The Right Hand of Doom is not highly regarded, even by fans of Howard. However, in this reader’s opinion it is the very font of Howard’s unique ability to present the psychic aspect of sorcery after the Promethean tradition, not placing the sorcerer as the mercurial trickster but as the lit mind of one who sees clearly the unseen puppet strings of the human world and manages to tug them enough to impose his will in the face of all of Man’s mechanistic affectations to being beyond the reach of the fates, furies and saviors which negate our willful actuality.

In this case, Kane is not the worker of vengeance, but the judge of the avenging deed as a callous fop, John Redly, boasts by the tavern lights that he has betrayed “Roger Simeon, the necromancer” and Solomon Kane, self-appointed judge and executioner of men, casts a shadow of words over the scene:

Read more at...