Conan: Book Of Thoth (Conan (Dark Horse Unnumbered)) [Paperback]

Kurt Busiek (Author), Len Wein (Author), Kelley Jones (Author)

Book Description

Series: Conan (Dark Horse Unnumbered) | Publication Date: December 12, 2006

Writers Kurt Busiek and Len Wein, creator of Wolverine and SwampThing, team up with the grandmaster of horror art, Kelley Jones, to tell thehorrifying origin of Thoth-amon Conan's greatest adversary!Inthe dank alleys of a decaying city, a beggar child conjures visions of a futurewhere, instead of spitting on him in the streets, the rich and privileged cowerin fear of his terrible authority. Through cunning, murderous means, heingratiates himself into a benevolent priesthood, only to turn the church andthe nation itself over to the terrible snake-god, Set!This essentialpiece of the Conan mythos reveals the secrets behind the dread sorcererThoth-amon for the first time!

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Robert E. Howard's memorable villain finally gets an origin story of his own in this volume, which collects a four-issue miniseries of the same name. Thoth is a beggar "in the blighted city of Memphia," his morals slowly eroded by an abusive father and harsh life on the streets. When his friend Amon receives an invitation to apprentice in the house of the kindly priest of Ibis, Thoth kills Amon and takes his place in the priest's home. Busiek (Astro City, JLA/Avengers) and the legendary Wein (Swamp Thing) do a fine job telescoping a lifetime's worth of sinister plotting and backstabbing into relatively few pages. Narration is well-executed and evocative ("a new wind did waft through Memphia, thin and dry though it was") and the narrator's identity, revealed at the end, is a nice twist. There is much blood shed in the book, but most of it is implied; only a few scenes contain graphic violence, although virtually every page bears at least one image that is genuinely terrifying or haunting. Liberal use of shadows and wiry outlines in Kelley's solid but moody art give shape to a world where even the agents of light do not seem entirely trustworthy. (Dec.)
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Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Dark Horse (December 12, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1593076487
• ISBN-13: 978-1593076481
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 6.7 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #954,847 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good story...Great Art!, January 13, 2007

By 

Tim Janson (Michigan) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Conan: Book Of Thoth (Conan (Dark Horse Unnumbered)) (Paperback)

Imagine...A Conan book where are favorite Barbarian is no where to be seen...It's no joke, but is indeed what you get with Conan The Book of Thoth. This volume reprints the four issue series from Dark Horse comics and lifts the veil on Conan's arch-foe, the black wizard Thoth-Amon of Stygia. It's interesting to note that while Thoth may be considered Conan's greatest foe, he actually only appeared in just one story written by Conan creator Robert E. Howard, "The Phoenix on the Sword" which first appeared in Weird Tales in 1932. It was really in the Marvel Comics' series that Thoth-Amon would become Conan's greatest enemy.

Thoth's origins were always shrouded in mystery and Kurt Busiek, who has been writing Conan's adventures at Dark Horse, along with long-time comic scribe Len Wein, tell the story of his background. Now it's hard to imagine Thoth as a boy but that's exactly how they start the story. Thoth is a street urchin, stealing what he can to appease his abusive father. Fate shines on him one day when his friend Amon, saves the life of Kharantus, the High Priest of the Ibis. The benevolent priest invites the boy to become an Acolyte at the temple. Thoth sees his opportunity, killing his friend and assuming his identity.

Thoth now finds himself in a great power and is soon seeking out the dark arts and comes across scrolls referring to the ancient, and long destroyed city of Acheron, home to great wizards and great evil. Now here's where things get a bit dicey...Thoth mentions that Acheron was home to a thousand centuries of black magic and diabolism, an archaic tradition of evil." This comment is lifted nearly word for word from the Conan story "The Hour of the Dragon" which was uttered by the priest Orastes speaking about the resurrected Acheron wizard Xaltotun. I'm not even sure Howard knew what he was writing as a thousand centuries, or 100,000 years places Acheron about 85,000 years before the Pre-Cataclysmic era of King Kull.

Okay, I got a bit side-tracked on that detail. At any rate, Thoth eventually finds the Ring of Set, the serpent God which gives him incredible power to overthrow the priests of Ibis and usher in the era of Set as Stygia's primary deity. The story takes places over several years as we see Thoth grow both in stature and power as he weaves insidious plots to gain control of Stygia.

The story is somewhat on the slow-moving side. There's only a sliver of the kind of action you expect in the typical Conan story. This is a story about more than swordplay. It's about intrigue and an insatiable quest for power. The story humanizes Thoth and I'm not sure if that's really such a good thing or not. In some ways it diminishes his stature as perhaps the ultimate force for evil in Conan's time. Still, it was interesting to see this take on Thoth's history.

While I will give moderate approval to the story, the art of Kelley Jones gets an unquestionable standing ovation from me. Jones has always been one of my favorites for his angular figures and expressive eyes of his characters. Few artists use light and shadow as well as Jones does.

Reviewed by Tim Janson

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Who the hell put those reviews (obviously from another book) here?, December 11, 2006

By 

Carla G. Dávalos Rdz "Chuckymonster" (Mexico, DF Mexico) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Conan: Book Of Thoth (Conan (Dark Horse Unnumbered)) (Paperback)

This is supposed to be for reviews of the Book of Thoth, not the regular Conan serie.
So, having cleared that, I must say that this is one of the most true to Howard's vision comic book stories ever; from the rich narrative to the magnificent images & the surprising conclusion (at least fro Thoth-Amon who had quite a shock from the reward he was expecting) The Kelley Jones art is magnificent (but I miss John Beatty's inking) and it fits the story well. All in all a great book for Conan fans, which can be appreciated by comic book readers or diehard book fans.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Story and acceptable drawings, May 14, 2011

By 

TigerEmerald - See all my reviews

This review is from: Conan: Book Of Thoth (Conan (Dark Horse Unnumbered)) (Paperback)

My understanding is that Thoth-Amon had only one real appearance in the Conan series, where Conan assisted Khalantees of Ibis in a quest to destroy an evil object. However, somehow Thoth-Amon has been made to be a lifetime enemy of Conan and writers have found ways to give him cameos.

I personally found the story of Thoth-Amon very interesting and fairly sensible, but I have to warn that in many ways I also felt a bit disappointed as well - personally theorizing where Thoth-Amon had come from and reading his story partially damaged my image of him as this ancient all powerful magician. Still, it was good to read that he was basically bad from the beginning.

My only possible quirk would be the drawings. The Conan comics in general are well known for their utmost art qualit, very detailed pictures with utter mature material. This comic's drawns was rather basic in comparison, but still good enough to convey the emotions of the characters within.