Dave Drake was my friend, and my colleague, for more than three decades. He passed away peacefully this weekend, on Sunday, in fact. If he were here, I’d be tempted to tell him that he took that whole “day of rest” thing a little too far. . . .  He was appreciative of gallows humor; we published two volumes of his humorous stories at Baen starting with All the Way to the Gallows. Of course, that wasn’t what he was best known for. The modern subgenre of military science fiction accreted around the core of Drake’s Hammer’s Slammers stories, those that Jim Baen first published in Galaxy magazine, and then at Ace, with an introduction by Jerry Pournelle. Jim continued to publish Dave everywhere he went: first Ace, then Tor, then Baen. The two of them made a great team.

I enjoyed everything Dave wrote, from his chatty reports on foreign travels, to his thoughtful Christmas cards. Still, I had my favorites among his literary works. The standalone novel Starliner was one of them, pure adventure science fiction and as light and carefree as Dave ever got. Redliners, another; the quintessential volume of military SF, and Dave in a very different mode. If you want to read one book to get a feel for his work, this is it. I loved the RCN series, buddy stories loosely inspired by Jim Baen’s favorite Napoleonic naval novels by Patrick O’Brien, written after Redliners, and thus after some demons had been, if not laid to rest, at least come to terms with. His Old Nathan fantasy stories, so evocative of the place he’d come to live, and inspired by his friend Manly Wade Wellman’s Silver John stories. The Lord of the Isles series with the great brother and sister team of Cashel and Ilna. His two Belisarius-inspired series with both S.M. Stirling and Eric Flint (and later Tony Daniel). The Lacey SF stories. The Vettius Roman fantasy stories. From his start writing horror and dark fantasy short stories, to the last far-future Arthurian novels of The Spark, The Storm and The Serpent, he remained a fascinating storyteller.

He was an incredibly talented writer, and game for anything. He considered himself a craftsman, and consistently downplayed his talents and contributions, but they were many and his works will last—they already have. But not the least of his contributions to the field was his generosity to his fellow writers—and editors, like me--through collaborations, short stories in anthologies, and time spent sharing his knowledge of the field. And he always delivered.

Dave was a collector and fan of pulp magazines, and he helped keep the pulps alive not only with his own small press with his friend Karl Edward Wagner, Carcosa, but also through his advocacy of such stories with Jim Baen. So, too, Rudyard Kipling, which resulted in two Kipling-centric volumes. And he translated Latin for fun (for examples of which, see his website: https://david-drake.com/).

He was a man of honor, and sometimes that made him prickly. But he was also decent and kind down to his bones, and you will see many, many examples of this in the testimonies pouring forth on social media. But I am very glad that his good friend Mark Van Name made sure that he understood he was appreciated before he died when he put together the festschrift Onward, Drake! https://www.baen.com/onward-drake.html. He appeared many times on the Baen Free Radio Hour podcast, as an interviewee, and even reading poetry, and we’ll do a roundtable retrospective of his career in January.

More can and will undoubtedly be written about Dave, but I’ll close this short appreciation of him and his life with words he often used to end telephone conversations: Go do good things!

We lost David Drake on December 10, 2023. He was a giant in the genre and a friend to Baen Books, and he will be missed. Drake wrote some of the most influential fiction in the genre and touched the lives of many readers and writers. To celebrate his legacy we’re offering discounts on some key Drake titles from his backlist along with discounts of works that show the mark of his influence.

D.J. Butler is the author of the Witchy War series, the Cunning Man series (with Aaron Michael Ritchey), Abbott in Darkness, and many other novels and stories. “One Man's Rescue” takes place in his Indrajit & Fix series, which includes In The Palace of Shadow and Joy and Between Princesses & Other Jobs.

One Man's Rescue

D.J. Butler

The scab-eyed Gund Yazzo leaned forward across the squat planks of the tavern table. He hulked over Indrajit and Fix, blocking the light from the doorway with his massive frame, wrapped in gray wool. “I want you to rescue two baby Gunds.” 

Indrajit scratched an itch along the upper length of his bony nose ridge and looked out the window. The rag dangling resistless in the opening permitted the cold wet wind of the King of Thunder Steppes to spray moisture across his face and shoulders. The cool shock was pleasant, reminding him of the shaded grottos and rocky bays of his youth. 

“The problem,” his partner Fix said, leaning forward into the Gund’s musty, vaguely paperlike stink, “is that one man’s rescue is another man’s kidnapping.” Fix’s voice was high-pitched, almost feminine. He was shorter than Indrajit, with a broad, muscular chest. His black hair and coppery skin contrasted starkly with the pallor of the Gund. For this meeting, he’d left the bulk of his weapons in their room, wearing only his falchion at his belt. 

Yazzo scowled, its muzzle twisting to reveal a mouthful of yellow warrior’s teeth, some menacing and sharp and others shattered by trial. Other than its teeth and its many arms, Yazzo had no visible weapons. “Are you saying you won’t take my money?” Its voice rumbled low, seeming to rise from beneath the table. As if to serve as punctuation, it dropped a fist-sized bag to the table with a metallic clink. 

On the other side of the common room sat the dog-headed Kyone Munahim and the Pelthite slinger Philastes Larch, pretending to drink and chat idly. At the Gund’s menacing expression, Munahim set down his cup and Philastes put a hand on his dagger. 

Fix gripped Indrajit by the shoulder. “We will take your money.” 

“Also,” Indrajit continued deliberately, “we care why we’re doing things. Even out here in the lands of the barbarians, we are men of principle. We rescue princesses and undertake other heroic tasks.” 

“By preference, at least,” Fix said. “It’s why we call ourselves the ‘Protagonists.’” 

The Gund leaned back, emitting a groaning sound that might have been a laugh. Behind its head, the white insectoid limbs sprouting from its shoulders rattled together like a bamboo grove in a monsoon. On other side of its pale face, Yazzo had a column of three eyes rising from its cheek to its temple. On both sides, the lower two eyes were filled with dark red tissue, clots the size of eggs, with a thick trailing strip connecting the two and dropping toward the Gund’s jaw. 

“You want to hear a story,” it said. 

Jim Beall (BS-Math, MBA, PE) has been a nuclear engineer for over forty years, a war gamer for over fifty, and an avid reader of science fiction for even longer. His experience in nuclear engineering and power systems began as a naval officer. Experience after the USN includes design, construction, inspection, enforcement, and assessment with a nuclear utility, an architect engineering firm, and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC).

The term “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) was coined by mathematician and computer scientist John McCarthy at a 1956 Dartmouth conference now deemed to be the birthplace of AI as a field of science, but the idea goes back nearly three millennia!

Finalists exemplify the best of near-future, forward-thinking science fiction. Annual contest marks 16 years of highlighting bright futures and rising talent.

Baen Books has signed a contract with author Christopher Ruocchio to publish the final two books in his internationally award-winning Sun Eater series, as well as for a first look deal for Ruocchio’s next series.

We’re happy to announce an easier way to deliver our Ebooks directly from Baen.com to your favorite Ereader. You can now email EPUB files directly to your device from our site—no download necessary!

Baen to publish new science fiction novels from authors Monalisa Foster and Marisa Wolf

Lucille Robbins, Eric Flint’s widow and heir, in conjunction with Baen Books would like to announce the forthcoming titles from Eric Flint.

Baen to publish sword and sorcery series The Chronicles of Hanuvar, with first book in August 2023

Baen Books formally announced this year’s finalists for the Baen Fantasy Adventure Award earlier this month.

It is with a heavy heart that we share the news that Eric Flint has passed away. We were proud to publish Eric’s first novel, Mother of Demons, in 1997, and to continue publishing his many worlds, including the best-selling Ring of Fire series that started with 1632.

There are several of Eric’s works already delivered and on the schedule. Eric was a tireless collaborator, and readers can also expect more of his works to be released with Eric’s designated collaborators in the future.

We will be celebrating Eric and his works on the Baen Free Radio Hour this week and the following week and encourage all to tune in.

—Toni Weisskopf
Publisher, Baen Books

Lakewood, Colorado author Wil McCarthy has been named the winner of the 2022 Prometheus Award for Best Novel, for his novel Rich Man’s Sky.