Zusammenfassung
Zusammenfassung von Red Nails
Für wen es gedacht ist
Readers who love swordplay, monsters and lost cities, and who enjoy a headstrong heroine and a barbarian hero trading insults while the walls close in. It suits anyone who likes tales of peril, sorcery and sharp action.
Worum es in diesem Buch geht
Red Nails is a sword and sorcery tale by Robert E. Howard, the Texas writer who gave the world Conan the Cimmerian. He wrote it in the 1930s, in the last years before his death in 1936, for the pulp magazines that fed readers on strange lands and bold fighters. It follows two wanderers who are on the run, Conan and a pirate named Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, and it sends them through a forest of monsters into a place that no map shows.
What you get is a fast adventure with a sharp sense of place. There are dragons that walk the forest, a city built as one vast palace, and a people shut inside it who have spent half a century on a single feud. Howard gives you fights, traps, sorcery and a pair of heroes who bicker and burn through every page. You also get a close look at two very different kinds of toughness. The story begins in a silent forest, with a tired woman on a tired horse.
In dieser Zusammenfassung
- 1A pirate flees into the silent forestFree
- 2Poison turns the dragon's own forest against it
- 3The city of jade has no streets
- 4A feud that has lasted fifty years
- 5Night brings treachery inside the walls
- 6What the story is about and how it is told
Punkt 1 von 6
A pirate flees into the silent forest
The story opens on Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, who has ridden for days through a forest where no bird sings. She is tall, golden haired and sea eyed, dressed in silk breeches and soft boots, with a sword on one hip and a dirk on the other. Her horse is spent, so she ties it beside a pool and climbs a dark crag to see what lies beyond the trees.
On a rock shelf near the top she finds a human skeleton with no broken bones. She cannot guess why a man would climb up there to die. From the high spire she sees only a green ocean of treetops, until she turns south. A mile away the forest ends, and on a cactus plain stand the walls and towers of a city. It is an astonishing sight so far from any outpost of civilization.
Then leaves rustle below, and she spins with her sword drawn. The man who has followed her is Conan the Cimmerian, a giant with fierce blue eyes. She has known him in the mercenary camp at Sukhmet, where Zarallo's Free Companies guard the Stygian frontier. Conan makes no secret of his admiration, and Valeria answers with scorn and a blade.
Their quarrel tells you much about both. Valeria left the camp after she knifed a Stygian officer who forced his attentions on her. She wants to live a man's life and will not be protected by anyone. Conan killed the officer's brother, who was close behind her. He wants her company, but he hates the thought of drawing steel on a woman. Their bickering is cut short by a terrible noise from the forest below.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Questions about Red Nails
What is Red Nails about?
It follows Conan the Cimmerian and the pirate Valeria as they flee through a forest of dragons and reach the strange city of Xuchotl, where two clans have fought a feud for fifty years.
Who is Valeria of the Red Brotherhood?
Valeria is an Aquilonian pirate and swordswoman who left a Stygian border camp after killing an officer. She is proud and quick with her blade, and she resents anyone who tries to protect her.
What are the red nails in the story?
They are copper nails driven into a black ebony pillar in the throne room of Tecuhltli. Each one marks an enemy killed in the feud, so the pillar becomes a grim record of the clan's hatred.
When was Red Nails written, and is it connected to a real place?
Robert E. Howard wrote it in the 1930s as part of his Conan stories. The city of Xuchotl and its lands are invented, set in his imagined Hyborian Age with names like Stygia, Kush and Aquilonia.
Is Red Nails easy to read?
It moves quickly, with short chapters, vivid scenes and plain, direct action. A clear story of pursuit, fighting and danger carries you from the forest to the city, so newcomers to Conan can pick it up and follow it.