Help me build up a Robert E. Howard book collection.

June 24, 2011 8:01 PM

Help me build up a Robert E. Howard book collection.

I want to get nearly everything of significance that Robert E. Howard wrote, though I'm unsure of which collections to seek out.

Luckily, I've discovered that every Conan-related book can be found in The Complete Chronicles of Conan which is still in print and seems to be the best place to get everything Conan-related by Robert E. Howard. But this still leaves me with all the other non-Conan characters that Robert E. Howard wrote about.

I was thinking of getting the new collection Conan's Brethren, but it's supposedly more of a sampler than anything else which makes me want to look elsewhere. Which collection(s) would be better, more complete alternatives to Conan's Brethren? Would I perhaps be content with just The Complete Conan and Conan's Brethren? Or is there more worthwhile stuff by Robert E. Howard that I should get my hands on?

In case you don't know the contents of Conan's Brethren, here they are:

Introduction

Solomon Kane

Solomon Kane's Homecoming (verse)
Red Shadows
Skulls in the Stars
Rattle of Bones
The Moon of Skulls
The Hills of the Dead
The Footfalls Within
Wings in the Night

King Kull

The Shadow Kingdom
The Mirrors of Tuzun Thune
The King and the Oak (verse)

Bran Mak Morn & the Picts

The Lost Race
Kings of the Night
The Dark Man
Worms of the Earth

Savages, Swordsmen & Sorcerers

Spear and Fang
Hawks of Outremer
The Gods of Bal-Sagoth
The Sowers of the Thunder
Lord of Samarcand
The Lion of Tiberias
The Shadow of the Vulture
The Valley of the Worm
The Frost King's Daughter
The Garden of Fear
Gates of Empire
Almuric
The Ghost Kings (verse)

Is there anything missing that I should get my hands on?

Thanks.

posted by GlassHeart to Writing & Language (2 answers total)

I like the Del Ray collections. I was putting together some Amazon links, but this guy has a listmania already set up, so I'll just link to that instead.
posted by fings at 8:20 PM on June 24, 2011

Yeah, mainly get the recent Del Rey editions. REH died at age 30, but he was extremely prolific. I believe that, like the Gollancz edition you mention, the current Del Rey editions eschew the unpopular edits once made by L. Sprague de Camp, and they go pretty far in collecting everything of significance. You definitely want Conan, Kull, Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, and the horror stories.

Incidentally, de Camp's poor rep among REH fans shouldn't dissuade anyone from trying his stuff too. The planet Krishna books are especially fun swashbuckling adventure stories. There just wasn't a good reason to mess with Howard's work.
posted by Monsieur Caution at 9:21 PM on June 24, 2011