Charles’s Comments (group member since Dec 07, 2008)

Charles’s comments from the Robert E. Howard Readers group.

Almuric is the closest, and only because it takes place on another world.

Night Winds is my favorite by Wagner too, and particularly Lynortis Reprise. I love that opening. It has influenced my own writing. I actually have loved everything I've read by Kew, although Bloodstone is his earliest written book, I believe, and is not as developed as some of his later stuff. Still well worth reading.

Karl Wagner's Kane is certainly one. David Gemmell is another fine writer of heroic fantasy. His Druss series is probably closest to Howard's Conan

Michael wrote: "Very good article and clever of you to notice it."

Thanks, man

Michael wrote: "I read that article Charles. I believe you took a whole story if I remember right...Was it "Lion of Tiberias" or another one of his Crusade stories?"

Most of it was from Lion, although I did a bit with some other crusader stories too

Blake wrote: "REH is special to me because having written poetry for the majority of my life, the first time I read his Solomon Kane poems I was immediately enthralled. Being a big fan of descriptive writing I c..."

I love his descriptive writing too. In fact, I had an article published a few years back of "found poems" from REH, where I went through his prose, took out connecting words like and and but, and rearranged the lines in poetry format. Whole pages of his work can easily be transformed into poetry in that way

congrats on the nomination

Michael wrote: "I've also been reading Charles Gramlich's Talera Series and it was great escapist fiction in the vein of Edgar Rice Burroughs Martian Stories. 5 Stars for the first book of the series. I have Book ..."

Thanks, man!

I've read quite a bit of their stuff and always enjoyed it.

Michael wrote: "I got it. Thanks for letting us know Charles. All your stuff is 5 Stars!!!"

Thanks, man. I appreciate that!

I've got a new Sword and sorcery kindle release out from Beat to a Pulp. This story is called Mage, Maze, Demon. Sword and sorcery featuring a character named Bryle. You can't escape Howard's legacy in stories like this. Only 99 cents, so I hope you check it out. http://www.amazon.com/Mage-Maze-Demon...

Here's the Goodreads page for it. Thanks to Seth Lindberg, who set this up: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

Howard said of Conan that he was the 'most real' of all the characters he'd created.

For Villains, Hannibal Lecter, of course. I thought Thulsa Doom in the Conan movie was a fine villain.

aye, Long John Silver. Great character.

I'm a big fan of Shannow, Scudder, Stark and Imaro as well

Hum, favorite characters? Good question. Here are some that occur to me right away.

John Carter of Barsoom
Dray Prescot of Kregen
Dominic Flandry, agent of the Terran Empire
Kane, the mystic swordsman
Kyrik, warlock-warrior
Druss the Legend
Bran Mak Morn, King of the Picts
Travis McGee
Ryan Tyler
Leo Guild

Star rover is very good

Frankenstein and Dracula are both good. Frankenstein is actually a pretty short novel. Another great classic read for vampire fiction is "Carmilla" by Sheridan Le Fanu. Many classic books like these can be gotten free from Project Gutenberg as ebooks.

To understand Howard's writing, I definitely think you need to read a fair amount of Jack London and ERB.

good stuff

I don't doubt that the research is finding some differences. But there are many complexities to control for. The "diminishing" pages as tactile feedback is interesting. I would not have thought that would have anything to do with it. And there could be other explanations, I imagine. Though it's interesting. The fragmented reading habits of e-publications may be a big part of it. This is what I've suspected as the major culprit explaining the differences. I thought that might settle out as people gained more experience but the technology is changing too fast for any kind of saturation. For me, I read plenty of fiction on a dedicated Kindle e-reader and, anecdotally, don't notice any differences, although I've not specifically measured for them either. There are definitely likely to be context specific cues, though, and some of that may shake out over time as people gain more and more experience.