Blood and Thunder: The Life and Art of Robert E. Howard is a 2013 biography written by Mark Finn. It would go on to be nominated for the Locus Award Nominee for Best Non-Fiction.

GoodReads describes it as,

“Robert E. Howard, creator of Conan, King Kull, and others that defined heroic fantasy, lived and died in the small town of Cross Plains, Texas. While his books remain in print, Howard himself has fallen into obscurity, his life mired in speculation and half-truth. This engaging biography traces the roots of his writings, correcting long-standing misconceptions, and offers a tour of Howard’s world as he saw it: through his own incomparable imagination.”

Besides Conan, Howard created amazing characters like Solomon Kane and Kull the Conqueror. He is inspiring and being a young kid from Texas myself and a writer, I feel a connection to him.

Finn does a good job with the historical background of Howard. We get to hear how the writer started out from humble beginnings and even with his stories, he started so small. He rose from the bottom of the barrel to become one of the most talented writers of our day.

I also applaud Finn for not just droning on with historical facts. You feel like you get to know Howard from his rise to fame to his tragic end. It was a treat getting to know Howard for who was and he impacted

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