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Category: Robert E. Howard

’24? in 42′ with…Bob Byrne????

’24? in 42′ with…Bob Byrne????

Jason Waltz kicked off season two of his 24? in 42 podcast interviews with your very own Monday morning columnist. The prior installment was with Malazan’s Ian C. Esslemont, so I’m in pretty good company here.

It should not surprise you that I was all over the place, covering Robert E. Howard, Michael Moorcock, Columbo, books on writing and screenwriting, Encyclopedia Brown, the Civil War, Tolkien, The Constitutional Convention of 1787, Lawrence Block, Steven Hockensmith, Norbert Davis, and much more.

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New Adventures for the World’s Favorite Barbarian

New Adventures for the World’s Favorite Barbarian

Conan the Barbarian: Battle of The Black Stone (Titan Comics collected edition, April 1, 2025). Cover by Jonas Scharf

Few things are more ubiquitous than Conan and fantasy. Decades of sword-swinging high adventure has earned the barbarian a following most can only dream of. It’s taken the heavily thewed warrior to the big screen, Marvel Comics, and more. But it’s his latest adventure at Titan Comics that may prove to be the icing on the proverbial Shadizarian cake.

“This isn’t my first time writing Conan, but it’s definitely the most expansive opportunity I’ve ever had to chart the direction of such an amazing iconic character. I could not be happier in terms of our team and the collaboration we have in terms of story, art, and worldbuilding,” Jim Zub, writer of Conan the Barbarian at Titan Comics, shared by email.

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Eleven Years of Monday Mornings with Bob

Eleven Years of Monday Mornings with Bob

Wow. Eleven years ago today, on March 10, 2014, I became an official Black Gate blogger. The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes kicked off a three year run, bringing a mystery presence every Monday morning. I roamed off topic a bit – but NOTHING like I do now. I mean, did you read last week’s baseball post?

Encouraged by my buddy William Patrick Maynard (an established Black Gater), I went from some uknown guy commenting on other people’s posts, to a moderately interesting weekly columnist. And every World Fantasy Award-winning website, with an amazing roster of bloggers, needs a mystery column, right???

I talked about joining Black Gate in my chronicle of what passes for my writing career: Ya Gotta Ask.

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“Worms of the Earth” and Robert E. Howard’s Ultimate Triumph

“Worms of the Earth” and Robert E. Howard’s Ultimate Triumph


Robert E. Howard in a photo sent to H.P. Lovecraft in 1931,
and Bran Mak Morn: The Last King (Del Rey, May 31, 2005)

January 22, 2025 was the 119th birthday of Robert E. Howard, my favorite author. The works of this great author resonate with countless fans to this day.

“Worms of the Earth” is my favorite story by Robert E. Howard. It features Bran Mak Morn, the last king of the Picts.

Howard was fascinated with Picts, his conception of whom was largely mythological, with splashes of real world history. The Picts in his stories span Kull, Conan, Bran, James Allison, and more.

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Roy Thomas’ Barbarian Life

Roy Thomas’ Barbarian Life

Conan The Barbarian #1 (Marvel Comics, October 1970). Art by Barry Windsor Smith

The package I received on July 6, 2020 brought me great joy! Roy Thomas is my favorite comic book writer. I correspond with him occasionally, and he is quite generous with his time, sharing his thoughts and memories. Very similar to how Gary Gygax did this, treating every fan with dignity and respect. A true gentleman.

I thanked Roy in my latest Hyperborea adventure book, The Sea-Wolf’s Daughter, because it included a character inspired by one of his creations. I sent him a copy of the book, and along with it my personal copy of Conan the Barbarian #1, to be signed by the author. Well, here it is! (He has an agency that normally handles this sort of thing, but he made an exception for me.) Excelsior!

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Savage Sword of Conan is Back

Savage Sword of Conan is Back


Savage Sword of Conan #1 (Titan Comics, February 2024). Cover art by Joe Jusko

Savage Sword of Conan, from Titan Comics, is the comic book that I have been waiting for. It is a thing of perfection: art, story, presentation, physical format – all unmatched.

The cover by Joe Jusko is brilliant, capturing some brutal imagery from the prose story within, penned by Jim Zub. I loved Joe’s work on the original SSoC run.

The introduction by Roy Thomas was a delight. Roy was the mastermind behind Conan the Barbarian and Savage Sword of Conan, but he’s also known for creating characters such as Wolverine, Vision, Werewolf by Night, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, Ultron, and scores more. Hearing that he had plans to contribute to this magazine filled me with joy.

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The Masters of Narrative Drive

The Masters of Narrative Drive

The Outlaw of Torn and The Mad King by Edgar Rice Burroughs (Ace Books, January 1973 and February 1979). Covers by Frank Frazetta and Boris Vallejo

An author friend of 70+ books told me that a novel is just “one damned thing after another.” This is a layman’s way of saying that a book needs “narrative drive.” Narrative drive keeps readers turning the pages. It exerts a pull that drags the reader along. Edgar Rice Burroughs was the master of narrative drive. Things are happening on every page of his books that keep you wanting to know more.

There are two primary kinds of “wanting to know more.” One is, more information about the story’s plot. This is based on intellectual curiosity, and mystery stories illustrate this most clearly. Who committed the murder? Why? How? Etc. This is the primary type of drive that good nonfiction has.

The second kind of “wanting to know more” is based on emotion and character. What is going to happen to a particular character or characters the reader is attached to? The strongest narrative drive combines these.

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The Best of Bob: 2024

The Best of Bob: 2024

Happy 2025! Let’s kick butt for another year. Or at least, limp to the finish 52 weeks. from now. I take what I can get. I started a Best of Bob feature last year. And while it may seem I’m constantly finding folks to write my column for me (hey – it’s a gift!), some of you Black Gaters may be surprised that I occasionally actually write my own essays for the Monday morning slot. John O’Neill is too savvy an editor for me to completely fool him for over decade.

So here are what I thought were ten of my better efforts in 2024. Hopefully you saw them back when I first posted them. But if not, maybe you’ll check out a few now. Ranking them seemed a bit egotistical, so they’re in chronological order. Let’s go!

1) Roaming the Old West, with Holmes on the Range (February 5, 2024)

It might look like I just throw something together every week (and looks aren’t always deceptive). But when I can find the time, I love putting together something special. And after reading/re-reading the entire series, I really nailed a three-part series on Steve Hockensmith’s Sherlock Holmes influenced, Old West mysteries about cowboy brothers Old Red and Big Red.

I followed up a pretty solid series overview, with the first-ever comprehensive chronology! And then, we rounded it out with a great Q&A from Steve himself. This is a terrific series: a great read, and solid on audiobook. Late in the year, the first two novels in a spin-off series that’s more Old West adventure than Holmes-flavored, came out. I’m looking forward to more of all aspects of the Double-A Western Detective Agency.

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Conan Unchained!, The Keep on the Borderlands, and the 50th Anniversary of Dungeons and Dragons

Conan Unchained!, The Keep on the Borderlands, and the 50th Anniversary of Dungeons and Dragons


Advanced Dungeons & Dragons CB1: Conan Unchained! by David “Zeb” Cook (TSR, 1984)

Before TSR created the Conan Role Playing Game with its own rules and conventions, they released two Conan adventure modules for use with AD&D, but with a few interesting rules additions, including Fear Checks, Luck Points, and more lenient Healing rules.

This adventure was written by the legendary David “Zeb” Cook and illustrated by the incredibly talented Jeff Butler. As I’ve had the pleasure of meeting both gentlemen at several conventions, I managed to get the book signed and personalized by each of them. It would be epic if I could get Arnold to sign it. 😉

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I Read a Year of Robert E. Howard Pastiche So You Don’t Have To (But you really might want to)

I Read a Year of Robert E. Howard Pastiche So You Don’t Have To (But you really might want to)


Three installments in The Heroic Legends Series from Titan Books: Conan:
The Shadow of Vengeance by Scott Oden (January 30, 2024), Solomon Kane:
The Hound of God by Jonathan Maberry (November 28, 2023), and Bran Mak
Morn: Red Waves of Slaughter by Steven L. Shrewsbury (March 26, 2024)

Pastiche — basically, licensed fan-fic — has been around as long as there has been fiction, but certain properties “lock in” on it; becoming sometimes so richly filled with authorized sequels, continuations or standalones, that the pastiche comes to outweigh the original work. BG’s Bob Byrne might tell me I’m wrong, and has the chops to do so, but I think Sherlock Homes probably outweighs every other character for stories written by hands other than the original author. But in the fantasy realm, that nod must go to Robert E. Howard, and of all his creations, to Conan of Cimmeria.

Starting with L. Sprauge de Camp and Lin Carter’s “posthumous collaborations,” of the mid-20th Century, wherein they finished unfinished manuscripts, rewrote non-Conan stories and added tales of their own to create a coherent timeline of his adventures, REH pastiche truckled along quite steadily through the 70s, with stories by diverse hands from Poul Anderson to Karl Edward Wagner, Dave Smith and Richard Tierney to Andrew Offut, and for not only Conan but for Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, Black Vulmea and others.

Many of these works were forgettable, some pretty good and a few excellent (IMO, the Offut Cormac Mac Art stories co-written with Keith Taylor are decidedly better than Howard’s use of the character and stand on their own as great S&S). After a glut of Conan novels into the early 80s by TOR, again by many diverse hands such as Robert Jordan and John Maddox Robert, the wind went out of Sword & Sorcery’s sails and there was little-to-nothing in REH pastiche for decades. Conan lived on for a time in Marvel comics, then a Dark Horse’s excellent reboot, in a MMORG, and that was it.

Then, out of nowhere, Heroic Signatures proudly announced it had acquired the rights to Robert E. Howard’s properties in 2018 – and did nothing. Nothing until the last two years, when they suddenly launched a three-pronged approach – novel length works, a new Conan comic series partnered with Titan, and a series of monthly digital short stories penned by established fantasy and horror writers. It’s the latter we’ll talk about here.

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