Jirel Meets Magic by C.L. Moore
Hellsgarde by C.L. Moore
Red Nails by Robert E. Howard (reread)
Jewels of Gwahlur by Robert E. Howard
Men of the Shadows by Robert E. Howard
The Shadow Kingdom by Robert E. Howard
Exile of Atlantis by Robert E. Howard
The Slithering Shadow by Robert E. Howard
The Pool of the Black One by Robert E. Howard
The Devil in Iron by Robert E. Howard
The Man-Eaters of Zamboula by Robert E. Howard
The Valley of the Worm by Robert E. Howard
A Witch Shall Be Born by Robert E. Howard (cool crucifixion scene and a bloodthirsty villainess but the action scenes get shortchanged)
The Black Stranger by Robert E. Howard (would have been better as a non Conan, non fantasy pirate tale)
Shadows in the Moonlight by Robert E. Howard
Kings of the Night by Robert E. Howard (short on plot but lots of action. Features both Kull and Bran Mak Morn)
The Gods of Bal-Sagoth by Robert E. Howard (this story was ok, but could have used some more fantastic/weird elements. I like the two main characters)
Shadows in the Dark - Conan pastiche by L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter. Pretty weak.
Legions of the Dead - Conan pastiche by L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter. Could have been good, but the ending is a dud.
The People of the Summit - Conan pastiche by Björn Nyberg and L. Sprague de Camp. Not good.
The Ivory Goddess - Conan pastiche by L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter
I've read 4 of the 6
Jirel of Joiry stories. They have been fairly repetitive so far. The first one is about Jirel wandering through a lad of magic, the second is a follow-up where she returns to the same place, and the third story is about her wandering around a new magic land. Not a lot of physical action in any of these stories. The last one I read,
Hellsgarde, is the best. It doesn't have a lot of action either, but there are some imaginative weird/horror elements that make up for it.
Robert E. Howard:
I'm getting a little burned out on his stuff. Three reasons:
1) "That's
RACIST!"
I'm not offended by the racial stuff so much as I am insanely bored by it. Howard is a broken record on the subject and manage to squeeze it into almost every story it seems. This man couldn't give you a recipe for sugar cookies without slipping in a half dozen references to "degenerate Toll House cookies, tainted by dark chocolate chips."
2) He writes with "panther like quickness"!
If you read pulp stuff or old western novels you will see a lot of hack writers describe their characters as moving with "cat like quickness" or of having "the grace of a panther." It's one of the laziest, most unimaginative ways to describe a character, imo. Well, when Robert Howard was a kid his See and Say toy must have been stuck on 'Kitty' because the only ****ing similes and metaphors he can come up with to describe Conan are feline related. Over and over again - sometimes twice within the same paragraph. I know that sounds like a silly thing to complain about but imagine reading the Master and Commander books if the only way Patrick O'Brian could describe the ocean was as a "wine dark sea."
3) Civilization vs Barbarism
This is a theme that he returns to often but he never really writes a story that actually explores the topic. Shit, 90% of the characters in these stories are barbarians and the other 10% are giant snakes so it's kind of hard to understand the point he's trying to make. Either write a story to do the topic justice or drop the constant references to Conan being awesome because of his "pure elemental barbarism."
I'm gonna take a little break from the Conan stuff and then come back to read "Hour of the Dragon." I think I've probably just read too many of Howard's stories back to back and his faults have become too noticeable.
Next I read:
This was a recommendation from my local bookstore owner. It's a ten part series and I can't tell for sure yet how I'm going to like it but book one was ok. My favorite part was the battle on the staircase.
Book 2:
Still pretty good. It ends in a way that makes me eager to check out book 3.
Book 3:
The mystery deepens. And deepens. And then deepens some more. A lot of twist and turns and borders on getting a little too confusing but it still holds together. Maybe a little too talky but still interesting.