The Savage Tales of Solomon Kane (62 page)

Solomon Kane's Homecoming

Originally appeared in
Fanciful Tales
, volume 1, number 1, Fall 1936. 381.7.9: period after “life”; 382.10.6: no period after “tears”; 383.7.3: “bave”; 383.12.4: comma after “place”; 383.18.2: “huonds”

Solomon Kane's Homecoming (Variant)

Text taken from typescript, provided by Glenn Lord. The typescript is in four-line stanzas; we have divided the lines. 387.22.1: “Sat” capitalized; 387.24.1: “By” capitalized; 388.4.5: closing quotation mark after “away.”; 388.5.3: comma rather than question mark after “Bess”; 388.11.4: “church-yard”; 388.13.7: “window-pane”; 389.13.1: no hyphen in “Adown”; 389.18.7: no comma after “bright”; 389.23.6: no comma after “again”

The fully illustrated Robert E. Howard Library for Del Rey Books

The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian

The Savage Tales of Solomon Kane

The Bloody Crown of Conan*

Bran Mak Morn: The Last King*

The Conquering Sword of Conan*

*forthcoming

PRAISE FOR ROBERT E. HOWARD

“At his best, Howard was the Thomas Wolfe of fantasy.”

– S
TEPHEN
K
ING

“Howard was a true storyteller – one of first, and certainly among the best, you'll find in heroic fantasy. If you've never read him before, you're in for a real treat.”

– C
HARLES DE
L
INT
Award-winning author of
Forests of the Heart
and
The Onion Girl

“I adore these books. Howard had a gritty, vibrant style – broadsword writing that cut its way to the heart, with heroes who are truly larger than life. It must be thirty years since I last read Howard, but there are moments from his stories that are as fresh in my mind as if I'd read them yesterday. I heartily recommend them to anyone who loves fantasy.”

– D
AVID
G
EMMELL
Author of
Legend
and
White Wolf

“The voice of Robert E. Howard still resonates after decades with readers – equal parts ringing steel, thunderous horse hooves, and spattered blood. Far from being a stereotype, his creation of Conan is
the
high heroic adventurer. His raw muscle and sinews, boiling temper, and lusty laughs are the gauge by which all modern heroes must be measured.”

– E
RIC
N
YLUND
Author of
Halo: The Fall of Reach

“Howard honestly believed the basic truth of the stories he was telling. It's as if he'd said, ‘This is how life was really lived in those former savage times!'”

– D
AVID
D
RAKE
Author of
Grimmer Than Hell
and
Dogs of War

“That teller of marvellous tales, Robert Howard, did indeed create a giant [Conan] in whose shadow other ‘hero tales' must stand.”

– J
OHN
J
AKES
New York Times
bestselling author
of the North and South trilogy

“Most of the fantasy of the past thirty-five years has two main wellsprings: J.R.R. Tolkien and Robert E. Howard. Tolkien himself, who had little use for most contemporary fantasists, rather liked the Conan tales. For headlong, nonstop adventure and for vivid, even florid, scenery, no one even comes close to Howard. If you want a rip-roaring good time, this is the place to start.”

– H
ARRY
T
URTLEDOVE
Author of
Guns of the South

“[Behind Howard's stories] lurks a dark poetry, and the timeless truth of dreams. That is why these tales have survived. They remain a fitting heritage of the poet and dreamer who was Robert E. Howard.”

– R
OBERT
B
LOCH
Author of
Psycho

“The stories have a livingness about them [that's] impossible to fake. . . . Not one of them is boring – there is always some special touch – and most, of course, are rousers.”

– G
AHAN
W
ILSON
Reviewer and author of
I Paint What I See

“For stark, living fear . . . what other writer is even in the running with Robert E. Howard?”

– H
.
P
.
L
OVECRAFT

“Howard . . . brought a brash, tough element to the epic fantasy which did as much to change the course of the American school away from precious writing and static imagery as Hammett, Chandler, and the
Black Mask
pulp writers were to change the course of American detective fiction.”

– M
ICHAEL
M
OORCOCK
Award-winning author of the Elric saga

“In this, I think, the art of Robert E. Howard was hard to surpass: vigor, speed, vividness. And always there is that furious, galloping narrative pace.”

– P
OUL
A
NDERSON
Award-winning author of
Genesis
and
World Without Stars

“For vivid, violent, gripping, headlong action, the stories of Robert E. Howard . . . take the prize among heroic fantasies.”

– L
.
S
PRAGUE DE
C
AMP
Author of
Lest Darkness Fall

“The best pulp [fantasy] writer was Robert E. Howard. . . . He painted in about the broadest strokes imaginable. A mass of glimmering black for the menace, an ice-blue cascade for the hero, betweeen them a swath of crimson for battle, passion, blood – and that was the picture, or story, rather, except where a vivid detail might chance to spring to life, or a swift thought-arabesque be added.”

– F
RITZ
L
EIBER
Author of
Farewell to Lankhmar

A Del Rey
^®
Book
Published by The Random House Publishing Group
Copyright © 1998 by Solomon Kane LLC
Solomon Kane is a registered trademark of Solomon Kane LLC
Illustrations copyright © 1998 by Gary Gianni
Editor: Rusty Burke
Series editor: Rusty Burke

Skulls in the Stars
© 1928 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, January 1929
The Right Hand of Doom
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
Red Shadows
© 1928 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, August 1928
Rattle of Bones
© 1929 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, June 1929
The Castle of the Devil
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
Death's Black Riders
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for The Howard Collector Vol 2, No. 4, Spring 1968
The Moon of Skulls
© 1930 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, June, July 1930
The One Black Stain
© 1962 by Glenn Lord for The Howard Collector, Spring 1962
Blades of the Brotherhood
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
The Hills of the Dead
© 1930 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, August 1930
Hawk of Basti
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
The Return of Sir Richard Grenville
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
Wings in the Night
© 1932 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, July 1932
The Footfalls Within
© 1931 by Popular Fiction Publishing Company for Weird Tales, September 1931
The Children of Asshur
© 1968 by Glenn Lord for Red Shadows
Solomon Kane's Homecoming
© 1936 by Shepherd and Wollheim for Fanciful Tales, Fall 1936

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. Originally published in Great Britain by Wandering Star Books Ltd., London, in 1998.

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2003114908

eISBN 978-0-345-47851-1

v2.0