GEMMELL, David A.

(1948-)

   UK journalist and then full-time author, primarily of HEROIC FANTASY. His first FANTASY series, The Drenai Saga, consists of Legend (1984; vt Against the Horde 1988 US), The King Beyond the Gate (1985), Waylander (1986),Quest for Lost Heroes (1990), Waylander II: In the Realm of the Wolf (1992) and The First Chronicles of Druss the Legend (coll 1993), the first 3 being collected, along with an additional story, as TheDrenai Tales (omni 1991). DAG's inclusion in this volume is largely due to his second series, the Sipstrassi novels, which are SCIENCE FANTASY: Wolf in Shadow (1987; vt The Jerusalem Man 1988 US), Ghost King (1988), Last Sword of Power (1988) and The Last Guardian (1989), all 4 being assembledas Stones of Power: The Sipstrassi Omnibus (omni 1992). The components of the series are linked by the Sipstrassi stones of healing and/or destruction, whose source is ATLANTIS. The middle two volumes, which have Arthurian resonances, are set in Britain during and after the Romanoccupation, but the framing works are set in a post- HOLOCAUST venue 300 years after Earth's axis has been tilted by an Immanuel VELIKOVSKY-style DISASTER; echoes of Erich VON DANIKEN's PSEUDO-SCIENCE books also abound.The Dying Earth setting (FAR FUTURE) is well achieved; there is TIME TRAVEL between Atlantis and its future; ESP, GENETIC ENGINEERING and IMMORTALITY are other themes.DAG's subsequent works have been: Knights of Dark Renown (1989), featuring PARALLEL WORLDS; the Macedon sequence of historical fantasies set in an ALTERNATE-WORLD Greece at the time of Alexander, to date comprising Lion of Macedon (1990) and Dark Prince(1991), in the second of which Aristotle (who else?) knows the secret of portals through time and space that lead to parallel worlds; Morningstar (1992), which introduces a bard and an ambiguous hero faced withnecromancy and Vampyre Kings; and Bloodstone (1994). DAG is accomplished and tough-minded, and interestingly varies (but not too much) stereotypical generic situations.

   PN

   See also: HISTORY OF SF; MAGIC.