Red Nails (collection)

Infobox Book |
name = Red Nails
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = "Red Nails" by Robert E. Howard, Berkley/Putnam, 1977
author = Robert E. Howard
illustrator =
cover_artist = Ken Kelly
country = United States
language = English
series = Conan the Barbarian
genre = Sword and sorcery Fantasy short stories
publisher = Berkley Books
release_date = 1977
english_release_date =
media_type = Print (Hardcover)
pages =
isbn =
preceded_by = The People of the Black Circle

"Red Nails" is a 1977 collection of three fantasy short stories and one essay written by Robert E. Howard featuring his seminal sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. The collection was edited by Karl Edward Wagner. It was first published in hardcover by Berkley/Putnam in 1977, and in paperback by Berkley Books the same year. It was reprinted in hardcover for the Science Fiction Book Club, also in 1977, and combined with the Wagner-edited "The Hour of the Dragon" and "The People of the Black Circle" in the book club's omnibus edition "The Essential Conan" in 1998. The stories originally appeared in the fantasy magazine "Weird Tales" in the 1930s.

The pieces in "Red Nails", in common with those in the other Conan volumes produced by Karl Edward Wagner for Berkley, are based on the originally published form, of the texts in preference to the edited versions appearing in the earlier Gnome Press and Lancer editions of the Conan stories. In contrast to the earlier editions, which included Conan tales by authors other than Howard, Wagner took a purist approach, including only stories by Howard, and only those thought to be in the public domain. His editorial comments dismiss editorial revisions made in the earlier editions.

Contents

*"Foreword" by Karl Edward Wagner
*"Beyond the Black River"
*"Shadows in Zamboula"
*"Red Nails"
*"The Hyborian Age" (essay)
*"Afterword" by Karl Edward Wagner