Howard was a true storyteller—one of the first, and certainly among the best, you’ll find in heroic fantasy. Readers familiar with Howard will fully understand the use of heightened language used to evoke a bygone age, even if some of the character descriptions might fall foul of contemporary sensibilities.

The eyes under his brows were volcanic blue and his features bluntly, ruggedly carved, with close-shaven jowls. When she runs afoul of an exiled Stygian noble, however, things take a deadly turn, embroiling them both in the schemes of a priest of the serpent god Set. At this point the novel appears to be going in a new direction and will be about how to finagle a gold heist with Stygians everywhere. Serving in the company known as Zarallo's Free Companions, he fights alongside soldiers of fortune from Zingara, Koth, Shem, and other lands—a hard-handed band of killers loyal to anyone who pays them well.com, Saffel discusses how Stirling was provided with “several outlines” reflecting what Titan wanted to do with the book. Howard’s greatest creation was, as I understand it, Harry Turtledove’s Conan of Venarium (Tor, 2003). He managed to combine the action, adventure, monsters and magic of Conan with more realistic characters and combat (and much less purple prose, racism and sexism). All Conan: Blood of the Serpent is, is a disappointing editorial cash-grab that urinates all over the Conan name. It really made me appreciate the new material more seeing the context that inspired it and having the story conclude with Red Nails.

His hair fell to his shoulders, square-cut and as black as any Stygian’s, tied back with a strip of black silk. With all that possibility at his fingertips, Stirling delivers a boring, uninspired plot and two dimensional characters. Hocking and one by Scott Oden—serialized as part of Marvel’s Conan the Barbarian and The Savage Sword of Conan comic book series. Howard’s Conan” is guaranteed to bother those short-sighted fans who merely want to virtue signal that this is NOT Robert E.

In Howard’s grim and all too realistic view, the barbarians are always at the gate, and once a culture allows itself to grow soft, decadent or simply neglectful, it will be swept away by the primitive and ruthless. Fans of apocalyptical thrillers like Stephen King’s The Stand will find Dies the Fire absolutely riveting…a fantastic epic work. So, Blood of the Serpent (2022) is a struggle for me to review objectively but, seeing as how Conan set me on this path, I owe him the attempt. I thought it was enjoyable but maybe a little underwhelming when I first completed Sterling’s portion of the book. Overall, even though I was not blown away by the story or packaging I still found the story engaging and welcomed it to my collection.