The King Of Ys: the Three end their Covenant with Ys and the last King of Ys converts from Mithraism to Christianity;
The Broken Sword: a Greek faun flees to Northern Europe;
The Merman's Children: Christian priests exile "...with bell, book and candle, all beings of heathendom..." (p. 24) from an island named after Aegir, the sea giant.
However, on a nearby uninhabited islet:
"Enough of the sea god's older power lingered that merfolk could approach from the south and go ashore." (ibid.)
Thus, all of these works read like a single long series. The Three of Ys include Lir, god of the sea, and Mananaan Mac Lir (son of Lir) is in The Broken Sword.
6 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Anderson's CONAN THE REBEL was his contribution to the Conan mythos created by Robert Howard. A rather odd book which does not quite fit into the "persona" of the Cimmerian, but still worth reading.
I would not say all the other books can truly be said to form parts of a series. Better to say they have some things in common.
Ad astra! Sean
CONAN THE REBEL has been called "CONAN THE LIBERTARIAN"... 8-). Tho' Conan actually is a 'free spirit', if you include laying waste and plundering.
I'm doing a Conan book right now myself -- BLOOD OF THE SERPENT. It's the first of a new series, designed to hew more closely to the original Howard material -- it's set in the month before RED NAILS, which was the last Conan story Howard wrote, and one of his best. Featuring both Conan and Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, also the stars of RED NAILS.
The Hyborian Age (when the Conan tales are set) is Howard's dream-world for historical type fiction; it has everything from close analogues of the 18th century American frontier (BEYOND THE BLACK RIVER) to pre-Christian Ireland and Scandinavia (Cimmeria, and stories like THE FROST-GIANT'S DAUGHTER) to the ancient Near East to ancient Egypt (Stygia) to... well, whatever you can think of. Aquilonia is fairly close to medieval France and Britain.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Exactly! The political assumptions of Anderson's Conan did not really fit the personality of Howard's Conan. I will be looking forward to your own Conan books!
Ad astra! Sean
You read it first here, folks! (At least I think you did.) Look out for BLOOD OF THE SERPENT by SM Stirling.
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