This collection, compiled and edited by Bobby Derie, presents the surviving correspondence of Novalyne Price Ellis—schoolteacher, writer, and friend of Robert E. Howard. At the center of the letters is her decades-long effort to complete a memoir of Howard, eventually published as One Who Walked Alone in 1986. The letters trace her frustrations, setbacks, and eventual triumph in telling the story as she remembered it, despite competing narratives and outside pressures.
Given away for free during Howard Days 2025, this edition includes correspondence with Glenn Lord and others, documenting the long path toward one of the most personal and important accounts of Howard’s life.
See also Bobby’s first volume.
Table of Contents
- 1 – Introduction
- 3 – 1978
- 5 – 1979
- 29 – 1980
- 55 – 1981
- 83 – 1982
- 103 – 1983
- 117 – 1984
- 136 – 1985
- 141 – 1986
- 154 – 1987
- 159 – 1988
- 160 – 1990
- 169 – 1992
- 170 – Appendix: Excerpt from In Search of Tomorrow
- 172 – Index
- 177 – Letters by Correspondent
| Publisher : | Robert Derie |
| Year : | June 2025 |
| Format : | Paperback (6 x 9 inches, perfect bound) |
| Pages : | 184 (including front and back covers) |
| Cover : | Various photos of Novalyn and others |
| Illustrations : | Photos and scans of newspaper clippings |
Notes
Compiled and edited by Bobby Derie
Limited Edition.
Will be distributed at Robert E. Howard Days, June 2025.
More by Bobby Derie
| Title | Summary | |
|---|---|---|
 | The Selected Letters of Novalyne Price Ellis Volume II | This collection, compiled and edited by Bobby Derie, presents the surviving correspondence of Novalyne Price Ellis—schoolteacher, writer, and friend of Robert E. Howard. |
 | “… when I last see him” The de Camp Interviews on Robert E. Howard | Bobby Derie’s Howard Days booklet presents selected de Camp interview material on Robert E. Howard from the Harry Ransom Center archives, offering a rare look at the de Camps’ research process and the recollections of people who knew Howard. |
 | The Selected Letters of Novalyne Price Ellis | The intimate and insightful correspondences of Novalyne Price Ellis, offering a unique glimpse into her relationship with Robert E. Howard and her interactions with prominent pulp scholars. This collection, edited by Bobby Derie, is a heartfelt tribute that enriches our understanding of these literary figures. |
 | The Robert E. Howard Trivia Book | Bobby Derie’s free book is distributed in Cross Plains on Howard Days 2023. It’s a trivia book with six hundred questions about Robert E. Howard and everything related. You can play it like Trivial Pursuit, assigning a color to each category. Trivia questions are divided into six categories; each set of questions are on the right-hand (odd-numbered) pages and the answers are on the back. Limited to 200 copies. Readers might want to flip through this book for their own enjoyment, but if you want to play a game with friends, try starting at a random page and taking turns asking questions from each category. Each question successfully answered is worth 1 point; the first to 30 points wins. (Why 30? Because Robert E. Howard was only 30 years old when he died.) |
 | Weird Beginnings | Distributed and sold at the Howard Days. Limited to 250 copies. Contains two Howard stories and essays by Patrice Louinet and Bobby Derie. |
 | Cross Plains Pilgrimage | Bobby Derie’s free book Cross Plains Pilgrimage was gifted to modern pilgrims (visitors) in Cross Plains on Howard Days 2022. It contains a sample of Derie’s scholarly work, focusing on E. Hoffman Price’s two visits to Howard. |
 | Index to One Who Walked Alone and Day of the Stranger | Robert Derie has created an index as a complementary work for Novalyne Price’s One Who Walked Alone: Robert E. Howard, The Final Years. |
 | Weird Talers: Essays on Robert E. Howard and Others | Here we find studies of the expansive and at times contentious correspondence of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard; Howard’s association with such colleagues in the pulp world as Clark Ashton Smith, Henry S. Whitehead, and Frank Belknap Long; Howard’s sporadic involvement with such fans as R. H. Barlow, Stuart M. Boland, and Francis T. Laney; a discussion of Howard’s writing for amateur papers; and numerous other topics. |
 | Essays on Robert E. Howard & Others | Special 50 edition copy of Robert Derie’s book, distributed at Howard Days 2018. Here we find studies of the expansive and at times contentious correspondence of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard; Howard’s association with such colleagues in the pulp world as Clark Ashton Smith, Henry S. Whitehead, and Frank Belknap Long; Howard’s sporadic involvement with such fans as R. H. Barlow, Stuart M. Boland, and Francis T. Laney; a discussion of Howard’s writing for amateur papers; and numerous other topics. |
