PRAISE FOR ROBERT E. HOWARD

“At his best, Howard was the Thomas Wolfe of fantasy.”

– STEPHEN KING

“Howard was a true storyteller – one of first, and certainly among the best, you'll find in heroic fantasy. If you've never read him before, you're in for a real treat.”

– CHARLES DE LINT
Award-winning author of
Forests of the Heart andThe Onion Girl

“I adore these books. Howard had a gritty, vibrant style – broadsword writing that cut its way to the heart, with heroes who are truly larger than life. It must be thirty years since I last read Howard, but there are moments from his stories that are as fresh in my mind as if I'd read them yesterday. I heartily recommend them to anyone who loves fantasy.”

– DAVID GEMMELL
Author of Legend and White Wolf

“The voice of Robert E. Howard still resonates after decades with readers – equal parts ringing steel, thunderous horse hooves, and spattered blood. Far from being a stereotype, his creation of Conan is the high heroic adventurer. His raw muscle and sinews, boiling temper, and lusty laughs are the gauge by which all modern heroes must be measured.”

– ERIC NYLUND
Author of Halo: The Fall of Reach

“Howard honestly believed the basic truth of the stories he was telling. It's as if he'd said, ‘This is how life was really lived in those former savage times!'”

– DAVID DRAKE
Author of Grimmer Than Hell and Dogs of War

“That teller of marvellous tales, Robert Howard, did indeed create a giant [Conan] in whose shadow other ‘hero tales' must stand.”

– JOHN JAKES
New York Times bestselling author
of the North and South trilogy

“Most of the fantasy of the past thirty-five years has two main wellsprings: J.R.R. Tolkien and Robert E. Howard. Tolkien himself, who had little use for most contemporary fantasists, rather liked the Conan tales. For headlong, nonstop adventure and for vivid, even florid, scenery, no one even comes close to Howard. If you want a rip-roaring good time, this is the place to start.”

– HARRY TURTLEDOVE
Author of Guns of the South

“[Behind Howard's stories] lurks a dark poetry, and the timeless truth of dreams. That is why these tales have survived. They remain a fitting heritage of the poet and dreamer who was Robert E. Howard.”

– ROBERT BLOCH
Author of Psycho

“The stories have a livingness about them [that's] impossible to fake. . . . Not one of them is boring – there is always some special touch – and most, of course, are rousers.”

– GAHAN WILSON
Reviewer and author of I Paint What I See

“For stark, living fear . . . what other writer is even in the running with Robert E. Howard?”

– H. P. LOVECRAFT

“Howard . . . brought a brash, tough element to the epic fantasy which did as much to change the course of the American school away from precious writing and static imagery as Hammett, Chandler, and the Black Mask pulp writers were to change the course of American detective fiction.”

– MICHAEL MOORCOCK
Award-winning author of the Elric saga

“In this, I think, the art of Robert E. Howard was hard to surpass: vigor, speed, vividness. And always there is that furious, galloping narrative pace.”

– POUL ANDERSON
Award-winning author of Genesis
and World Without Stars

“For vivid, violent, gripping, headlong action, the stories of Robert E. Howard . . . take the prize among heroic fantasies.”

– L. SPRAGUE DE CAMP
Author of Lest Darkness Fall

“The best pulp [fantasy] writer was Robert E. Howard. . . . He painted in about the broadest strokes imaginable. A mass of glimmering black for the menace, an ice-blue cascade for the hero, betweeen them a swath of crimson for battle, passion, blood – and that was the picture, or story, rather, except where a vivid detail might chance to spring to life, or a swift thought-arabesque be added.”

– FRITZ LEIBER
Author of Farewell to Lankhmar