The Complete Chronicles of Conan – International Edition, April 1, 2009 PDF

The Complete Chronicles of Conan (GollanczF.) Paperback – International Edition, April 1, 2009
Author: Visit ‘s Robert E. Howard Page ID: 0575077808

Review

“Howard was the Thomas Wolfe of fantasy, and most of his Conan tales seem to almost fall over themselves in their need to get out.”  —Stephen King

“A hero of mythic proportion, fashioned by a storyteller who helped define what a modern fantasy should be. Rogues in the House is one of the finest tales of sword and sorcery ever written.”  —Raymond E. Feist, author, The Riftwar Cycle

“Pure adventure yarns with a touch of weirdness.”  —H.P. Lovecraft

“Handsome.”  —Fantasy and Science Fiction

About the Author

Robert E. Howard’s (1906–1936) tales of heroic and supernatural fantasy won him a huge audience across the world and influenced a whole generation of writers, from Robert Jordan to Raymond E. Feist.

Series: GollanczF.Paperback: 944 pagesPublisher: Gollancz; Export / Airport centenary ed edition (April 1, 2009)Language: EnglishISBN-10: 0575077808ISBN-13: 978-0575077805 Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 2.2 inches Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds Best Sellers Rank: #1,464,056 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #14812 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Fantasy > Epic #123334 in Books > Literature & Fiction > United States
If you’re at all a fan of fantasy, you owe it to yourself to read the original Conan stories written by Robert E. Howard. He’s one of the very few writers of pre-Tolkien fantasy whose characters are still household words a hundred years later. There’s a reason. Conan is an elemental, archetypal character, and Howard’s writing is masterful — as Stephen King described it, "Howard’s writing seems so highly charged with energy that it nearly gives off sparks." No one else in fantasy has ever managed to write action as ferociously primal as Howard, and Howard’s original Conan stories have a madness and a ferocious joy that no other writer has ever completely recaptured. If you’ve only seen Conan through knockoffs or films, do yourself a favor and read the original: the difference is like whiskey to water.

I like this collection because it’s a one-volume collection of all Howards’ Conan stories, in order of publication without extraneous materials edited by L. Sprague de Camp or others based on Howard’s notes — for example, it foregoes including "The Treasure of Tranicos" (de Camp’s edited version) in favor of Howard’s original Conan story, "The Black Stranger" (which was rejected for publication, rewritten by Howard for another character named Black Vulmea, which was again re-written by DeCamp as "Tranicos"). It contains Howard’s two essays on the Hyborian Age (detailing history before and after Conan, respectively), the poem "Cimmeria," and all in all contains everything it needs to contain and nothing it shouldn’t — a solid, single-volume collection of the original Conan stories by Howard, in order of publication.

I should mention one broad issue with Howard’s writing and a couple of relatively minor flaws with this volume.
I have been a fan of Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories since I first got my hands on the Ace paperbacks with the Frank Frazetta covers back in the early 80s. It wasn’t until much later that I discovered how adulterated those stories were, and went searching for more "pure" Howard. I now own about three collections of the complete Howard Conan stories, with this single volume collected edition being the third.

"The Complete Chronicles of Conan: Centenary Edition" is a handsome imitation leather-bound hardback by UK-based publisher Gollancz, who also published the 2-Volume "The Conan Chronicles" which was one of the first collection of all-Howard material (without the supplemental De Camp edits). This "Centenary Edition" was published in the UK in 2006 to celebrate the 100th birthday of author Robert E. Howard, and is a companion volume to the Necronomicon: The Best Weird Tales of H. P. Lovecraft collection that is similarly bound.

The stories here are presented exactly as they were originally published. This contrasts with the 3-volume Del Rey editions (The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, The Bloody Crown of Conan,
Download The Complete Chronicles of Conan – International Edition, April 1, 2009 PDF

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