Black Sun

I recently finished reading Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke. I've been putting reading this book off for a couple of years, I honestly was out-Nazi'ed out a few years back and didn't want to touch it, even though I found The Occult Roots of Nazism a very informative read. I won't claim that Black Sun was a fun read, but it was a good read. Theres a lot of information here, I learned much about Evola and Savitri Dev and Miguel Serrano and more about Christian Identity that I probably wanted to. These people are scary, and like everything else that gives me nightmares I turn it into gaming. In this case I have one player whose 1937 incarnation was a fascist organizer and I finally got around to reading this book for ideas. Since the same player has invested heavily in mystery cult stuff and there is a corrupted branch of said mystery cult, this book seemed a natural read, and it has certainly given me some ideas.

I recommend this book on two fronts. The first is to attempt to gather information on the persistent dark side of our humanity that, for whatever reason, chooses to destroy what it dislikes rather than attempt to resolve the differences. The second is for gamers who want to move beyond cardboard pulp Nazi villains. I wish I had read this book a few years back when I was running Pantellos for that very reason.

Fool Moon

Because a lot of people I respect said reading Butcher was not as bad as I might have made it, and because I had nothing better to do at yesterdays company picnic I read Fool Moon which I found, as second novels usually are, much weaker and less enjoyable than the first. Though I must give him credit for dealing with the variety of European werewolf stories in a nice and rather taxonomic way. And then introducing just about every single one of them in the story.