet myself, so I doubt I’ll be able to do it justice. But to me, this is what the effect was like.

Imagine you’re walking down a city street, when you’re in that transition phase as evening’s giving way to night. And out of the corner of your eye, you glimpse two shadowy figures. You catch a snatch of whispered conversation – one that hints at dark subcultures and sinister doings on the periphery of the civilized world you inhabit. Things you’ll never see directly, but whose presence you might sense obliquely in the occasional darting shadow or newspaper headline about a mysterious disappearance.

Then you look and the two figures aren’t there. But you never feel quite as secure in your world again.

None of this was stated overtly. It was just the sensation I got reading it. Conveyed in six lines. Not bad, huh?

Anyway, check out Ms. Addison’s Website here. And be sure to check out her books. Even if you’re a little leery of poetry, like me. Or rather – like I used to be.

Writer Jon Gibbs recently contributed a piece that I think is worth reading for any aspiring writer. He gave me permission to repost it here. And once you finish reading this post, be sure to check out his Website and his blog, both of which have a lot of informative and entertaining stuff.

So take it away Jon …

Give Yourself Permission to Fail

by Jon Gibbs

For many writers, rejections are a bit like a trips to the dentist. We’ll do almost anything to avoid them, rather than risk getting bad news.

You can understand someone being afraid of dentists (I know I am), but why fear rejection? What’s so terrible about someone passing up the chance to publish your work?

I think it’s partly because, no matter how much we like to pretend we don’t care, it hurts to have a story turned down.

And so it should. If you don’t care if your story gets accepted, why submit it there in the first place?

But I believe there’s more to it than worrying about the sting of being told ‘No thank you’ by someone you’ve probably never met.

A rejection, especially when we’re starting out, is a hammer blow to our self-confidence. The bad news for would-be writers is that you’re going to get rejected, probably quite a lot. If getting published is important to you, those rejections are going to hurt.

The good news is that it gets easier. The more knocks you take, the tougher you’ll get, and if you make the effort to improve your craft, if you’re willing to recognize your mistakes and learn from them there’s a good chance that you will get published.

So go on, give yourself permission to fail. Take a deep breath and pitch that story.
One day, your dream will thank you.

Born in England, Jon Gibbs now lives in New Jersey, where he is the founder of The New Jersey Authors’ Network (www.njauthorsnetwork.com) and FindAWritingGroup.com, Jon’s middle grade fantasy, “Fur-Face” (Echelon Press), was nominated for a Crystal Kite Award. The sequel, “Barnum’s Revenge,” is scheduled for release in February, 2013.

Jon has a website: www.acatofninetales.com and a blog: http://jongibbs.livejournal.com. When he’s not chasing around after his three children, he can usually be found hunched over the computer in his basement office. One day he hopes to figure out how to switch it on.

You might also encounter The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys.

But seriously, folks. The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys are Brian Koscienski and Chris Pisano. I’ve run into them at a few events, along with their project manager and handler Christine Czachur.

They, along with editor and writer Jeff Young, comprise Fortress Publishing. I’ve become a big fan of their magazines “Trail of Indiscretion” (science fiction, fantasy, and horror) and “Cemetery Moon” (horror).

I also picked up their “Scary Tales of Scariness,” in which Brian and Chris pit themselves against a variety of adversaries, including Cthulu, zombies, vampires, and The Potato People (don’t ask). It’s really funny.

They’ve got a bunch more publications, including a sequel to “Scary Tales of Scariness,” that you can check out at their Website here.

Of course, the Federal Bureau of Nickname Registration would have long-since revoked their license to call themselves “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys” if they weren’t also a fun group.

So in the following interview, I try to convey the magic. The madness. The raw, unbridled sensuality that is … The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys experience. Read on.

Can you explain a little about what Fortress Publishing is? Where are you based? How long have you been around? What are some of the things you put out?

PISANO: Well, Fortress is more a state of mind, being one with the universe around us….
KOSCIENSKI: Dude.
PISANO: Sorry.
KOSCIENSKI: As writers, Chris and I started collaborating on different ideas and stories and novels. We realized that we had quite a bit going on, so we decided to protect our intellectual property…
PISANO: Intellectual??
KOSCIENSKI: … our intangible assets by forming a corporation. We the decided that since we have a corporation, why not use it to try to understand more about the industry that we’re trying to break into. So, a little over 8 years ago, Fortress Publishing, Inc. was born.
PISANO: We started off publishing a graphic novel and a few chapbooks, but now we’re focused on
publishing magazines and anthologies.

How does the division of labor work between Brian, Chris and Christine? Is there anyone else who should be getting a shout-out?

KOSCIENSKI: Well, Chris and I are the idea men.
PISANO: The visionaries.
KOSCIENSKI: The cash cows.
PISANO: The visionaries.
CHRISTINE: **ah-hem**
KOSCIENSKI: Okay, Chris and I are the writers.
PISANO: And editors of our magazines. I edit “Cemetery Moon” and he edits “The Realm Beyond”.
KOSCIENSKI: Christine is our lovely and freakishly intelligent Project Manager.
PISANO: And Chief Science Officer
KOSCIENSKI: And Booth Babe.
PISANO: And Mayhem Coordinator.
KOSCIENSKI: And pimp.
CHRISTINE: The sad thing is my business card actually does say most of those titles. And don’t forget Jeff.
BK & PISANO: Jeff who?
CHRISTINE: Jeff. Jeff Young. Jeff Young the editor for “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys” series of books. Jeff Young the antagonist in many of the stories found in “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys” series of books.
KOSCIENSKI: We know. We were just testing you.
PISANO: We have to keep you on your toes.
CHRISTINE: **sigh**

Is there an origin story behind the Drunken Comic Book Monkeys?

KOSCIENSKI: There is, and it’s pretty interesting, too.
PISANO: No. No, it’s not.
KOSCIENSKI: Okay, the way I tell the origin story is interesting.
PISANO: No. No, it’s not.
KOSCIENSKI: Sure it is! My version has robots and ninjas!
PISANO: No. No, it doesn’t.
CHRISTINE: Girls, you’re both pretty, now shut up. Tom, as the way I’ve heard it – ad nauseum — the name came about early in their writing career. As they were looking for resources on how to start a small business, specifically a micro-press publishing company, they couldn’t find much info. So, they started writing about it in a series of articles called “The Journey”. A few websites and online magazines published them and the boys started doing more articles about comics and the world of entertainment as well as reviews. As more websites started to syndicate them, they realized they needed a funny name. Once they hit the bottom of their third pitcher, they discovered “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys.”
KOSCIENSKI: Pssssst. Don’t forget to mention the impending blog.
CHRISTINE: Yes, Tom, once I set up a blog for these knuckleheads, they will be reposting “The Journey”.

Are there any forthcoming projects from Fortress Publishing of which we should be aware (or
forewarned)?

PISANO: Always! We’re like rabid wolverines!
KOSCIENSKI: You can’t stop us, you can only hope to contain us!
CHRISTINE: **sigh**
PISANO: Up next is an anthology called “TV Gods”.
KOSCIENSKI: The writers are taking their favorite mythology and mashing it together with their favorite TV show.
CHRISTINE: Due out May 2014.
PISANO: And we’re working on the next book in “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys” series called “Fantastical Tales of Fantasy.”
KOSCIENSKI: Where Chris and I are the characters in Fantasy stories.
CHRISTINE: We’re aiming for the end of the year.
PISANO: And, of course, we recently had our debut novel released.
KOSCIENSKI: It’s a little like the TV show “Heroes”, except much grittier.
CHRISTINE: It’s called “The Shattered Visage Lies” and it’s published by Post Mortem Press.

How did the “Scary Tales of Scariness” project come about? Was there alcohol involved? Because I find that highly unlikely.

KOSCIENSKI: Well, this may shock you, but the idea did come about one time Chris and I were at Hooters.
PISANO: Well into a second or fourth or sixth pitcher of beer.
KOSCIENSKI: We were talking about zombie stories. I hate them; Chris loves them.
PISANO: So, I was taunting him by saying I was going to write a zombie story with us in it.
KOSCIENSKI: I then said I was gonna get revenge by writing a vampire story with us in it.
PISANO: Then we decided that would be a really fun book to write.
KOSCIENSKI: And hopefully read.
PISANO: We came up with all kinds of creatures to fight and almost as quickly came up with loose story ideas.
KOSCIENSKI: The funniest one was “The Drunken Comic Book Monkeys vs. Trick or Treat”.
PISANO: I fell off my stool form laughing so hard.
KOSCIENSKI: At the time, we had no idea what it was going to be about.
PISANO: “Scary Tales of Scariness” was the first of the series. It sold pretty well at conventions, so we decided to do “Sciencey Tales of Science Fiction” as a sequel.
CHRISTINE: Both are available at our website, or any online bookstore, or any brick-n-mortar bookstore by request.

The publishing industry — really, the very concept of “publishing” — seems to be changing at lightning speed these days. What do you do to keep up?

KOSCIENSKI: Run to Christine.
PISANO: Cry to Christine.
KOSCIENSKI: Ask Christine for help.
PISANO: Beg Christine for help.
BK & PISANO: CHRISTINE!!!
CHRISTINE: **sigh** Yes, Tom, one of my official titles is Chief Science Officer, which is they’re not so clever way of telling me I’m in charge of keeping up with the technologies. Since eBooks are the latest way for writers and publishers to release their works, I need keep myself – and The Monkeys – abreast of the situations.
KOSCIENSKI: She said, “a breast.”
PISANO: Totally.
CHRISTINE: **sigh** Anyway, technology is not only is changing the world of publishing, but also the world of marketing and advertising as well. And since these two can’t operate any technology more complex than a beer bottle opener, it’s up to me to convert their books to eBooks, usually through smashwords.com, and make updates to the Fortress Publishing, Inc. Facebook page, and contact book stores.

If you could pick any monster for the Drunken Comic Book Monkeys to square off against that they haven’t faced yet, which one would it be?

KOSCIENSKI: Existential ennui.
PISANO: Potatoes.
KOSCIENSKI: We already fought potatoes!
PISANO: I wanna fight them again!
CHRISTINE: Is laryngitis an option?

Christine … how do you stand it?

CHRISTINE: Oh, Tom … I drink … heavily … a lot ….

See, this was about 1979, and vampires were still pretty freakin awesome. Animated corpses with diabolical powers clawing their way out of their graves, hell-bent on tearing open some throats? Come on. What’s in that scenario for a 12-year-old boy not to love?

Little did I know that pop culture vampires had already begun their steady decline into wussification (which I’ve previously touched on here).

Anne Rice — a guilty pleasure of mine, I must admit — painted them as a bunch of preening pretty-boys in “Interview With the Vampire,” published three years earlier. In subsequent decades, they would increasingly become the domain of black-lipstick-wearing goth types.

Then the “Twilight” series came along. And in retrospect, we might as well have dubbed ourselves the “Twinkly Happy Prancing Little Unicorn Patrol.”

But vampires aren’t the only folkloric creatures to make a pop culture transformation from scary and dangerous to twee and sparkly. In a previous generation, the same thing happened to fairies.

Yes, fairies. As in Tinker Bell. As in the gay slur referencing the (offensive, ignorant and untrue) stereotype of gay men as a bunch of mincing weaklings. As in the benign, childlike beings that have graced countless pieces of eye-searingly tacky home décor. Those things.

They used to be badass.

I don’t need to get deep into the particulars of fairy folklore here. I’m no expert anyway.

But I understand there are a lot of different interpretations of the nature and origin of fairy folklore. One school of thought has it that fairies started as pagan deities, repurposed by later Christians. Another that the stories originated as surviving legends of conquered peoples banished to the woods and gone guerilla.

As I said, lots of variations. But the overarching theme is that they’re mysterious beings lurking beyond human settlements, more often than not waiting for an opportunity to fuck you up.

They tended to function as a metaphorical manifestation of nature, at a time when people generally regarded the natural world as more of a threat than a resource to be protected. And their appearance in folklore frequently coincided with sex, insanity or death.

By the Victorian Era, with the Industrial Revolution in full swing, a lot of people were buffered from nature — for better and for worse. Amid a wave of nostalgia for the pastoral life, the popular depiction of fairies changed from mysterious and menacing to benevolent and cute.

That was when J.M. Barrie wrote in Peter Pan: “When the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies.”

As origin stories go, that’s quite a departure from some wild-eyed Pict skulking through the woods with a flint knife clenched in his teeth.

Wow. It just struck me that I’m taking a long goddamn time to mention the book that’s supposedly the basis of this review — The Halfling’s Court, by Danielle Ackley-McPhail.

The Halfling’s Court is among a series of anthologies and novels grouped under the rubric “Bad-Ass Faeries.” You can see more about them here.

Overall, these books represent an admirable attempt to wrench fairy stories back to their origin as … well … badass.

The Halfling’s Court is the first of those books I’ve read, though I doubt it will be the last. It was a hoot!

I genuinely don’t know if the books in the series are all part of a unified story or not. The dustjacket of The Halfling’s Court says it’s based on a couple of stories from a previous Bad-Ass Faeries anthology. Sometimes I felt a bit lost as the story referenced characters and events from past stories. But that didn’t detract from my enjoyment.

The “halfling” in question is a half-fairy, half-human. He’s estranged from the fairy kingdom and rules his own mini-kingdom — the “court” in the title. Too precious by half, you say? Bear with me.

The “court” is actually a biker bar, where he presides over a Harley-riding motorcycle club. Then a fairy king regards him as a threat and comes gunning for him. All manner of bad assery ensues.

Here’s the thing, though. From that description, you might get the idea that this is a gimmicky, jokey book, based entirely on the seeming incongruity of fairy bikers.

Ackley-McPhail is clearly aware of this seeming incongruity, and the book has its humorous elements. But this isn’t some tongue-in-cheek goof.

The characters are genuine and complex enough to be engaging, which draws you into the story. You actually care about what happens to them. The fight scenes, which employ magic, are exciting and surreal.

And though you root for the biker club, Ackley McPhail doesn’t present this as some simplistic dark-vs.-light fable. The bikers are violent, unpredictable and dangerous. They’re just a bit more sympathetic than the other guys.

So if you’re interested in the kind of fairies who are more likely to knock your teeth down your throat than to take them from under your pillow and leave a quarter, check out The Halfling’s Court. It’s a fun read.