The young poet Ashley Dioses has already established herself as a leading voice in contemporary weird poetry. Known for her meticulous use of rhyme and meter, her deft melding of the strange and the erotic, and her novel treatments of such age-old themes as the vampire, the witch, and the ghoul, Dioses now gathers the best of her recent poetry into her first collection—a scintillating assemblage of nearly 100 poems short and long, published and unpublished.
With this single volume, Ashley Dioses takes her place as a worthy successor to the long line of California Romantics, beginning with Ambrose Bierce, Clark Ashton Smith, and Nora May French, and carrying on with Donald Sidney-Fryer and K. A. Opperman (The Crimson Tome), with whom she has worked closely.
Ashley Dioses is a poet from Southern California whose work has appeared widely in print and online venues, including Spectral Realms, Weirdbook, Weird Fiction Review, and HWA Poetry Showcase.
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Praise for Diary of a Sorceress
These lapidary selections reveal a practiced auctorial hand and a keen and enshadowed imagination. . . . From the first selection to the last, the poet conducts us on a wild and innovative tour of beauty and horror.—From Donald Sidney-Fryer’s introduction
I have no doubt that Ashley Dioses is an important and distinctive voice in weird poetry. She may be at the beginning of her career, but she can already take her place with Ann K. Schwader, Wade German, and Adam Bolivar as one of the shining lights in this field.—S. T. Joshi
The title of this collection is spot-on: for if ever there was a sorceress of imagery and language, that poet is the magnificent Ashley Dioses. I am overjoy’d to have this new book in my trembling hand.—W. H. Pugmire, author of Monstrous Aftermath: Stories in the Lovecraftian Tradition
West Coast Romanticism takes a Gothic turn in these richly imagined verses. Crafted in the tradition of Clark Ashton Smith and George Sterling — yet with a fresh, vibrantly female spirit—voices often missing from the dark fantastic speak out clearly. Witch or valkyrie, selkie or sorceress, each has her own story . . . and the right amanuensis. Ashley Dioses delivers an addictive blend of myth, shadow-dream, and pure emotion.—Ann K. Schwader, author of Dark Energies
With incantations both delicate and potent, Dioses’ Sorceress teases secrets from the moon and stars, the nightshade and the lily, the creatures of myth and the gilded rogues gallery headed by Lady Bathory. In this exquisite debut, the object of love may be ever-elusive, but the passion it inspires is eternal.—Kyla Lee Ward, author of The Land of Bad Dreams
From fae to fantastic, from vampires to Valkyries, from Medusa, moons and maenads, from ghouls and graveyards to selkies and sirens, Ashley Dioses’ weird poetry, in sonnet, rondel and other forms, runs the gamut of hellish themes. The inclusion here of tributes to such writers as Poe, Beckford, Le Fanu, Chambers, Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith, and even to Sacher-Masoch, Richard Gavin and Donald Sidney-Fryer, does not detract from Dioses’ originality of voice. The epic “Atop the Crystal Moon” alone is worth the price of admission. This first collection by a young weird poet proves her a mistress of sorcerous sensuality, weaving a witchery of words that will captivate and enchant.—Leigh Blackmore, author of Spores from Sharnoth and Other Madnesses
Nicely spooky stuff, vivid and atmospheric. The poetry of Ashley Dioses makes me wish I were still editing Weird Tales. She would have been a natural there.—Darrell Schweitzer, author of The Shattered Goddess
Dioses has conjured a collection in the style of C.A. Smith, yet with a fresh perspective that works so well. Her “dark diary” expands as we go. Some notable favorites: “Night Play” where she sees Pegasus with “eyes like molten gold”; you’ll be entranced by the magic of her long poem, “Atop the Crystal Moon” and shiver after reading “Bat in the Boiler Room” with lines such as “Beyond the halls invisible in gloom/ the bat hung waiting in the boiler room”. A remarkable collection, recommended!—Marge Simon, Bram Stoker Award winner of Vampires, Zombies & Wanton Souls
Ashley Dioses’ poetry collection sings with a classical style that’s accessible, not dated. Each of the four entry sections in this Diary of a Sorceress delivers a different version of magical beings, fantastic creatures, desire and blood offerings. The poems unwind like spells, seducing the reader with beautifully formed language. Flowers fill shadowy nights with scents of death and struggling life pressed between pages, withered, yet fragrant. Come dream a dreamer’s dream of longing with Dioses.—Linda D. Addison, award-winning author of How to Recognize a Demon Has Become Your Friend
Here for your delectation, youthful passionate lyric verses of darkness and dread, the greater number of them having a surprisingly upbeat tone as though Love in the key of Gloom means eternal romance, if not High Fetish. Additionally the poet has a delight in Thesauric Discoveries for Goths!—Jessica Amanda Salmonson, author of Anthony Shriek
With Diary of a Sorceress, Ashley Dioses displays a rare magic with words, assembled into poems that are really spells. Whether she’s conjuring a lustful Maenad, the Blood Countess, or lost Carcosa, these enchantments are dark, lush, wondrous, disturbing, and completely hypnotic.—Lisa Morton, multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Samhanach and Other Halloween Treat
Ashley Dioses is one of the brightest talents of the new generation of poets working in the weird verse tradition and a collection of her work is something to be welcomed and treasured.—Pete Atkins, screenwriter of Hellbound: Hellraiser II and Wishmaster
Ashley Dioses’ debut, Diary of a Sorceress, is rich with macabre, lyrical imagination. It opens doors to beauty, and labyrinths fraught with radiant blasphemies. Her poetry rests comfortably beside that of Weird Tales, Arkham House, Ann K. Schwader, and Richard L. Tierney.—Joseph S. Pulver, Sr., editor of The Madness of Dr. Caligari
There is delicate music in Diary of a Sorceress by Ashley Dioses. Written in traditional forms, Diary is a promising first volume from a new fantasy poet. Filled with uncanny love potions to her beloved, delicious and captivating lines, and rhythmical tributes to Poe, George Sterling, C. A. Smith, and Robert Chambers, Diary of a Sorceress shows meter is continuing its fine resurgence in modern weird poetry, and in the work of Ashley Dioses.—Charles Lovecraft, Publisher & Editor, P’rea Press
Table of Contents
Introduction
Prelude: My Dark Diary
I. Entry One: Atop the Crystal Moon Diary of a Sorceress Entry One Letters to a Sorcerer A Sorcerous Tome The Glass Vial Witch Lord of the Hunt Labyrinthine King Midnight Strides Night Play Moon Enchantress Atop the Crystal Moon Dragonspeak Scarlet Autumn Aurora Fire Sprite Lord of the Deep Selkie Fallen Atlantis Medusa’s Mirror Morning’s Moon Lady Death
II. Entry Two: Kiss the Stars A Sea of Snow and Frost The Abandoned Garden Graveyard Blossom Under the Chrysanthemums Calla Lilies Black-Veined Whites Vapors The Perfect Rose The Dwelling Place The Moon Kiss the Stars Celestial Mysteries The Hands of Chaos
III. Entry Three: Star Lighting One Winter Eve To an Unknown Mistress A Queen in Hell Ever Fair Star Lighting Lover’s Witch Witch’s Love Enchantress Dark Poet of My Heart Dark Valentine Dark Valentine II My Dark Valentine The Celebration of Dreams The Fires of Summer Rondel to My Love Sky Fallen Maiden A Sorceress’s Love A Lover’s Sorceress Panic Maenads They Sing in Whispers A Glamorous Touch Prisoner of Love On Amaranthine Lips Sweet Renegade Siren’s Song Sephora Can I Stop Your Heart?
IV. Entry Four: On a Dreamland’s Moon Daemonolatry Goetia The Black Goddess Ligeia Ghoul Mistress My Corpse, My Groom A Valkyrie’s Vendetta The Rotting Goddess Nyarlathotep On a Dreamland’s Moon Nitokris Winter Witch The Necro-Conjuring Sorceress Narda the Czarina Castle Csejthe Painted in Blood Bathory in Red I Nadia II Bat in the Boiler Room III Black Orchid IV The Power of the Sun Blood Siren’s Alcove Anthropomancy Carathis Twisted Trails of Thought Lady in Black Velvet Mircalla With a Love So Vile The Easter Lily Even Madness Cannot Hide Horror The Medallion Ilvaa Saturn Vexteria A Sorceress’s Final Vision
Tributes A Page From Jack’s Diary, by Adam Bolivar My Lady of the Nightshade Flower, by K. A. Opperman Upon Reading Diary of a Sorceress, by Michael Fantina Ashiel’s Garden, by D. L. Myers
Afterword
Acknowledgments
This product was added to our catalog on Thursday 03 August, 2017.
