As you all may know by now I love the works of Robert E. Howard. Even though I haven’t read all of his work I’ve yet so far encountered anything he’s done that I right out disliked. The man simply was a legend and wrote some of the best Fantasy this world has ever seen in the name of Conan and Solomon Kane for example, but also other characters such as Kull of Atlantis and El Borak. Howard also wrote woman characters where Red Sonya/Sonja and Agnes De Chastillion, or Dark Agnes as she’s also called, might be his most famous.
I’ve never read any of the Agnes stories but when Mats Ingelborn of Yabot publishing told me he could send me a copy I couldn’t resist the temptation. A huge thank you goes out to Mats, you’re the man!
He’s also the one who translated these Dark Agnes stories to swedish and much like his work on the Hour of the Dragon he did an outstanding job!
And just the thought of translating and releasing Dark Agnes in swedish I think nobody else in the world would have thought of, but it’s cool as shit that we actually got it!
As for the stories themselfs, it’s Howard. I mean what can I say? It’s bloody, harsh language, blood and guts and a woman kicking ass. Of late there has been so much crap in Hollywood about “strong female characters”, which more than often missed the mark completely and ended up in total failure of their goal of portraying women as strong and independant. Well, Howard manage to create this amazing character who took control of her own life and destiny, not taking crap from anyone or anything and who would gut anyone who treated her like shit. Dark Agnes is a perfect example of what Hollywood have been trying to create for the last couple of years and failed miserably, and this Howard did before he died in 1936.
I honestly had no big hopes or interest in this because I’m too busy within the Hyborian Age as of now, and historical novels and fiction just isn’t my thing. But this was totally worth putting my time into and I would like to thank Mats Ingelborn once again for sending me this.
If you’re not a swedish speaking person you can find these in the Del Rey collection called Sword Woman And Other Historical Adventures. If you do speak swedish then I highly recommend this if you’re interested in reading a GOOD female character, historical fiction or just wants to expand on your mandatory Howard reading 😉
It is a must read!
Hyborian Book Reviews 