Don D'Ammassa
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Donald Eugene D'Ammassa (born April 24, 1946) is an American
fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving Magic (supernatural), magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy ...
,
science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
and horror critic and author.Clute, John. "Don D'Ammassaa."
Article in ''SFE: The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction''.
He is chiefly known for his numerous reviews, written over a period of more than thirty years. He writes as Don D'Ammassa.


Writing career

D'Ammassa first made a name for himself as a fan writer in the 1970s; he was nominated for the
Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer The Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer is the Hugo Award given each year for writers of works related to science fiction or fantasy which appeared in low- or non-paying publications such as semiprozines or fanzines or in generally available electroni ...
for 1976, 1977, 1978, and 1986, and his
fanzine A fanzine (blend word, blend of ''fan (person), fan'' and ''magazine'' or ''-zine'') is a non-professional and non-official publication produced by fan (person), enthusiasts of a particular cultural phenomenon (such as a literary or musical genre) ...
''Mythologies'' was nominated for the
Hugo Award for Best Fanzine The Hugo Award for Best Fanzine is given each year for non professionally edited magazines, or "fanzines", related to science fiction or fantasy which has published four or more issues with at least one issue appearing in the previous calendar y ...
for 1977 and 1985. His career as both critic and professional author began in the early 1980s. A long-time reviewer for ''
Science Fiction Chronicle DNA Publications was an American publishing company that existed from 1993 to 2007 and was run by the husband-and-wife team of Warren Lapine and Angela Kessler. Initially based in Massachusetts, DNA Publications relocated to Radford, Virginia. A ...
'', his reviews have also appeared in other venues, and many are compiled on his website ''Critical Mass''. According to
John Clute John Frederick Clute (born 12 September 1940) is a Canadian-born author and critic specializing in science fiction and fantasy literature who has lived in both England and the United States since 1969. He has been described as "an integral part o ...
, his assessments are "noted for ... fairness and generosity, and for the extremely wide range of texts he has covered." His broad knowledge of speculative and adventure fiction are reflected in his ''Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' (2005), ''Encyclopedia of Fantasy and Horror Fiction'' (2006) and ''Encyclopedia of Adventure Fiction'' (2009). As a short story writer D'Ammassa has produced a substantial body of horror stories and relatively fewer science fiction and fantasy tales. His longer works are more evenly divided between these genres. His more recent novels "convey a sense that he is systematically traversing the worlds of twentieth century sf in order to pay tribute from a more recent perspective to the worlds and modes typical of the form."


Bibliography


Series


Sandor Dyle

*''Scarab'' (2004) *''Narcissus'' (2007)


Wanda Coyne

*''The Maltese Gargoyle'' (2015) *''The Hippogriff of the Baskervilles'' (2016) *''Ten Little Homunculi'' (2017)


Other novels

*''Blood Beast'' (1988; rewritten as ''The Gargoyle'' (2011)) *''Servants of Chaos (2002) *''Haven'' (2004) *''Dead of Winter'' (2007) *''The Kaleidoscope'' (2015) *''The Sinking Island'' (2015) *''Caverns of Chaos'' (2015) *''Living Things'' (2015) *''Perilous Pursuits'' (2015) *''Wormdance'' (2015) *''Carbon Copies'' (2015) *''Multiplicity'' (2015)


Short stories

*"Automatic Success" (1982) *"Love Charm" (1985) *"The Hatchetman" (1989) *"Literally Speaking" (1990) *"Little Evils" (1991) *"Strange Developments" (1991) *"The Guard Tower" (1991) *"The Splicer" (1991) *"Wake Up Call" (1991) *"Shadow Over R'lyeh" (1991) *"Context" (1992) *"The Dead Beat Society" (1992) *"Homework" (1992) *"Cleansing Agent" (1993) *"Friday Nights at Home" (1993) *"Puppets" (1993) *"Subterrine - Or 20,000 Leagues under the Soil" (1993) *"The Daylight Vampire" (1993) *"The Spirit of Mars" (1993) *"Forever in My Thoughts" (1993) *"Moloch's Furnace" (1993) *"Payment in Arrears" (1993) *"Passing Death" (1993) *"Corruption in Office" (1993) *"The Library of Lost Art" (1993) *"Shadow and Substance" (1993) *"Frontier Spirit" (1994) *"Inspiration" (1994) *"Jack the Martian" (1994) *"Misadventures in the Skin Trade" (1994) *"The Kaleidoscope" (1994) *"A Tight Situation" (1994) *"A Noteworthy Affair" (1994) *"All Flesh is Clay" (1995) *"Coming Attractions" (1995) *"Escape" (1995) *"Hair Apparent" (1995) *"Misapprehensions" (1995) *"Next-Door Neighbor" (1995) *"Present in Spirit" (1995) *"The Dunwich Gate" (1995) *"The Houseguest" (1995) *"The Knight of Greenwich Village" (1995) *"The Phantom of the Space Opera" (1995) *"Twisted Images" (1995) *"The Best of Company" (1995) *"Actual Mode" (1995) *"Empirical Facts" (1996) *"Translation Station" (1996) *"Sneak Thief" (1996) *"Orwell's Other Nightmare" (1996) *"The Potpourri Plot" (1996) *"Thoracic Park" (1996) *"Milk-Curdling Horror" (1996) *"Kites" (1996) *"Dark Providence" (1997) *"Expectations" (1997) *"Getting with the Program" (1997) *"Restoring Order" (1997) *"Remnants" (1997) *"Bad Soil" (1997) *"The Managansett Horror" (1997) *"Adding It Up" (1998) *"Scylla and Charybdis" (1998) *"Leave Me Alone" (1998) *"Bad Feelings" (1998) *"Candid Camera" (1998) *"Immortal Muse" (1998) *"Stakeout" (1998) *"The Chindi" (1998) *"The Piggy Bank" (1998) *"The Predator" (1998) *"Cat Eye's" (1998) *"Prey for the Dead" (1998) *"Dominion" (1999) *"Dumb Genius" (1999) *"The Intrusion" (1999) *"The Karma Sutra" (1999) *"Realizations" (1999) *"Wormdance" (1999) *"Dark Paris" (2000) *"The Devil Is in the Details" (2000) *"Something in Common" (2001) *"Departure Delayed" (2001) *"The Black Rose" (2002) *"A Good Offense" (2003) *"Curing Agent" (2003) *"Dealing with Stress" (2003) *"The Word Mill" (2003) *"Parting Shot" (2004) *"The Man who Walked to Procyon" (2004) *"Growing Old Together" (2004) *"Fore-Thought" (2004) *"Diplomatic Relations" (2006) *"The Natural World" (2008) *"No Problem" (2008) *"Funeral Party" (2009) *"Hearts of Stone" (2009) *"Complexity" (2009) *"Duck and Cover" (2009) *"Slipstream Fiction" (2010) *"Piecemaker" (2010) *"No Distance Too Great" (2010) *"Chronic Pain" (2011) *"Dead Reckoning" (2011) *"Farm on the Down" (2011) *"Remotely Possible" (2011) *"Scrimshaw" (2011) *"The Incorruptible" (2011) *"Misprints" (2011) *"Martyrs" (2011) *"Housebound" (2011) *"The Buddy System" (2011) *"The Last Demon" (2012) *"Echoes" (2013) *"Pre-Pirates" (2013) *"City Girl" (2015) *"Night Duty" (2015) *"The New Guy" (2015) *"The Thing in the Library" (2015) *"Border Town" (2017) *"Lost Canyon" (2017) *"Shell Games" (2017) *"The Bad Neighbor" (2017) *"The Key" (2017) *"The Old Place" (2017) *"The Warden of the Wall" (2017) *"The Well Being" (2017) *"Wendy" (2017) *"Creepy Hollow" (2017) *"Invaders from the Unknown" (2017) *"It Came from Out There" (2017) *"Mission to the Red Planet" (2017) *"The Altered Astronaut" (2017) *"The Anomaly" (2017) *"The Day the World Dissolved" (2017) *"The Red Hornet" (2017) *"Isn't Life Great?" (2017) *"The Chaos Business" (2019) *"The Custodian" (2019) *"The Effigy" (2019) *"The Thin Spot" (2019) *"The Three Pale Men" (2019) *"Twisted" (2019)


Nonfiction

*''Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' (2005) *''Encyclopedia of Fantasy and Horror Fiction'' (2006) *''Encyclopedia of Adventure Fiction'' (2009) *''Architects of Tomorrow: Volume I'' (2015) *''Masters of Detection: Volume I'' (2015) *''Masters of Detection: Volume II'' (2015) *''Masters of Detection: Volume III'' (2015) *''Architects of Tomorrow: Volume II'' (2016) *''Masters of Adventure: Volume I'' (2016) *''Masters of Horror: Volume I'' (2016) *''Architects of Tomorrow: Volume III'' (2017) *''Masters of Detection: Volume IV'' (2017) *''Masters of Horror: Volume II'' (2017) *''Not Exactly a Memoir'' (2017) *''Masters of Detection: Volume V'' (2018) *''Masters of Fantasy'' (2018) *''Architects of Tomorrow: Volume IV'' (2019) *''Architects of Tomorrow: Volume V'' (2019) *''Masters of Detection: Volume VI'' (2019) *''Masters of Horror: Volume III'' (2019) *''Masters of Adventure: Volume II'' (2020) *''Masters of Fantasy #2'' (2020)


Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:D'Ammassa, Don 1946 births Living people American fantasy writers American science fiction writers American horror writers Writers from Rhode Island 21st-century American novelists American male novelists People from Providence, Rhode Island 21st-century American male writers