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| Author: Robert E. Howard
Publisher: Del Rey
Category: Book
List Price: $16.95
Buy New: $7.47
You Save: $9.48 (56%)
New (39) Used (27) Collectible (2) from $4.10
Avg. Customer Rating:  97 reviews
Sales Rank: 6295
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 463
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.2
ISBN: 0345461517
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780345461513
ASIN: 0345461517
Publication Date: December 2, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
Conan is the man! January 8, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is great stuff, utterly action-packed! Howard has a wonderful sense of words, and--though he makes the occasional error in cognate reuse (e.g., "the courier coursed down the corridor")--he describes people, places, and events in jaw-dropping detail. You can faint from the splendor of the fabulously wealthy cities and places he word-paints ('limns', to use a favorite term of his). I could do without the all-too-frequent brutally detailed battle scenes, indicating precisely which archers and pikemen were positioned where and whose horse slipped in whose blood. Just when you're about to lose interest, rest assured that a ferocious dragon or wacky gorilla-monster lurks around the next corner. Oh, and there's some very good black magical humor, e.g., when one wizard, in the guise of an eagle, makes off with the head of a second wizard, whose headless body runs after him, muttering curses. You've got to admit that that's imaginative. I witthold my sixth star because of the uneven nature of some of the stories: indeed, the earlier tales seem to flow better than the later ones (n.b. that Conan's character chronology is unrelated to Howard's authorship chronology). Also, the dialogue occasionally seems silly or stinted: it's hard to believe that a barbarian--even though we know he's thoughtful and good-hearted--would engage in such lengthy monologues (all but monologues, I should say) while supposedly "conversing" with other characters. His words sound like what one would write, not like what one--a barbarian, moreover--would say. But never mind these nickety-pickety nitpicks: this is great, great stuff. After enjoying these, you may want to look into the other volumes (but of course!) and Howard's other works: Bran Mak Morn, Kull, and Solomon Kane. The last of these has adventures such as battling voodoo demons in darkest Africa, chasing vampire queens into forgotten cities, and engaging in swordplay with the enchanted skeletons of murdered sorcerers. Aah! That's the ticket!
Conan is bigger than life November 23, 2007
Michael In Hell Lord of Homicides
I discovered Conan while still in high school in a book called King Conan. Forty years later, the Howard stories still give me a thrill. I bet I've read each one ten times over the years and I never grow tired of the high adventure and the evil magicians, priests, and monsters. I'm glad to see they continue to remain in print. If you've never read Conan, you're in for a thrill.
This is it! November 6, 2007
The real CONAN as only Robert E. Howard wrote it! Disregard all previous editions. This is the most definitive and faithful to Howard's original manuscripts. Also includes REH's original fragments, drafts and outlines! Plus the illustrations are awesome! Only the hardcover includes full color plates! Also, if you missed reading TIN0 GEORGIOU'S masterpiece--THE FATES, go and read it.
A must have for fantasy fans November 4, 2007
I will not bore you with a lenghty review, considering that there are plenty of reviews for you to read. Suffice it to say that if you are a fan of fantasy and are wondering whether this is truely a 5 star book, then think no more an buy it, because it is 5 stars!
comprehensive writings of howard? August 26, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
After comparing some of my old conan novel titles with the titles found int he 3 books of this series - there are some titles that I couldn't find in this 3 series of books. It is true that Sprague de. camp might have written some of these titles (one of the books doesn't make the author of the writing quite clear int he case of "drums of tumbalku", and possibly others). But I'm not sure since one reviewer stated that there were unfinished short stories. So they could be here. anyway, here is a listing of stories that I couldn't find in these books under the same or different titles (my conan collection is not complete btw, although I do own a lot of conan books):
drums of tumbalku
the hall of the dead
rogues in the house
the hand of nergal
the bloodstained god
the snout in the dark
hawks over shem
the road of eagles
wolves beyond the border
black tears
the flame knife
As I said, my collection is not comprehensive, so there may be other books that have stories written by Robert Howard (the master), that may not be listed in these books. But then again, since I don't have these 3 books and can only go by what people write in these reviews, then I can't say for sure. Nor am I sure abou the "short stories" and what title, if any, were given to them.
I haven't read conan in years. But from my memory, I think I liked most authors. No author was able to capture the magic of Robert Howard's writings. The closest that came close was maybe Robert Jordan (he even made the same type of spelling mistakes that robert howard made). But no author was able to capture the subconscious imagery which people could identify with, which may have made these writings so famous and endearing int he first place. For example, the giant collossus banging at the door (reminiscent of the angry dad trying to knock down the door), or the demonic woman - sucking the life force out of men and turning them into stone (possibly an analogy of the emotional vampirism of some women).
The only author who I think that did not write anything that resembled Conan was "Steve Perry". The style of writing is so different from that of other Conan books, that I simply did not recognize it as Conan (women were respected, people were too friendly, Conan was a talkative person, you had tons of weird creatures all over the place like it was a smurf village, etc etc).
And yes, people may complain about Sprague de Camp, and even Lin Carter. But it has to be remembered that these were devoted fans and researchers. Without them, the Conan revival might have never happened.
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