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All My Robert E. Howard Essays (October 2024)

All My Robert E. Howard Essays (October 2024)

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I am the in-house mystery guy (that’s how I hoodwinked John O’Neill into giving me a weekly column). Ten years later, he’s still trying to configure the Firewall to keep me from getting up my Monday morning post! I organized the Discovering Robert E. Howard, and Hither Came Conan series’ here at Black Gate. And contributed, of course. That’s the advantage of being in charge of them!

Robert E. Howard is my second-favorite writer (trailing only the terrific John D. MacDonald), and I’ve written over two dozen essays related to him here at Black Gate. With more to come, of course. I posted my second Kirby O’Donnell post in last month, and I’m working on my second spicy tales post.

I came late to Howard. I have loved mythology since grade school. The Iliad remains one of my all-time favorite stories, and I have a copy of Schleimann’s Ilios. That led me to Dungeons and Dragons in middle school, and I know I was reading The Lord of the Rings somewhere around the 8th grade. I was a fantasy fan for life.

I bought the first Ace Conan paperback, but it sat on my shelf, unread. Not sure why. I know I read David C. Smith’s Oron, but not that one. As my son was playing with the Thomas the Train layout in the kids section of Barnes and Noble one day, I started reading the first Dely Rey Conan book. I read that the next time we were there. And I bought it. And Robert E. Howard would move up the ranks of my favorite writers, as I bought more Del Reys.

Conan and El Borak are about even at the top, and then Solomon Kane. But I just continued to like Robert E. Howard, more and more.

Here are all of my own Robert E. Howard-related essays here at Black Gate. A couple are pretty good, I think. Mostly in the first two sections below. Check out a couple, please. By Crom!

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What I’ve Been Reading: September, 2024

What I’ve Been Reading: September, 2024

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I listen to audiobooks because I can fit them in far easier than I can actual books, to read. But even as my bifocals have to continually work harder, I still enjoy actually reading, be it a physical copy, or on my Fire tablet (I prefer the former, but needs must win out sometimes). So, let’s look at some of what I’ve been reading lately.

THE WATERS OF ETERNITY – Howard Andrew Jones

I’ve been talking more about my Black Gate buddy since he announced he is battling brain cancer. As I mentioned last week, I re-listened to his two Dabir and Asim novels. I prefer the short stories, and this collection of six of them is my favorite featuring the duo. While still being sword and sorcery, with elements of the fantastic, these are more mysteries, which is what I really enjoy about the two.

Howard’s a really good writer, he loves these Arabian fantasies, and they mix sword and sorcery with mystery. And the ebook is dirt cheap. You can’t go wrong with this one.

WOLFE OF THE STEPPES – Harold Lamb

Lamb was a prolific Pulpster in the early 20th Century. A historian as well, his adventure stories are detail-filled thrill-rides. There are eighteen tales of Khlit the Cossack, a gray-bearded survivor on the Asian steppes around the start of the 17th Century.

Lamb was a great influence on Robert E. Howard, and Howard Andrew Jones collected all the Khlit stories in four volumes. There are three more books of Lamb’s adventure tales as well. The first story, which was much shorter than the others, didn’t do anything for me. However, the next two were novella-length adventures and much better. Other than REH, I don’t read Adventure stories, but I am enjoying Khlit and will continue on.

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What I’ve Been Listening To: September 2024

What I’ve Been Listening To: September 2024

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And it’s time for you to find out what I’ve been listening to. I know you’ve been anxiously waiting since last month. Now, if you read last two blog posts. Which I’m SURE you did….you know I watched 26 Marvel movies. While that was fun (and ridiculously indulgent), it did cut a bit into my listening (and reading). But I still managed to get in some of both. So, awaaaay we go.

THE DESERT OF SOULS – Howard Andrew Jones

If you follow me on Facebook, you’ve seen me talking about my Black Gate buddy Howard Andrew Jones, who recently revealed he’s battling a fast-acting brain cancer. I’ll write more about that topic, but I decided it was time to get back to some of his work.

A couple years ago, he wrote an epic fantasy, The Ring Sworn trilogy. He switched publishers, and the third book of his latest trilogy, The Chronicles of Hanuvar, is due out October 1. It seems destined to go down as one of the best in modern sword and sorcery.

I really like his Arabian fantasy stories featuring Dabir and Asim. I’m re-reading the short story collection, The Waters of Eternity (an absolute steal in digital). But on a trip to visit him a few weeks ago, I decided to re-listen to the first novel, Desert of Souls.

Robert E. Howard is about the only Adventure stuff I read. I never got into H. Rider Haggard, and I’m familiar with Ali Baba and Aladdin (no, not from Disney). But these sword and sorcery mysteries are good reads.

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The World of Tiers and Beyond: Philip Jose Farmer, Part I

The World of Tiers and Beyond: Philip Jose Farmer, Part I

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The World of Tiers, Volumes 1 and 2 (Science Fiction Book Club, November 1981). Covers by Boris Vallejo

Philip Jose Farmer (1918 – 2009). Farmer was a versatile writer. I discovered him from his Sword & Planet work with his World of Tiers series, but went on to read a lot of other books by him, including some pastiches he wrote in ERB’s universe. I’ll be discussing him here in two posts.

My introduction to Farmer came through the Science Fiction Book Club. They offered the first five books in The World of Tiers in a two-volume set, and I still have mine (shown here, with covers by Boris Vallejo.) I read them straight through and looked for more. There weren’t any. Not at the time. Years later, another book (More than Fire) was published, but I haven’t read it. I did read a connected book called Red Orc’s Rage.

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The End of Time and Me: Michael Moorcock’s Dancers at the End of Time

The End of Time and Me: Michael Moorcock’s Dancers at the End of Time

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The Dancers at the End of Time trilogy: An Alien Heat, The Hollow Lands,
and The End of All Songs (Avon Books, September and November 1977,
and June 1978). Cover art by Stanislaw Fernandes

When I discovered Moorcock in the early 1980s, I read his trilogy Dancers at the End of Time and the associated novel A Messiah at the End of Time. I remember enjoying the trilogy, though I have only vague memories of the stand-alone novel. Back in 2017, I re-read Moorcock’s Elric series and wrote about it for Black Gate. In 2020, I did the same for his Corum novels and in 2022, I revisited Erekose. Rather than look at Hawkmoon, which I last re-read in 2010, I decided to dive into The End of Time sequence.

In addition to The Dancers at the End of Time trilogy and the novel The Transformation of Miss Mavis Ming (also published as Messiah at the End of Time and Constant Fire), Moorcock has written several short stories that belong to the sequence: “Pale Roses,” “White Stars,” “Ancient Shadows,” “Elric at the End of Time,” and “Sumptuous Dress: A Question of Size at the End of Time.” Although most were published before I read the trilogy, I believe I missed all of them with the exception of “Elric at the End of Time.”

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What I’ve Been Listening To: August, 2024

What I’ve Been Listening To: August, 2024

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A (Black) Gat in the Hand takes another week off, as I’ve continued listening to audiobooks daily. Last month I talked about some of my Audible choices. Whether I’m working, writing, driving, or trying to fall asleep, I am often listening to an audiobook. Often it’s a repeat, so my attention doesn’t have to be focused. But also, new things I wouldn’t get to otherwise.

EGIL & NIX – Paul S. Kemp

My Dungeons & Dragons-playing middle-school self devoured Elric, and Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser; loving both series’. But while I’ve re-read the Melnibonian many times, Leiber’s series lost its appeal. I’ve tried re-reading it a couple times, and just wasn’t into it.

I did enjoy, however, the first two of three Egil & Nix novels by Paul Kemp. These are absolutely an homage to Leiber’s duo. Anyone who likes Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser should really enjoy this pair. The constant non-swearing swearing (shite, farkin) is tiresome, but some authors seem to think it’s useful. Whatever.

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Neverwhens: Ancient Civilizations Topple and the Age of Heroes ends in the Blades of Bronze Trilogy by Mark Knowles

Neverwhens: Ancient Civilizations Topple and the Age of Heroes ends in the Blades of Bronze Trilogy by Mark Knowles

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Seriously, how many D&D encounters did this one scene inspire? (Jason and the Argonauts, 1963)

I sincerely doubt any Black Gate reader needs an education in who Ray Harryhausen was or why his films, despite the sea-change in special effects technology, remain seminal classics (I’ve been making my way through a bunch of his swashbuckling adventures with my Zoomer son, who notes, time and again, how ‘cheesy and awesome’ the stop motion is, but also calls out how perfect at times the strange movements are at making monsters seem, well…strange and *monstrous* in a way that smooth CGI does not).

I myself am young enough that the only Harryhausen film I saw in theaters was his grand finale, Clash of the Titans (1981), though thanks to Saturday matinee TV I had a steady diet of all that came before.

Clash itself is interesting, because, written by Beverley Cross, while ostensibly the story of Perseus — one of the few *likable* Greek heroes, and one of the few with a reasonably “happy” ending to his tale — the film is to large extent a reworking of an early film Cross had done with Harryhausen, Jason and the Argonauts (1963).

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In the tradition of Conan: The Kyrik and Kothar Novels by Gardner F. Fox

In the tradition of Conan: The Kyrik and Kothar Novels by Gardner F. Fox

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The Kyrik novels by Gardner F. Fox (Leisure Books, 1975-1976)

I’m getting ready to embark on a series of posts about Philip Jose Farmer, but got distracted looking through my shelves and decided to throw in a post about the Sword & Sorcery work of Gardner F. Fox, who I mentioned here a while back for his two book S&P series set on the planet Llarn.

While my small hometown library didn’t have anything by Robert E. Howard, they had various books claiming to be “In the tradition of Conan.” That’s how I found out about Howard. The first “In the tradition” book I read was Kyrik: Warlock Warrior by Fox, from Leisure Books, 1975. The cover was candy to a starving teen. By Ken Barr (although I didn’t know it at the time), the cover showed a muscled barbarian swordsman astride a pterodactyl with a nearly naked green-haired beauty beside him. My imagination ignited. And when I started reading it, I loved it even more.

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Unabashed Pulp: Dire Planet by Joel Jenkins

Unabashed Pulp: Dire Planet by Joel Jenkins

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The first three novels in the Dire Planet series (Pulp Work Press, 2009).
Covers by Mats Minnhagen, Noel Tuazon, and Michael Dean Jackson

Joel Jenkins has written 9 books in his Dire Planet series, and a tenth is planned, which Joel suggests may end the series. The published books are:

Dire Planet
Exiles of the Dire Planet
Into the Dire Planet
Strange Gods of the Dire Planet
Lost Tribes of the Dire Planet
Abominations of the Dire Planet
Immortals of the Dire Planet
Forbidden Cities of the Dire Planet
Final Outpost of the Dire Planet

Garvey Dire is representing the West in a space race with China to establish the first manned base on Mars. Garvey’s ship crashes though, and as he lies dying, he is visited by an image of a green skinned woman swordslinger and ends up being transported 50,000 years into Mars’s past. From there Garvey’s adventures follow the pattern established by ERB in his Barsoom books, although with many fresh details and inventive twists.

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New Treasures: Gogmagog and Ludluda by Jeff Noon and Steve Beard

New Treasures: Gogmagog and Ludluda by Jeff Noon and Steve Beard

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Gogmagog and Ludluda (Angry Robot, February 13, 2024 and December 3, 2024). Cover art by Ian McQue

I had a fruitful trip to the local Barnes & Noble last week. I brought home the latest issues of Asimov’s Science Fiction and Analog, as well as a nice assortment of recent-ish trade paperbacks. In the mix was a new novel by the team of Jeff Noon and Steve Beard, Gogmagog, with an intriguing cover that grabbed me immediately.

I dipped into Gogmagog as soon as I got home, and I found it delightful. It’s the tale of Arcadia “Cady” Meade, a 78-year-old retired sea captain, who’s about as crusty and entertaining as they come. She’s hired by a young girl and her robot guardian to take them down the river Nysis, past treacherous shores peopled with strange plants and robots — and haunted by the spirit of a terrifying river dragon.

Gogmagog is the opening volume in a two-book set. The closing book, Ludluda, arrives at the end of the year. Feast your eyes on the wonderful matching covers by Ian McQue above, courtesy of Reactor.com.

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