Old Gods Wins the Costigan Award!

Found out Friday night that my collection, Old Gods and Other Tales, won the Costigan award from The Robert E. Howard Foundation, presented at Howard Days in Cross Plains, TX. From the website: “Awarded for original creative writing that carries on the spirit and tradition of Robert E. Howard, to better recognize and celebrate his influence on future generations of writers.” This is the first time my writing has ever won an award. And for it to be THIS award? The proverbial chef’s kiss.

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Absolutely banging cover by STAS BORODIN!

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I’ve been to Howard Days once, back in 2000 — before my long-suffering pastiche Conan novel morphed into what would become Men of Bronze. I remember meeting Rusty Burke, this year’s Guest of Honor, and trying to find a way to broach the topic that I’d be perfect to write a new Conan pastiche work (despite not having any publishing credits to my name beyond a couple of stories in a local magazine). I think the most I managed to squeak out was I wanted to be a writer and I was inspired by REH.

Every life is a journey; over the years, I’ve made friends with a good many stalwarts in the nascent field of REH studies, Rusty included. I’ve worn my inspirations on my sleeve, and developed a writing style that proudly stands on the coat-tails of REH — from adopting similar usage and diction, and embracing an “older” vocabulary, to absorbing his themes and blending them with my own, to straight-up mimicry. It has moved beyond the realm of imitation and become simply how I write.

And I wrote a handful of books. Men of Bronze got my foot in the door; by 2010’s The Lion of Cairo, it was no mystery that my chief inspiration was REH. The Grimnir Saga hammered that home; then, along came the opportunity to write licensed Conan pastiche that would appear in the pages of the re-launched Savage Sword of Conan comic. I’d written in a similar fashion to REH, prior to 2019. Now, here was the chance to write his flagship character in as close an approximation of his voice as I could. I leave it to readers to decide if it was a success as a pastiche, or simply a spirited homage.

Which leads us to last year’s collection, Old Gods and Other Tales. It came at the tail-end of a massive writing year, 350K words of material fueled by a weird confluence of events — stress-induced hypergraphia stemming from the end of my publishing journey with St. Martin’s, the loss of Howard Andrew Jones, and an inability to find my way forward. The bulk of what I wrote, that year, was cozy fantasy; kind of a warm hug in word form. But, I had moments of blood and thunder. “Old Gods”, “The Prince of Cups”, “The Bones Remember”, “The Purple Shroud” . . . these were me getting back in conversation with my old self and rediscovering my first love. The collection had a couple of duds (the Martin Kestrel stories were too wordy and experimental, I think; lots of navel gazing and wandering philosophy), but someone thought enough of it to nominate it for an REH Foundation award . . .

. . . And Friday night it won.

This particular award — given by the foundation whose very existence is meant to expand and protect the legacy of Robert E. Howard — is a very potent form of validation, for me. It tells me I have done the right thing in pursuing the career I have, in the manner I’ve pursued it. I am a shameless mimic of REH’s themes, style, and language; I’ve used his work as a road-map for my own for nigh upon 45 years. I taught myself the ropes by copying his stories, then branching into my own material as my confidence increased. And along the way, I’ve built my own style in the shadow of his. And I am fine with being in his shadow — the same way Ptolemy was content to live in the shadow of Alexander.

So, thank you to the members of the REH Foundation, and to the anonymous soul who nominated Old Gods and Other Tales. I cannot think of an award that means more to me than this one.