Warriors of the Steppes: The Complete Cossack Adventures, Volume Two

I heard about Lamb from a Wall Street Journal article, and was intrigued. It's been many years ( a teenager in fact) since I read the Robert E. Howard 'Conan' books, and I thought I had 'out grown' them. I was increasingly disappointed by modern 'adventure' fiction, which is usually poorly written. What a joy to discover Harold Lamb. He's remarkably historically accurate, yet doesn't let the 'exotic' or historical details bog down the story. In this series, which is a collection of short stories from his pulp magazine days- the hero characters like Khilt (a cossack) rely on their wits as much as their swords. although a 'collection' of tightly woven short stories, there is a unifying 'thread' to them, so it doesn't feel like you're reading a dozen or so completely different works. Great 'escape' reading.

When your fans include Robert E. Howard, David Drake and SM Stirling, you must be doing something right. Such is the case with Harold Lamb. In this second volume of Lamb's "Cossack" adventures, the stories get better and better as you progress through the book. Considering that the first tale is excellent, you can't go wrong buying this book. If you are a fan of swashbuckling adventure, you owe it to yourself to check out Harold Lamb.

I bought this book (and the companion volume) after reading some of Lamb's work in the 'Flashing Swords' ezine and anthology from Pitch-Black Press (Sages and Swords). I'd never heard of Lamb before--and now I've read his work, I'm stumped if I know why that is. Everything that's good about adventure fiction is in this book: strong and cunning protagonists, treacherous villains, and exotic locales, and all written in a clean and fast-paced prose style I wish I could emulate. I read the whole thing in a week, then read the other volume straight after. When I finished, I went back and read them again. My only caveat about the books has nothing to do with the stories, but the covers. The stock used for the covers is a little thin, and it warps badly if it gets damp. If you do buy a copy (and you should), then keep the cover away from water, otherwise it will curl and start to come apart. If you're at all interested in adventure fiction, you should buy this book and any others by Lamb you can. Really, they're very, very good.

Warriors of the Steppes is the second in a four-volume set that collects, for the first time, the complete Cossack stories of Harold Lamb and presents them in order: every adventure of Khlit the Cossack and those of his friends, allies, and fellow Cossacks, many of which have never before appeared between book covers. Compiled and edited by the Harold Lamb scholar Howard Andrew Jones, each volume features never-before reprinted essays Lamb wrote about his stories, informative introductions by popular authors, and a wealth of rare, exciting, swashbuckling fiction. This second volume collects all five tales of Khlit's greatest friend, the valorous Abdul Dost, and Dost's comrade Sir Ralph Weyand. Life across the Roof of the World is more dangerous than ever as Khlit teams up with Abdul to thwart a gang of kidnappers, stamp out a cult of stranglers, save the dazzling Retha, and reluctantly lead an Afghani rebellion against the forces of the Mogul. Contained herein are the THREE NEVER-BEFORE-COLLECTED stories of Khlit the Cossack, including the short novel The Curved Sword.