Conan and the Emerald Lotus

Let’s be honest here. Even if Robert E. Howard somehow ended up being the father of the modern hack-and-slash genre, barbarian in throes – the stories about Conan haven’t aged kindly. Deny it all you want. The charming hunk of muscle comes across as a half-crazed brute with an improbable amount of luck and stale swordsmanship. But, then again, reading a Conan story is a lot like eating your favorite burger. You know what you’re getting yourself into and even though you might regret it in the end, you’ll probably be back for more – and pretty soon at that.

I didn’t expect much else in the way of literature when I picked up Conan and the Emerald Lotus by John C. Hocking.  Somehow, within the span of a few pages, Hocking had managed to revive that stale of old Hyborean ham and kicked up a pretty good storyline at that. Fast-paced, slightly erotic, musty and on some level even featuring a naked and honest account of drug and power-abuse it kept me turning pages until the very end. Good job, Hocking! I won’t give any of the story away, you can read a very decent synopsis of it here - but rather point to this particular issue of the Conan franchise as a remarkably successful one.

There doesn’t seem to be much else by Hocking in the series, which is a terrible shame if you ask me – but it does rather turn this little story into – you guessed it, a gem.