Conan Reading Guide

KOLAT

Mongoose
Hello,

I have most of the books of Conan RPG from Mongoose Publishing and enjoy it. Now I want to go further and read the original novels from Robert E. Howard ,L. Sprague de Camp and others.
But i'm a bit Lost with all the books available.

Can anyone give me the complete list of novels and tell me in which order i have to read those novels, in a way that i can read them in chronologic order: in a word i need a Reading Guide.

Sorry if i'm not clear with my request.

KOLAT
French Glorantha/Runequest Fan and Newly Conan Fan ;)
French poster from Paris/France :oops:
 
I stumbled across this timeline that I've found helpful. It contains both the short stories of Howard, as well as most of the pastiches.

http://www.dodgenet.com/~moonblossom/timeline.htm

Also, they just reprinted the Howard stories as they were originally written in :

1. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian
2. The Blood Crown of Conan
3. The Conquering Sword of Conan
 
1. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian
2. The Blood Crown of Conan
3. The Conquering Sword of Conan

These books are fabulous for anyone seriously interested in REH's work. With the appendices, they include virtually everything Howard ever wrote on Conan.
 
Dave45 said:
I stumbled across this timeline that I've found helpful. It contains both the short stories of Howard, as well as most of the pastiches.

http://www.dodgenet.com/~moonblossom/timeline.htm

Also, they just reprinted the Howard stories as they were originally written in :

1. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian
2. The Blood Crown of Conan
3. The Conquering Sword of Conan


Actually, the chronlogy you found in that link is the adapted from the old chronology as established by De Camp and Carter to acomodate their (terrible) pastiches. The currently most accepted chronology, and the one that is used in this rpg of Mongoose and in the current (an superb) comics series by Dark Horse, is the chronology deduced by Dale Rippke, which uses only Howard's tales as reference and a lot of common sense. You can fin it in:

http://www.rehupa.com/rippke_chronology.htm

Read it, enjoy it, and let us know if you like it better.

IMO, you don't need to read the vast majority of the pastiches, and certainly not those of De Camp and Carter. You will find optional information in some rpg books, like Diviatix the druid in Beyond the Black River, but no need to suffer reading those stories, really.
 
Funny, I just downloaded a listing of all the published books for Conan from www.conan.com. Go to the site and click on "Publishing".
 
Auggie said:
Funny, I just downloaded a listing of all the published books for Conan from www.conan.com. Go to the site and click on "Publishing".
To save nagivating, here's the direct link: http://www.conan.com./bibliography.shtml.

But - as you may see - it's not up to date. It still says, "The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian (Conan of Cimmeria, Book 1) ... November 2005 (hardcover, forthcoming)" and "The Conquering Sword of Conan (Conan of Cimmeria, Book 3), November 2005 (trade paperback, forthcoming)": both have been published.

There's also a single hardback volume of the Millennium/Gollancz Fantasy Masterworks collections now available:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0575077662/ref=pd_rnr_fr_gw_nr/202-9462211-8652612 - not available in the U.S., I think, because of licensing conflicts with the Del Rey editions.

Ciao,
Ant
 
1. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian

I bought that one about two month ago, and am reading it little by little (if only I had some more time...). I must say i was a bit skeptic at first but I'm really enjoying the tales...

arnon
 
Crichton said:
Dave45 said:
I stumbled across this timeline that I've found helpful. It contains both the short stories of Howard, as well as most of the pastiches.

http://www.dodgenet.com/~moonblossom/timeline.htm

Also, they just reprinted the Howard stories as they were originally written in :

1. The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian
2. The Blood Crown of Conan
3. The Conquering Sword of Conan


Actually, the chronlogy you found in that link is the adapted from the old chronology as established by De Camp and Carter to acomodate their (terrible) pastiches. The currently most accepted chronology, and the one that is used in this rpg of Mongoose and in the current (an superb) comics series by Dark Horse, is the chronology deduced by Dale Rippke, which uses only Howard's tales as reference and a lot of common sense. You can fin it in:

http://www.rehupa.com/rippke_chronology.htm

Read it, enjoy it, and let us know if you like it better.

IMO, you don't need to read the vast majority of the pastiches, and certainly not those of De Camp and Carter. You will find optional information in some rpg books, like Diviatix the druid in Beyond the Black River, but no need to suffer reading those stories, really.

I actually agree - The Howard stories are definately the place to start. None of the pastiches measure up to the original stories by Howard certainly, but some are fun/entertaining. This was the only timeline that I was aware of, but thanks for the link to the Howard chronology. I was looking for something like that not too long ago myself. Very helpful!!!
 
And I almost forgot - the new Conan comic from Dark Horse is absolutely fantastic! The stories definately have a REH feel to them.

I recently heard that the series will be changing writers soon, so hopefully the new writer will keep up the same standard.
 
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