Arthan the bear man is back with another free story. Last time it was “Hunter’s Moon”. This time we have “Green With Envy” as the were-bear enters a forest where something very strange is going on. He finds dead men hanging in the trees, the flesh falling off their skeletons. And who is behind it…a young girl?
This tale is the second last in the upcoming collection The Beacon House and Other Stories out in about a week. The book is the fifth about Arthan following the four novels. The collection has six tales including the long novella “Descent”. It’s 60,000 words about the adventures of Arthan as a young man, recently released from his training at the Mountain. And boy, does he have adventures!
From the Introduction:
For those in the know, the Arthan the bear man series (also known as The Bearshirt Series) is four novels long and counting. So why a collection of short stories? I suppose I could have used these different ideas within novels but I wanted to write about Arthan’s early years. In the novel series, he is already a man in his thirties (which for a were-bear is old enough!) What was his life like before the armies of bees and war with the werewolves?
There were a couple of other considerations. The first is the book called The Jungle Tales of Tarzan (1919) by Edgar Rice Burroughs. That collection of stories was singularly responsible for my entire career as a writer. If I hadn’t encountered it, with its wonderful Neal Adams cover back in mid-1970s, I don’t think I would have been a writer. And quite possibly a reader either. It was the gateway and it was a story collection. So why not? Why shouldn’t Arthan have one, too?
Certainly The Jungle Tales of Tarzan inspired me as a young reader but I don’t think these stories borrow from old Edgar Rice Burroughs much except for a love of adventure. I’ve talked about this before: Arthan was originally conceived as Conan meets Beorn from The Hobbit, but it has grown into its own thing pretty fast. The world of the weres has its own culture and Sword & Sorcery fun. As this story shows. I hope you enjoy it. — GW
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