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The Haunter of the Ring and Other Stories
"For stark, living fear... what other writer is even in the running?" - H. P. Lovecraft on Robert E. Howard.
In this collection you will find several of Robert E. Howard's greatest horror stories, including "Rattle of Bones," "The Horror from the Mound," "Skull-Face," and many more.
Ranging from gothic horrors to supernatural terrors and chilling tales of insanity and death, these tales reveal the extraordinary talent and range of one of short fiction's most accomplished writers.
ABOUT THE SERIES: The Arcturus Classics series brings together high-quality paperback editions of classics works, presented with contemporary graphic cover designs. Together they make a wonderful collection which is perfect for any home library.
In this collection you will find several of Robert E. Howard's greatest horror stories, including "Rattle of Bones," "The Horror from the Mound," "Skull-Face," and many more.
Ranging from gothic horrors to supernatural terrors and chilling tales of insanity and death, these tales reveal the extraordinary talent and range of one of short fiction's most accomplished writers.
ABOUT THE SERIES: The Arcturus Classics series brings together high-quality paperback editions of classics works, presented with contemporary graphic cover designs. Together they make a wonderful collection which is perfect for any home library.
384 pages, Paperback
Published April 1, 2022
7 people are currently reading
63 people want to read
About the author
Robert E. Howard
2,990 books2,649 followersRobert 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.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 30, 2024
2.75 - hey besties so I have a little story time!
I have this book challenge board that’s supposed to help diversify your reading and encourage you to find and read authors you wouldn’t normally seek out. One of the prompts is to go to your favorite section of the bookstore, take a book off the shelf randomly and read it.
This was that book.
If I had known the era of horror that the stories in this collection came from, if I had known the author was friends with Lovecraft, and if I had known that the writing would be the way that it is, I would not have ever picked up this book, because I would have known it would not be for me.
But I did pick it up. And I did read it. But I am not the target audience. So take this review with a grain of salt.
Was there some interesting stuff in some of these stories? Yeah, I suppose so. I did like how the first story “In the Forest of Villefère” and the following story “Wolfshead” were actually connected, but this connection wasn’t revealed until perhaps 75% through the story. That was something I wasn’t anticipating. Howard’s interpretation of how werewolves work was also interesting. A later story, “Sea Curse” had some interesting characterization of the sea. But, a majority of the stories weren’t interesting or felt cliché and unoriginal. Even subgenres that weren’t as developed at the time and Howard could’ve made a lot of interesting new explorations into felt surface level and uninspired. There was just nothing in here that gave me pause or made me think, from a horror standpoint, “huh, that’s a unique spin” except for the things I mentioned before. Which total to three.
But the thing that just turned me off from this collection the most is the actual writing style. It’s just not for me. It feels pretentious, but in a way that feels like the writer being snooty rather than genuine, and at least, to me, it’s distracting. These stories aren’t scary and not even flinch-worthy because the writing is so extra. Some of these stories also were just icky to read because of the way they portrayed or utilized marginalized groups (which I know was of the time, but that doesn’t make it right and also doesn’t mean I have to feel fine reading it).
As I said before, I would not have picked this book up if I hadn’t blindly taken it off the shelf at HFB. If you like Lovecraft, you will likely like this. Not for me though.
I have this book challenge board that’s supposed to help diversify your reading and encourage you to find and read authors you wouldn’t normally seek out. One of the prompts is to go to your favorite section of the bookstore, take a book off the shelf randomly and read it.
This was that book.
If I had known the era of horror that the stories in this collection came from, if I had known the author was friends with Lovecraft, and if I had known that the writing would be the way that it is, I would not have ever picked up this book, because I would have known it would not be for me.
But I did pick it up. And I did read it. But I am not the target audience. So take this review with a grain of salt.
Was there some interesting stuff in some of these stories? Yeah, I suppose so. I did like how the first story “In the Forest of Villefère” and the following story “Wolfshead” were actually connected, but this connection wasn’t revealed until perhaps 75% through the story. That was something I wasn’t anticipating. Howard’s interpretation of how werewolves work was also interesting. A later story, “Sea Curse” had some interesting characterization of the sea. But, a majority of the stories weren’t interesting or felt cliché and unoriginal. Even subgenres that weren’t as developed at the time and Howard could’ve made a lot of interesting new explorations into felt surface level and uninspired. There was just nothing in here that gave me pause or made me think, from a horror standpoint, “huh, that’s a unique spin” except for the things I mentioned before. Which total to three.
But the thing that just turned me off from this collection the most is the actual writing style. It’s just not for me. It feels pretentious, but in a way that feels like the writer being snooty rather than genuine, and at least, to me, it’s distracting. These stories aren’t scary and not even flinch-worthy because the writing is so extra. Some of these stories also were just icky to read because of the way they portrayed or utilized marginalized groups (which I know was of the time, but that doesn’t make it right and also doesn’t mean I have to feel fine reading it).
As I said before, I would not have picked this book up if I hadn’t blindly taken it off the shelf at HFB. If you like Lovecraft, you will likely like this. Not for me though.
October 21, 2022
Having heard Howard was a close friend of Lovecraft’s, I was really looking forward to reading some of his work. While not every story in here worked for me, I enjoyed the vast majority of them.
This book is mainly made up of horror short stories. Some of them more along the lines of typical horror, others take place in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos, and a few have a more historical or mythological twist to them. I’m not too well-versed in horror at this point, but there were a couple of stories in here that actually scared me, which doesn’t happen too frequently. I found Graveyard Rats particularly frightening, and it also happened to be one of my favorites. I also really enjoyed In the Forest of Villifére and Wolfshead, two werewolf stories. The Cairn on the Headland ties into Norse Mythology, which was pretty cool. There are also a few good Cthulhu Mythos stories in here, though the only ones I really loved were The Fire of Asshurbanipal and Dig Me No Grave.
The only big negative I can think of for this collection, aside from having one or two stories I found pretty meh, is the novella Skull-Face. This story takes up over 25% of the whole collection at roughly 100 pages—by far the lengthiest story here—but I found it quite uninteresting and dull.
Overall this was a solid collection of stories. So far I’ve read three of these Arcturus editions of horror short story collections, and this one is easily my favorite—even outdoing one for Lovecraft, one of my favorite authors. Solid collection of stories here.
Rating: 8/10
This book is mainly made up of horror short stories. Some of them more along the lines of typical horror, others take place in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos, and a few have a more historical or mythological twist to them. I’m not too well-versed in horror at this point, but there were a couple of stories in here that actually scared me, which doesn’t happen too frequently. I found Graveyard Rats particularly frightening, and it also happened to be one of my favorites. I also really enjoyed In the Forest of Villifére and Wolfshead, two werewolf stories. The Cairn on the Headland ties into Norse Mythology, which was pretty cool. There are also a few good Cthulhu Mythos stories in here, though the only ones I really loved were The Fire of Asshurbanipal and Dig Me No Grave.
The only big negative I can think of for this collection, aside from having one or two stories I found pretty meh, is the novella Skull-Face. This story takes up over 25% of the whole collection at roughly 100 pages—by far the lengthiest story here—but I found it quite uninteresting and dull.
Overall this was a solid collection of stories. So far I’ve read three of these Arcturus editions of horror short story collections, and this one is easily my favorite—even outdoing one for Lovecraft, one of my favorite authors. Solid collection of stories here.
Rating: 8/10
March 8, 2025
A great bundle of short stories. Each one containing a captivating adventure and high-octane, grasping prose. The horror stories such as “the thing on the roof” made me so tense that I would jump from a shutting door. If you like old school dnd and h.p. Lovecraft, give this a chance!
Unfortunately there is extremely blatant racism, not just in choice of words, but also playing a major part in some of the stories. Howard is definitely a disgusting white supremacist. I still like his writing despite this fact
Unfortunately there is extremely blatant racism, not just in choice of words, but also playing a major part in some of the stories. Howard is definitely a disgusting white supremacist. I still like his writing despite this fact
July 23, 2024
This is a nice collection of Robert E. Howard's dark stories. Some are adventure with a supernatural element, there are a couple of crime stories, and some good old spine-chilling horror stories. There is even a story in which Conan appears, framed by a dream of the protagonist. And there is the novella "Skull-Face" which would have made a great movie serial back in the 1930s, if only someone back then had thought to do it.
February 28, 2025
Better than expected. Old style horror stories, a bit less overwrought than Lovecraft. Good fun. Not sure this is the exact collection I read.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews