Lord of the Dead

by Robert E. Howard

Howard, Robert Ervin

Genres: Occult Detective

186 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 1981

About the author

Robert Ervin Howard was an American pulp writer of fantasy, horror, historical adventure, boxing, western, and detective fiction. Howard wrote "over three-hundred stories and seven-hundred poems of raw power and unbridled emotion" and is especially noted for his memorable depictions of "a sombre universe of swashbuckling adventure and darkling horror."

He is well known for having created—in the pages of the legendary Depression-era pulp magazine Weird Tales—the character Conan the Cimmerian, a.k.a. Conan the Barbarian, a literary icon whose pop-culture imprint can only be compared to such icons as Tarzan of the Apes, Count Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, and James Bond.

—Wikipedia

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Mark Tallen · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 * I found this to be a gripping short story, by Robert E.Howard. It packs plenty into its short narrative. Detectives, the occult, cults, hypnotism, even reincarnation! I read this story from 'The Best Of Robert E.Howard volume 1' published by Del Rey.

[Little Timmy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Robert E. Howard is my all time favorite writer, but for many years much of his work was heavily edited. This is another of the heavily edited collections of Robert E. Howard's stories. I am a purist when it comes to a writers works. I know some of these stories are no longer PC but they should be read as Howard wrote them and understood that he wrote in another time period. Don't read this book unless you just can't find any others of Howard's unedited books to read. Message me if you need a list of what is good from this awesome fantasy and action writer.

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

[Short story read in The Best of Robert E. Howard Volume 1: Crimson Shadows]

Reminded me in some way of Big Trouble in Little China.

1930s detective Steve Harrison gets embroiled in the mystic criminal underworld and ends up battling in the Mongolian crime lord Erlik Khan's lair. Khan is attempting to unite all the eastern secret societies to rule the city. There's some weird stuff about reincarnation - apparently people want Harrison dead because he's the reincarnation of some dude they want to get revenge on. The climax was a lot of fun, and I like that it was told through Harrison's POV while he was on the verge of death and blacking out.

There's a lot going on in this story between the occult, reincarnation/revenge story, and the detective story.

[Miles Cain · Rating 5 out of 5]

The reason for such a high rating is that this was one of my first Howard books besides Solomon Kane, so it resonates the most with me, if only more Harrison yarns were made. If your in the mood for something different from howard this is a perfect place to start despite a finished story and a story rewrote to fit the duology into a trilogy.

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Howard's pseudo-mystery stories are not as interesting to me as his fantasy but they certainly turn the genre on it's head with action galore. You can see the influence of Sax Rohmer in these, but Howard did it much better.