As The Ripe Wheat Lies After The Reaping

Here's a new thing I'll do once in a while. I'm going to post a passage of writing that I love. I've been told that such a thing is covered by Fair Use, but to cover my ass, I'm linking to the books, so it might be considered a review. Also, why don't I pick up 4% of the sale, if you buy it? But money isn't the goal.

Here's a bit I love from The Cairn on the Headland by Robert E. Howard. To the best of my knowledge, this work is in the public domain:

"Aye, it had been a feasting of ravens, a red flood of slaughter, and I knew that no more would the dragonprowed fleets sweep from the blue North with torch and destruction. Far and wide the Vikings lay in their glittering mail, as the ripe wheat lies after the reaping. Among them lay thousands of bodies clad in the wolf hides of the tribes, but the dead of the Northern people far outnumbered the dead of Erin. I was weary and sick of the stench of raw blood. I had glutted my soul with slaughter; now I sought plunder. And I found it--on the corpse of a richly-clad Norse chief which lay close to the seashore. I tore off the silver-scaled corselet, the horned helmet. They fitted as if made for me, and I swaggered among the dead, calling on my wild comrades to admire my appearance, though the harness felt strange to me, for the Gaels scorned armour and fought half-naked."

How 'bout that, huh? If you dug this and want to read more, you can buy the collection through the link below

The Hills of the Dead

Hey, Folks! I was recently a guest on the SFFaudio Podcast, discussing Robert E. Howard's Solomon Kane story, The Hills of the Dead. You can listen here: http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=49705 There's a reading of the story by Paul Boehmer, followed by our discussion. I first read it years ago, along with the other Solomon Kane stories, and this one stuck with me the most. The Hills of the Dead is the one I tell people about, even years later, mainly because it's got the most innovative disposal of vampires I've ever seen. To think this was written in the 1930s and I haven't seen rip-offs is impressive. If you're a hardcore horror person, maybe it won't feel so unique. At any rate, go listen to the podcast!

Hear The Old Weird Masters

As you know, I'm a lover of audio fiction and I've recently made a couple of discoveries featuring two of the legends of Weird Tales from the 1920s and '30s.

The H.P. Lovecraft Literary Podcast (http://hppodcraft.com/) is an awesome way to be introduced to or to revisit the works of H.P. Lovecraft. Each episode explores one of the old man's stories and they do so in chronological order, so you can pick up a collection and read along with them. Chad Fifer and Chris Lackey discuss the tales with intelligence and great senses of humor with plenty of excerpts thrown in. I'm only three shows in and I know I'll be downloading all of them soon.

The SFFaudio podcast #79 (http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=24487) gives us a free reading of the entirety of Robert E. Howard's Conan adventure, Queen of the Black Coast, read by Gary Kobler. This is a great story which I've read a few times and am listening to now. I don't normally reread or re-listen to anything, but great stylists like William Gibson, Ray Bradbury and Robert E. Howard always bring me back to the table.

Both of these podcasts give the listener a taste of the old masters at work. If you've never tried them or if you have and you love them, then check these out.

Conan On Audio (The Cimmerian, Not The Late Night Guy)

I was quite pleased to discover last night that BrokenSea Audio Productions has seen fit to bring some of Robert E. Howard's Conan stories to life on audio. Free audio! Give it a go: http://brokensea.com/conan/

Howard is my favorite writer. Not on literary merit, to be sure. The reason he's number one is that he was able to make black ink combine with pulp paper in such a way that it pulses in your hands. Roll up those sleeves because the passion spills over the edges of the page. Howard wrote with fire and fury and didn't give a damn about refinement or the liberal use of adjectives.

Caveats (Now that you've already gone and clicked on the link): Howard was a racist. He was a small town Texan writing during the depression era. That he was a racist shouldn't come as too much of a shock. You'll hear that worldview spill over into some of his stories. Where it does, I don't see it as particularly vicious, but some of you may be offended.

Also, though I've downloaded them, I haven't listened to these yet myself. I tried a few seconds worth just to make sure they weren't selling timeshares instead of reading Conan stories. The bit I listened to seems to have been narrated by either Randy "Macho Man" Savage or some other wrestling/surfer dude. Whoever he is, he's into it.

I have read both of these stories. Of the two stories so far posted "Red Nails" is by far the more powerful. There's something dread and claustrophobic about the whole thing that made me put my book down a couple of times and take in deep gulps of air. It's definitely one of the darkest Conan stories I've ever experienced.

Take up your sword, gulp your own air and dive straight into the heart of Hyboria.