The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian

By: Robert E. Howard

Narrated by: Todd McLaren

Between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis and the gleaming cities...there was an age undreamed of, when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars.... Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand...to tread the jeweled thrones of the earth under his sandalled feet.

In a meteoric career that spanned a mere 12 years before his tragic suicide, Robert E. Howard single-handedly invented the genre that came to be called sword-and-sorcery. Collected in this volume are Howard's first 13 Conan stories in their original versions and in the order Howard wrote them. Included are classics of dark fantasy like "The Tower of the Elephant" and swashbuckling adventure like "Queen of the Black Coast."

Here are timeless tales featuring Conan the raw and dangerous youth, Conan the daring thief, Conan the swashbuckling pirate, and Conan the commander of armies. Here, too, is an unparalleled glimpse into the mind of a genius whose bold storytelling style has been imitated by many yet equaled by none.

©2002 Conan Properties International, LLC. (P)2009 Tantor

Great stories hampered by the narration

I am not a fan of the narrator and it sort of killed the joy of experiencing these stories again. I also wanted a bit more of a gap between the stories or some narrative about them after each one.

Nice to hear the original Robert Howard

I enjoyed this because REH was so ahead of his time. Yes there will be some things that may upset some but remember this was written in the 1920's. Come and sit around the fire and listen to the stories about the "Cimmerian" and forget about what is PC. Looking forward to more, and the narrator is wonderful as well.

The embodiment of SWORD & SORCERY!!!

Great listen, got me through my days of work.Roberts words vividly tear your mind awesomely.

My favorite Conan story

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Really well acted and they are by far some of the best stories from Howard.

What about Todd McLaren’s performance did you like?

He did not sound the same for each person.

In the originally published order

I'd read the Conan books decades ago and they just really never gelled in my head. I've absolutely enjoyed this audiobook. The voices are done well and with proper drama. I think that the order also made a difference. The writing style does evolve and it's a smooth transition throughout as it's done in the order of the writer evolving. I think the paperback books attempting to put the stories in the chronological order of Conan's life may have resulted in a disjointed feel as the writing style had subtle changes back and forth. I highly recommend this audiobook and I'm planning on getting the rest.

Terrific Reading!!

This was an excellent reading of the story but I was losing my mind every time the narrator mispronounced "Cimmerian".

Robert E Howard is a legendary storyteller who profoundly earns his place in American literature with these short stories! Be prepared to keep a dictionary or dictionary app on hand, its not hard to figure out the meaning based on context but its nice to learn the words for when they come up again.

classic sword and sorcery

one of them is super racist but the rest are great! evoked some great d&d memories

Another great set of Conan Tales

Would you try another book from Robert E. Howard and/or Todd McLaren?

I have read other Robert Howard books. Todd McLaren needs to look into the pronunciation of the names for the books he is reading really annoying that he mispronounced Cimmerian and Cimmeria throughout the whole book.

Would you be willing to try another book from Robert E. Howard? Why or why not?

Yes

What didn’t you like about Todd McLaren’s performance?

He mispronounces names from the books

Do you think The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

There are many Conan books

Solid Recounting, with minor quibble

This was recommended to me as the best way to start reading Howard’s Conan series. It’s the original tales, unaltered and in some cases unfinished, but in all cases absent what are now largely considered bastardizations of Howard’s works by other authors.

This volume of a three-part series opens with a very helpful introduction/essay on the context of Howard’s writing, and the historiography of his works following his death. From there it follows Howard’s Conan stories chronologically in order of their writing, as Howard intended. It’s interesting to see the man Conan, and the world of Hyborea, evolve in this manner, as the reader discovers Conan in the same way Howard did while writing him.

I have to say the writing is not what I expected- it’s both simple and dense at the same time, and has an undercurrent of Lovecraftian horror (who was a contemporary and friend of Howard’s). I suppose you could say the horror is not lovecraftian, but Howardian, but I think it’s fair to give those supernatural references to “unknown horrors”, etc., some credited influence to Lovecraft, while recognizing Howard’s attempt to ground the themes and stories in a recognizable, historic context and setting.

The stories themselves are of mixed quality, but I found all entries in this volume interesting, especially in the first half of the book. Some towards the end become formulaic, and I imagine they were written during the period Howard suffered financially and needed to churn out work to live. Those entries aren’t necessarily bad, but they are more what the unread Howard reader would probably consider quintessential Conan...a scantily clad damsel in distress who Conan saves by being macho and crafty. There’s a lot more to Conan than those themes, though, and actually reading the material bears that out. It’s also clear how much a product of the period in which they were written these stories are, as evidenced by some of the language and themes used around race and gender roles; if some of the sections were written this way today they’d never make it through editing due to being potentially (or sometimes blatantly) offensive. That said, they also add another layer of complexity to consider within the themes of barbarity vs civilization vs race.

Overall I’d highly recommend reading this book and series if nothing else but to understand the progenitor literature of the entire Sword and Sorcery genre.

One note on the narration. I found the narrator had a good voice and pacing for the stories, but there were some mispronunciations that were really distracting. Some, like gunwales, only cropped up here and there but should be something a narrator knows how to pronounce (hint: it isn’t pronounced gun-walls or gun-wales). The big problem was his mispronunciation of the word Cimmerian, which is used constantly throughout the works. There are two generally accepted ways it can be pronounced: Sim-MARE-ian, and Sim-MERE-ian. The narrator chose to use neither.

Chapter Issues

The content is amazing*, and the narration is good, outside of a few questionable pronunciations. My biggest issue with the book is the jumbled chapters in the chapter list -- selecting a story puts you in the middle of some other chapter. It's infuriating trying to find the beginning or end of anything.

* Pulp stories written in the 30s will always be a reflection of their time. While the language R.E. Howard uses is dated to say the least, it should be noted that Howard was extremely progressive for his time, and this is reflected in his treatment of his characters. All that said, listen with a grain of salt.