This review originally appeared at Grimdark Magazine on February 22, 2025.

Red Sonja: Consumed

By Gail Simone – Orbit – November 19, 2024

Review by Robin Marx

Red Sonja: Consumed by Gail Simone opens with the titular redheaded “She-Devil with a Sword” dealing with the tricky aftermath of a successful heist. After seducing Ysidra, barbarian queen of a nomadic tribe, Red Sonja absconded with a priceless golden armband called the Hunter’s Asp. Not only does she find herself pursued by Ysidra’s tireless Wolf Pack, but an equally implacable assassin is also sent after Sonja when she stiffs the treasure’s prospective buyer and keeps the Asp for herself. And although she views herself as rootless and living only for the present, circumstances conspire to drive her back to her devastated homeland of Hyrkania, where a traumatic reckoning awaits with both her own personal history and that of her people.

As a character, Red Sonja has a long and involved history. While working on Conan the Barbarian for Marvel Comics, writer Roy Thomas and artist Barry Windsor-Smith came up with the character as a female foil to Conan. They looked to original Conan creator Robert E. Howard for inspiration, taking the swashbuckling heroine “Red” Sonya (note the Y, not J) of Rogatine from Howard’s 1934 historical adventure “The Shadow of the Vulture,” transplanting her in heavily modified form from 16th century Vienna to Conan’s Hyborian Age. Given a revealing costume (albeit not initially the armored bikini with which the character would later become indelibly associated) and dramatic origin story, Red Sonja became an instant hit after her introduction in 1973. In addition to numerous appearances within the pages of Conan the Barbarian, Red Sonja went on to star in her own comic titles, first at Marvel and currently at Dynamite Entertainment.

While a handful of Red Sonja prose novels exist, Red Sonja: Consumed is the first to be published since 1983. This novel is also notable for its author: Gail Simone. Not only is Simone an experienced Red Sonja writer, her 2013 19-issue Dynamite Entertainment run with the character is one of the most acclaimed in the character’s multi-decade history. And while various authors have had many different portrayals of the character, in this reviewer’s opinion, Simone’s is the most fun. Sexual assault is often a part of Red Sonja’s backstory, as an inciting incident that (along with some divine intervention in the form of a sympathetic goddess) leads her to become an indomitable swordswoman. Sonja is often depicted as adhering to a vow of chastity, refusing to be bedded by any man unless he bests her in combat. Both in her tenure on the comic and in this novel, Simone dispenses with all of that. No rape-based origin story, no goddess, no vow of chastity. Simone retains Sonja’s fearlessness and deadly allure, but she’s no longer a warrior nun. Simone’s Sonja is earthy. She still wears the trademark bikini, but one gets the sense that she wears it for herself, not to titillate every alehouse yokel. She’s brave and capable, but occasionally surly, spiteful, and flippant. She doesn’t always have the best hygiene or odor about her. Her carousing sometimes gets her in trouble. Far from chaste, she’s both pansexual and voracious (regrettably absent from the novel, “I’m Red Sonja, I’m everybody’s type” is a memorable quote from Simone’s comic run). Simone allows her to be an imperfect mercenary swordswoman with both admirable qualities and flaws, who enjoys the full spectrum of pleasures permitted by her freewheeling lifestyle. Happily, the heroine presented in Red Sonja: Consumed is the same one we know from Simone’s reign on the comic.

Appealing characterization aside, perhaps inevitably, Red Sonja: Consumed reads like a first novel from an established comic book creator. The pace remains speedy throughout, but the plot wanders before tightening up in the last third of the book. While infrequent, there are jarring instances of “head hopping,” where the perspective wanders between multiple characters within a single scene. Betrayed queen Ysidra and the psychotic assassin Sylus are compelling characters, but they disappear for long stretches of the narrative, to the story’s detriment. The setting of the novel—still the same Hyborian Age inhabited by Conan, even though the characters have different ownership today—is somewhat vaguely rendered, but that seems a perennial issue with the Red Sonja comics as well.

On the positive side of the ledger, however, Simone’s background as a comic writer results in intensely vivid visuals. Throughout the novel I found myself effortlessly imagining various events as full-page comic spreads. Combat scenes are frequent, graphic, and vicious. Sonja brutally dismantles her opponents, going the extra mile to make sure they stay down permanently. The supernatural threat that reveals itself late in the book is also presented in a deliciously creepy manner.

While there are some rough edges, Red Sonja: Consumed is a fast-paced and entertaining dark Sword & Sorcery novel. The book is an easy recommendation to existing fans of Simone’s work on the Red Sonja comic book, but no prior experience with the character is necessary. Readers with a strong emotional investment in the more classic depiction of the character, with the assault survivor and vow of chastity elements intact, might balk somewhat at the messier heroine Simone presents us with, however. Feisty fantasy heroines are more common now than in decades past, but Red Sonja remains one of the best. While I enjoy and respect the work of earlier creators like Roy Thomas and Frank Thorne, Gail Simone’s rendition is the most modern and fun.

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