From Amazon.com
Long before Robert Jordan built his wildly successful Wheel of Time series (debuting with 1990's
Eye of the World), the now-canonized writer cut his fantasy teeth borrowing time with Robert E. Howard's dark pulp-fiction hero, Conan of Cimmeria. Of the six novels Jordan contributed to the Conan series (well, seven, if you count the alt-history
Conan the Destroyer), three have been assembled here for rerelease: 1983's
Conan the Triumphant and 1984's
Conan the Magnificent and
Conan the Victorious. (The other three appear in Jordan's first collection,
The Conan Chronicles.)
Anyone who writes Conan stories immediately draws the scrutiny of true believers--those of us who carted around tattered Carter and de Camp paperbacks in our book bags for years, drooling over the lusty Boris Vallejo covers (laughably tame compared to the Weird Tales covers from the '20s and '30s, where Conan first appeared). But Jordan gets it right, some argue better than anyone but REH himself, soundly grasping the first rule of Conan writing: the stories aren't about Conan; Conan is the story. A problematic hero, an almost elemental force, Conan exists beyond good and evil--the predictable wench-hoisting and head-cleaving of a good Conan tale are just a backdrop for the blue-eyed barbarian, which plays perfectly to Jordan's superlative descriptive skills.
This second Jordan collection is classic Conan: The Magnificent pits the Cimmerian against belligerent hill people, a golden-eyed fire beast, and bow-toting noble babe Jondra; in The Triumphant, Conan kicks butt on the evil god Al'Kiir and his sinister (and, of course, hot) servant Lady Synelle; The Victorioushas Conan wounded by a poisoned assassin's blade--and his search for an antidote leads him to Vendhya and a subterranean crypt guarded by the eight-armed beast Masrok and a host of demons. Crom and steel! --Paul Hughes
From Publishers Weekly
Everyone starts somewhere, and #1 bestselling author Jordan (the Wheel of Time series) started, more or less, here: with three classic pastiches of Robert E. Howard's mighty-thewed hero, published in mass market in the early 1980s. In Conan the Magnificent, the big guy is a thief in Zamora, where he and another (female) thief, Tamira, have their eyes on the precious jewels owned by the powerful Lady Jondra. To get them, Conan must vanquish a shaman, a dangerous tribe and a firedrake. In Conan the Triumphant, an older Conan works as a captain of mercenaries in Ophir. The cunning Lady Synelle is making bloody sacrifices to the ancient and evil god al'Kiir in order to consolidate her claim to the throne. Synelle takes an interest in Conan when he comes into possession of an image she can use to revive the god. Also pursuing Conan, but with more deadly motives, is the female bandit Karela, his old rival and lover. In Conan the Victorious, our hero must flee Turan after killing an officer of the City Guards. He ends up en route to Vendhya, with a caravan that is about to plunge into an intrigue conjured up by one Naipal, a wizard who is trying to revive an army of immortal warriors. It takes all of Conan's strength, wits and allies to fulfill the title's promise. For all their careful plotting and world building, Jordan's Conan tales are delightfully implausible, filled with rousing descriptions of extravagant physical feats and willing women. His action-packed novels add few new nuances to Conan's character, but they make an entertaining continuation of his adventures, and enjoyable fare for Jordan fans until the Wheel of Time rolls back into sight. (Oct.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
de Robert Jordan
de Robert Howard
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