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Adventures of Conan
Конан наемника
Изхвърлен на брега на най-далечните северни райони на Британия, Конан полага клетва да служи като наемник на високомерната, красива кралица Елкуина. Скоро силният варварин е въвлечен във война срещу двама крале, които искат да заграбят земите на Елкуина и срещу магьосника Илма, кроящ планове за господство над целия Север и с нечисти помисли към кралицата. От напоените с кръв снегове на горите на Британия до магьосническата Преместваща се страна се водят битки. Мъртвите стават да се бият, но победата може да извоюва единствено Конан Наемника.
224 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1987
7 people are currently reading
283 people want to read
About the author
John Maddox Roberts
126 books251 followersaka Mark Ramsay
John Maddox Roberts is the author of numerous works of science fiction and fantasy, in addition to his successful historical SPQR mystery series. The first two books in the series have recently been re-released in trade paperback.
John Maddox Roberts is the author of numerous works of science fiction and fantasy, in addition to his successful historical SPQR mystery series. The first two books in the series have recently been re-released in trade paperback.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
May 18, 2022
This was the second Conan novel that Roberts wrote, but is set a few years before his first, Conan the Valorous. It's set in the most Northern section of Brythunia, and Roberts did a good job of fleshing out an area that Howard didn't describe in any detail with a Scottish flavor. It's a standard Conan adventure in which he becomes embroiled in a struggle between rival kings and an evil wizard on behalf of a beautiful queen. (Surprisingly, his amorous designs go unfulfilled.) The book includes lengthy pieces by Robert Jordan and L. Sprague de Camp that attempt to put all of the published stories by all of the various writers who had contributed to Howard's character into a cohesive chronology.
April 5, 2024
High adventure in the age of barbarians. When Conan pledges himself to a northern queen to be her champion he runs afoul of two jealous kings vying for her kingdom. Featuring bloody battles, savage beasts and vile wizards this is definitely an entertaining take on Conan.
April 14, 2022
A fun entry in Tor's extensive Conan series! Set in the far northern reaches beyond the Vilayet Sea (not Brythunia like the blurb states!), Conan the Champion pits Conan into a familiar conflict. With warring kings and queens, sorcery, demons, and mythical monsters galore, this was quite an enjoyable sword and sorcery romp.
That being said, it didn't quite blow me away. There were many things I loved, don't get me wrong... but John Maddox Roberts gets very wild and weird here. Conan the Champion featured a giant ice snake, a huge scorpion, varying demons, a fantastical realm of inhuman hunters, and more. While this made the book varied and colourful, it felt a little (or a lot) overkill at times, which ultimately dulled the impact. Sometimes, simply, less is more. However, the battle scenes were great and the northern setting was a nice change from these stories which usually take place in hotter and more exotic climates.
Overall, this was an entertaining read which, though never offering a dull moment, lost a few points for being too sporadic and wacky, rushing itself at times (especially the ending, which was over in a heartbeat), and not focussing on Conan as much as I would have liked. Plus, Conan was a little too... pissy at times? I wasn't a fan of how he lost his cool with Queen Alcuina for not openly wanting him. She needed a royal suitor, and this just felt childish on Conan's part, who should know better. At this point in his life especially, the character is meant to be more mature and level-headed, but he wasn't always written that way here.
Still, some great moments and not a bad read! I think, despite a few flaws, it just about earns four stars. The dedication to Robert Jordan and Harriet McDougal was also a nice touch. I know Jordan started his career writing the first Conan books in this run, but it's cool that he and Harriet continued to edit them afterwards too!
That being said, it didn't quite blow me away. There were many things I loved, don't get me wrong... but John Maddox Roberts gets very wild and weird here. Conan the Champion featured a giant ice snake, a huge scorpion, varying demons, a fantastical realm of inhuman hunters, and more. While this made the book varied and colourful, it felt a little (or a lot) overkill at times, which ultimately dulled the impact. Sometimes, simply, less is more. However, the battle scenes were great and the northern setting was a nice change from these stories which usually take place in hotter and more exotic climates.
Overall, this was an entertaining read which, though never offering a dull moment, lost a few points for being too sporadic and wacky, rushing itself at times (especially the ending, which was over in a heartbeat), and not focussing on Conan as much as I would have liked. Plus, Conan was a little too... pissy at times? I wasn't a fan of how he lost his cool with Queen Alcuina for not openly wanting him. She needed a royal suitor, and this just felt childish on Conan's part, who should know better. At this point in his life especially, the character is meant to be more mature and level-headed, but he wasn't always written that way here.
Still, some great moments and not a bad read! I think, despite a few flaws, it just about earns four stars. The dedication to Robert Jordan and Harriet McDougal was also a nice touch. I know Jordan started his career writing the first Conan books in this run, but it's cool that he and Harriet continued to edit them afterwards too!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 14, 2017
За това вече е виновен Доктора, който погъделичка заспалата ми любов към жанра. Така и не прочетох всички преведени книги от поредицата за Безсмъртния воин навремето, ама като гледам не съм изпуснал чак толкова.
Джон Мадокс Робъртс се вмъква някъде след оригиналните пиратски приключения на Конан, около тридесетата му годишнина. Воинът корабокрушира на слабонаселен бряг далеч на север и е принуден да изкара там зимата. Понеже не може да стои на едно място се хваща наемник за едно от враждуващите местни кралства. Има магьосници, демони, други измерения, битки и единоборства. Все хубави работи.
Сега да помрънкам: С изключение на няколкото дни плътен екшън, когато отиде да спасява кралицата от измерението на демоните и една финална патаклама, нашето момче цяла зима пи бири до камината. Да добавим и, че това е единствената книга в която остава на сухо и получаваме... Джон, брато, искам като чета книга за Конан да си представям, че съм той, а не той да е мен – льокащ бира и зяпащ отстрани екзотичните красавици.
Двете сюжетни линии в книгата са вплетени една в друга само наужким, а са си две отделно новели и даже смятам, че щяха да са по-добри, ако не бяха на едно място (но пък е утешение, че такива простотии не се правят само тук).
Като цяло беше добре, а за четиво докато се правиш, че работиш си беше супер.
Джон Мадокс Робъртс се вмъква някъде след оригиналните пиратски приключения на Конан, около тридесетата му годишнина. Воинът корабокрушира на слабонаселен бряг далеч на север и е принуден да изкара там зимата. Понеже не може да стои на едно място се хваща наемник за едно от враждуващите местни кралства. Има магьосници, демони, други измерения, битки и единоборства. Все хубави работи.
Сега да помрънкам: С изключение на няколкото дни плътен екшън, когато отиде да спасява кралицата от измерението на демоните и една финална патаклама, нашето момче цяла зима пи бири до камината. Да добавим и, че това е единствената книга в която остава на сухо и получаваме... Джон, брато, искам като чета книга за Конан да си представям, че съм той, а не той да е мен – льокащ бира и зяпащ отстрани екзотичните красавици.
Двете сюжетни линии в книгата са вплетени една в друга само наужким, а са си две отделно новели и даже смятам, че щяха да са по-добри, ако не бяха на едно място (но пък е утешение, че такива простотии не се правят само тук).
Като цяло беше добре, а за четиво докато се правиш, че работиш си беше супер.
April 14, 2022
I enjoy the JMR Tornans. This one is not one of his best. It’s flighty. It feels episodic. It jumps from a gritty tale of Conan being the champion to a Northern Queen against two brigand kings and a wizard to a too strange in a non-Hyborian feeling outer plane. It even has one strange chapter, that while cool in its Poul Anderson Northern-Thing, it again feels out of place.
There is non-stop action and if this weren’t supposed to be a Conan story, it would be a 4 star read.
The edition I read has two bonus features: a publishing history of Conan books by Robert Jordan, who was the editor of the Tornans by this point in history, and a Biography of Conan by Sprauge De Camp. The later is amusing as de Camp does many somersaults in an attempt to squeeze everything he had pastiched and everything marketable. He even tries to shoehorn in the novelizations of the movies Conan the Barbarian (1982) and Conan the Destroyer.
There is non-stop action and if this weren’t supposed to be a Conan story, it would be a 4 star read.
The edition I read has two bonus features: a publishing history of Conan books by Robert Jordan, who was the editor of the Tornans by this point in history, and a Biography of Conan by Sprauge De Camp. The later is amusing as de Camp does many somersaults in an attempt to squeeze everything he had pastiched and everything marketable. He even tries to shoehorn in the novelizations of the movies Conan the Barbarian (1982) and Conan the Destroyer.
March 26, 2019
Conan is shipwrecked in the north Viyalet Sea at the beginning of winter and it will be 4 months before another ship comes along. Spurning an offer to wait it out in comfort at the local trading post he travels north looking for adventure. He rescues a traveling party from some ruffians and discovers that one of them is a beautiful and haughty queen. This queen is being courted by two kings, the Fat King and the Tall King. The Tall King has a pet wizard to aid him, but the Queen also has a wizard, just not as powerful. Since the Queen refuses to marry either King, the Fat King because he is old and fat and the Tall King because he collects human scalps. both Kings plot to capture the Queen and marry her despite her protests. Conan becomes the Queen's Champion and swears to protect her from both Kings.
The Tall King's wizard attacks the Queen's fort but Conan saves the day. Then the wizard sends some demons to kidnap the Queen, and Conan and her wizard follow them through a demon gate to a fairy land filled with carnivorous trees. Here Conan meets some Melniboneans.
With the Queen absent both Kings decide it's a good time to attack and kill all her followers. Soon this results in a battle of three armies and a lot of treachery. And blood on the snow.
Conan is his regular self here, going well out of his way to find someone to fight. He exhibits his natural leadership by teaching the Northmen new ways to fight, and gets to practice all his special skills, like climbing and sneaking and pretending to slip before stabbing someone in the face. One thing different is that the Queen does not immediately fall into his arms, and mostly just treats him like crap the whole time. It's fun to see Conan back up north, and to see how he reacts to being among other northmen. When in the south he complains about how soft and effete the southerners are, but when he is up north he complains about how the northerners are all ignorant and live in squalor. The northerners think he is weak because wears a shirt to keep warm when it's only 10 below zero, and he doesn't bother to get off his horse before he kills someone.
A good story, with a decent plot concerning three kingdoms, some wizardry, and a trip to the demon realms.
The Tall King's wizard attacks the Queen's fort but Conan saves the day. Then the wizard sends some demons to kidnap the Queen, and Conan and her wizard follow them through a demon gate to a fairy land filled with carnivorous trees. Here Conan meets some Melniboneans.
With the Queen absent both Kings decide it's a good time to attack and kill all her followers. Soon this results in a battle of three armies and a lot of treachery. And blood on the snow.
Conan is his regular self here, going well out of his way to find someone to fight. He exhibits his natural leadership by teaching the Northmen new ways to fight, and gets to practice all his special skills, like climbing and sneaking and pretending to slip before stabbing someone in the face. One thing different is that the Queen does not immediately fall into his arms, and mostly just treats him like crap the whole time. It's fun to see Conan back up north, and to see how he reacts to being among other northmen. When in the south he complains about how soft and effete the southerners are, but when he is up north he complains about how the northerners are all ignorant and live in squalor. The northerners think he is weak because wears a shirt to keep warm when it's only 10 below zero, and he doesn't bother to get off his horse before he kills someone.
A good story, with a decent plot concerning three kingdoms, some wizardry, and a trip to the demon realms.
September 14, 2017
Conan the Champion is set farther north than any of REH’s stories. Roberts’ Conan is cocky and aggressive, “wild and self-governed.” He will talk some trash, even to the twice-dead corpse of an ice zombie.
“‘Well, Agiluf,’ Conan said when he once again had breath, ‘you could not slay me when you were alive. Did you think you would have a better chance dead?’”
But Roberts’ Conan is no young hothead. Not anymore.
“There had been a time when Conan would have instantly split the man’s skull for these words, but age and experience had taught him to be prudent, especially in a strange land. He said simply: ‘I have no desire to dispute with you here in the home of my friend. But if you really want to sell me to the slavers, let us go over to yonder field, and I’ll carve your guts out and strangle your friends with them.’”
Roberts’ Conan still isn’t quite Howard’s—Roberts leans more on Scottish history; Howard on Texas history and the influence of the Great Depression—but it is pretty darn close.
Conan is shipwrecked in the far north of the Vilayet Sea and has to winter among warring barbarian clans. The book is notable for a couple reasons. One, Conan’s would-be romance with the queen of the clan he spends the winter with is prevented by her duty. Two, Conan journeys to an alternate dimension where he fights some creatures in the very best tradition of the fae—very reminiscent of Robert Jordan’s Aelfinn and Eelfinn and Leigh Brackett’s aliens from People of the Talisman. This is definitely the weirdest of the three John Maddox Roberts Conan books I’ve read.
“‘Well, Agiluf,’ Conan said when he once again had breath, ‘you could not slay me when you were alive. Did you think you would have a better chance dead?’”
But Roberts’ Conan is no young hothead. Not anymore.
“There had been a time when Conan would have instantly split the man’s skull for these words, but age and experience had taught him to be prudent, especially in a strange land. He said simply: ‘I have no desire to dispute with you here in the home of my friend. But if you really want to sell me to the slavers, let us go over to yonder field, and I’ll carve your guts out and strangle your friends with them.’”
Roberts’ Conan still isn’t quite Howard’s—Roberts leans more on Scottish history; Howard on Texas history and the influence of the Great Depression—but it is pretty darn close.
Conan is shipwrecked in the far north of the Vilayet Sea and has to winter among warring barbarian clans. The book is notable for a couple reasons. One, Conan’s would-be romance with the queen of the clan he spends the winter with is prevented by her duty. Two, Conan journeys to an alternate dimension where he fights some creatures in the very best tradition of the fae—very reminiscent of Robert Jordan’s Aelfinn and Eelfinn and Leigh Brackett’s aliens from People of the Talisman. This is definitely the weirdest of the three John Maddox Roberts Conan books I’ve read.
October 5, 2020
Conan is washed up on the northern shores of the Vilayet Sea, naked and helpless in a land of savage winters, bloodthirsty warlords, and conniving sorcerers.
Sucks to be them.
Roberts' second offering is a marked improvement over the first. The plot is scaled down a few orders -- gods and elder beings are shunted into the background, and the protagonists are petty chiefs and bandits. There is still plenty of magic to go around, but it's a lot more manageable in scope. Yes, there are demons and a spiritual realm to traverse, but we are no longer asked to believe that a mage capable of raising the horrors of the deep gets slapped down almost as an afterthought. The villains are a lot more fleshed out and memorable, despite being nothing more than local thugs. And, of course, the titillation is on another level.
This is a Conan I can get behind.
Sucks to be them.
Roberts' second offering is a marked improvement over the first. The plot is scaled down a few orders -- gods and elder beings are shunted into the background, and the protagonists are petty chiefs and bandits. There is still plenty of magic to go around, but it's a lot more manageable in scope. Yes, there are demons and a spiritual realm to traverse, but we are no longer asked to believe that a mage capable of raising the horrors of the deep gets slapped down almost as an afterthought. The villains are a lot more fleshed out and memorable, despite being nothing more than local thugs. And, of course, the titillation is on another level.
This is a Conan I can get behind.
September 10, 2018
Отлична история за Конан, този път, за разнообразие ситуирана в далечния Север, която, като се има предвид кога е писана, очевидно е послужила за ... нека го кажем вдъхновение, на някои аспекти от Игра на тронове :)
April 23, 2020
It is the second book by John Maddox Robert I read and I noticed a pattern. Essentially, Conan goes on a quest or is forced to do something and along the way gets a side quest, kills something horrible in a super awesome manner and then resumes the main quest to its completion.
I did not enjoy this one as much as Conan the Valorous, but it was a lot of fun as well. Another thing this author seems to enjoy is weird daemonic creatures. The other book had a lot of them and this book as some as well.
It was a good book and I'm going to keep reading what this author has to offer.
I did not enjoy this one as much as Conan the Valorous, but it was a lot of fun as well. Another thing this author seems to enjoy is weird daemonic creatures. The other book had a lot of them and this book as some as well.
It was a good book and I'm going to keep reading what this author has to offer.
March 28, 2018
Nice, novel-length, fun, diversionary reading.
May 16, 2020
The first Conan book I've read in which Conan doesn't get laid! He tries, but the Queen Alcuina is too set on maintaining a royal bloodline.
July 16, 2021
It has been awhile since I read a Conan book. This one was very good. The author got the Conan character correct. It was very enjoyable.
June 21, 2025
I read this when it was first published in 1987. It is another unmemorable, and often boring, adventure of Conan. The best of this character can be found in the Marvel Comics 275 issue run of “Conan the Barbarian” (1970-1993).
September 2, 2018
Pues lo de siempre. Pero en mundos paralelos donde hay bestias. Merece la pena a quien ame el pulp.
January 25, 2019
A snowy tundra in the rustic northlands of hyberborea is the setting. Conan defends a queen in the midst of a hostile courtship of imperious kings vying for her troth and lands.
August 7, 2022
Приключенията на най-известния варварин този път са в дивия север. Прави се интересно сравнение между юга и севера. Най- много ми хареса приключенията в света на духовете.
October 8, 2022
Roberts writes a decent Conan, and this one is no exception. The ending was rushed, but otherwise it would a fast paced adventure in the southern reaches of Hyboria.
June 28, 2018
I know the author from his Roman mysteries and learned he once did a number of Conan pastiche and was curious.
JMR captures the tone of Conan better than a lot of the pastiche writers (as I recall, it has been 20 years since I read one), but the tale itself was "meh". Too short for the plot, and resolved in a page. Fun for an airplane read but not memorable.
JMR captures the tone of Conan better than a lot of the pastiche writers (as I recall, it has been 20 years since I read one), but the tale itself was "meh". Too short for the plot, and resolved in a page. Fun for an airplane read but not memorable.
May 7, 2012
This is possibly the best non-Howard/de Camp Conan writing I've sampled thus far. Robert Jordan's Conans are very much a TV soap with swords (who would have thought?), a quality soap, but still; Steve Perry's Conans are pleasant, but his Conan speaks and acts like Simon Templar, which produces henious cognitive dissonances in people like me; whereas the Conan of Maddox that I'm reading now is written as well as an S M Stirling book, but stuff actually happens, and at a robust pace at that, and it happens to people I find interesting.
September 3, 2011
Leí la versión en español: Conan El Campeón.
No encontré esta versión en la página de good reads.
Se me escapan los detalles en la historia de este libro... señal que no es muy memorable, pero a final de cuentas es Conan y me entretuvo un rato.
No encontré esta versión en la página de good reads.
Se me escapan los detalles en la historia de este libro... señal que no es muy memorable, pero a final de cuentas es Conan y me entretuvo un rato.
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews