WARBIRD'S SUGGESTED READING LIST

 

Bard, Bard II, Bard III: The Wild Sea, and Bard IV: Raven's Gathering
by Keith Taylor

History and fantasy make for a magical blend in this excellent series, set in northern Europe during the Dark Ages. Bard, the first book in the series, introduces the reader to one Felimid mac Fal, a bard of Erin taking a bit of a 'time out' on the mainland. This book is essentially a compilation of short stories and novelettes that appeared in Ted White's Fantastic magazine in the early 1980s. Bard is a good read, but it is the trilogy formed by Bard II, Bard III: The Wild Sea, and Bard IV: Raven's Gathering that makes this series truly shine. There's something for everyone here: action, adventure, romance, humor, and tragedy.

Pirates of Venus, Escape on Venus, Lost on Venus, Carson of Venus, and The Wizard of Venus
by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Everybody has heard of Tarzan of the Apes. Disney's recent animated feature film version of Tarzan has reintroduced the Lord of the Jungle to a new generation - but Tarzan is just one of many memorable characters created by the prolific Edgar Rice Burroughs. The Venus series deals with the misadventures of Carson Napier (aka Wrong Way Carson), who builds his own spaceship so that he might travel to the planet Mars. Unfortunately, a miscalculation sends him off course - heading straight for the heart of the sun. All seems lost, but Carson manages to turn the ship toward Venus. As the spaceship plummets into the planet's perpetual cloud cover, Carson bails out, only to find himself stuck in a tree - a tree that would make a sequoia look like a mere shrub...

Conan the Barbarian
by Robert E. Howard

You may have seen the movies. You may have seen the TV series. You may have read the comic books. You may even have read a Conan tale or two - but if you haven't read one of the 21 stories listed below, you simply haven't read a REAL Conan story.

Conan was conceived and created by Robert E. Howard of Cross Plains, Texas. Howard saw 17 of his Conan stories published in the early to mid 1930s; most appeared in the pages of Weird Tales magazine. 4 others were published after his untimely and tragic suicide in 1936. Many of these stories have been reprinted in altered form, along with a host of 'new' stories adapted from a Howard's non-Conan stories, posthumously 'completed' fragments of unfinished Conan stories, and 'pastiches' written by other authors attempting to 'fill the gaps' in Conan's life. In my opinion, things have gotten far out of hand - there have been so many 'new' Conan stories written in recent years that poor Conan must scarcely have had time to take a bathroom break.

Seemingly endless legal squabbles have contrived to keep many of the original Conan stories out of print. To date, no publisher has been able to gather all 21 original and unedited Robert E. Howard Conan stories into a single, definitive collection. Here's hoping it happens soon. But don't hold your breath - Conan has become big business, and it seems the posthumous collaborators stand to make more money by keeping their 'edited' versions of Conan on the bookshelves. Those of us who long for a collection of the REAL Conan stories would seem to be out of luck.

 

The Phoenix on the Sword (1932)
The Scarlet Citadel (1933)
The Tower of the Elephant (1933)
Black Colossus (1933)
The Slithering Shadow (1933)
The Pool of the Black One (1933)
Rogues in the House (1934)
Shadows in the Moonlight (1934)
Queen of the Black Coast (1934)
The Devil in Iron (1934)
The People of the Black Circle (1934)
A Witch Shall be Born (1934)
Jewels of Gwahlur (1935)
Beyond the Black River (1935)
Shadows in Zamboula (1935)
The Hour of the Dragon (a novel, 1936)
Red Nails (1936)

The following stories were published after REH's death.

The God in the Bowl
The Black Stranger
The Frost Giant's Daughter
The Vale of Lost Women

REH began but never finished four other Conan stories. Posthumous 'collaborators' took it upon themselves to complete these fragments. You or I might as well have completed them.

The Snout in the Dark
Drums of Tombalku
The Hall of the Dead
The Hand of Nergal

Dracula
by Bram Stoker.

100 years old and still going strong. I had not read this until recently, and now that I have, I realize that Dracula has been portrayed in almost every Dracula movie as a BIG SILLY WIMP!!! Especially that fiasco somebody had the nerve to call "Bram Stoker's Dracula". Geez, 60 seconds into the movie, it became obvious to anyone who had read the book that this movie was heading straight to hell in the proverbial handbasket. And why is it that everybody in the dang Film Industry wants to REVERSE the roles of Mina and Lucy?!? I saw one Dracula movie wherein Lucy was Dr. Seward's DAUGHTER!!! Good golly gosh, in the book Dr Seward is one of three men who PROPOSE MARRAIGE to Lucy!!! Egad, you crazy Film Industry People!!! What do you do? Write your scripts based on the scripts of whoever failed to actually read the book the first time around? Anyhow, the rest of you put down those VCR remotes and go READ this classic tale of horror and suspense!!!

Stranger in a Strange Land
by Robert A. Heinlein.

The story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human born on Mars and raised by Martians. When he returns to Earth, well, he finds that being HUMAN is a bit tricksy. This science fiction classic was published in the early 60s, and hoo boy, I bet it raised some eyebrows! Still has that effect today, I'd imagine. And I'm not just talking about the naughty bits (now you will want to read it for sure). Thou art God! Woo hoo!

The Humanoids
by Jack Williamson.

A chilling look at what Microsoft has planned for us all - eh, heh heh, I mean, did you ever wonder what it might be like to have a faithful robot servant who was always there at your side to take care of you and serve you and protect you from harm? If so, ya better read this. If not, well, I hear Windows ME is going to be really cool! By the way, Jack Williamson is one of the Grand Masters of Science Fiction. Read this and you'll know why.

The Silver Metal Lover
by Tanith Lee.

Something of a Romeo and Juliet story, with the part of Romeo played by a Robot named Silver. I stumbled across this one entirely by accident (I forgot to send in the little card informing the book club that I didn't want anything that month). Hi, Pam!

The Lost World
by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

So what if Doyle believed in faeries? He wrote some good stuff, ya know, and not just the Sherlock Holmes stories. Michael Crichton 'borrowed' the title of this one for his sequel to Jurassic Park. Crichton's Lost World is an island, but Doyle's is an extremely remote plateau somewhere in South America, upon which one may find - you guessed it - dinosaurs. Forget the horrible movies (except maybe for that very old silent film version). Forget the TV series. Read the book!

Winter's Tale
by Mark Helprin.

Amazing. Beautiful. What's it about? A white horse, a thief, a lake monster, a city, a bridge, the past, the future...

The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings
by J.R.R. Tolkien.

Who hasn't read this? You should be tied to a bedpost and fed X-lax!!! I was 17 when I first encountered Tolkien. I lived on a farm surrounded by lots and lots of green hills and trees and "knobs" (mini-mountains, sorta), just a few hundred yards from a river. So it was very easy for me to imagine myself right there in the Shire with Frodo and the rest of the LOTR gang...all I had to do was look out the window!

The Wild Cards Anthology Series
edited by George R.R. Martin; various authors.

An extra-terrestrial Virus is loosed upon the people of Earth. Millions die horrible, painful deaths. Thousands become strange, twisted, caricatures of their former selves. And a few, just a few, gain amazing and wonderful Powers...

The Beast Master and Lord of Thunder
by Andre Norton.

Yes, yes, the first thing you think of is that ridiculous movie. Sad but true, this book was the inspiration for the movie. But -- the book is about a Native American named Hosteen Storm, who was a Galactic Commando in an interstellar war. The story begins shortly after the destruction of Terra. Storm and his "Team" of psi-sensitive animals (Surra, a genetically-altered dune cat; Baku, an African Black Eagle; and Ho and Hing, a pair of Meerkats) relocate to the planet Arzor, where Storm soon hires on as a ranch hand... see how closely the movie followed the book? ;-)

The Ceremonies
by T.E.D. Klein.

What the heck happened to this guy? This is one fine horror novel! His book of short stories, Dark Gods, is also excellent. Strong Lovecraft influence here. Solid writing. I know that Klein once edited the Twilight Zone magazine, and I think he's edited some recent horror anthologies, but I haven't seen any other Klein novels! What's up with that?

IT
by Stephen King.

Forget The Stand. IT is the quintessential King novel. Unmatched by anything he's done since. IMHO, of course. The sad little TV mini-series barely scratched the surface of this one.

The Illuminatus Trilogy
by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea.

You have to read fnord it for yourself. It is, among fnord other things, a "NON-LINEAR" novel. Hail Eris! All hail Discordia!

The Dunwich Horror and Others, At the Mountains of Madness, and Dagon and Other Macabre Tales
by H.P. Lovecraft.

No other author has had his work so severely trashed by the Film Industry. Forget the videos. Read the stories! And as for you Poe freaks, get over it! No Edgar Allen Poe story ever made me afraid to go out of the house at night. Of course, that happened way back when I was (sigh) young and impressionable. The story that did it: The Whisperer in Darkness.

Run Away!

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