Zothique
#854.22 of 664 ranked universes · full ranking
Books 1 book Status Complete 1970 Reading commitment Low Clark Ashton Smith Last reviewed 2026-08-27
Overview
Zothique is Clark Ashton Smith's dying-earth story cycle, set on Earth's last, decaying continent under a dimming sun. Written for Weird Tales between 1932 and 1935, the tales follow sorcerers, necromancers, and doomed wanderers through a baroque, morbidly ornate world nearing its final twilight, and stand alongside Jack Vance's later Dying Earth as one of the twin foundations of the dying-earth subgenre within pulp-era fantasy.
Sword & sorcery, Dark fantasy · For Adult
Core Canon: Reading Order (1 work) counts toward ranking
The Zothique Cycle Clark Ashton Smith
| Work | Year | Canon | Rating | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Zothique: The Final Cycle | 1970 | core | 4.22 (1,372 ratings) |
Collects the individual Zothique tales, originally published in Weird Tales 1932-1935; first gathered as a standalone collection in the 1970 Ballantine Adult Fantasy series edition.
Quick answers
- How many books are in Zothique? Zothique's Core Canon is 1 book.
- Is Zothique finished? Complete (1970).
- How much reading does Zothique take? Low reading commitment (estimated from 1 Core Canon book · ~364 pages).
- How is Zothique ranked? #85 of 664 ranked universes on this site, based on 1,372 reader ratings across 1 Core Canon book. See the full ranking for how this is calculated.
Why is it ranked #85?
Ranked #85 of 664 ranked universes.
- Average reader rating of 4.22 across 1 core book.
- A smaller readership (1,372 ratings), so the score carries less weight of numbers.
- Less than 0.01 behind #84, The Stonewater Kingdom (a finer tie-break level decides the order).
- Below the top-10 average of 4.45.
Why explore this universe?
Highly rated · 1 book · Complete · 1k ratings · Ranks #85 overall
Good choice if you want a quick, low-commitment sword-and-sorcery universe that's already finished, so there's no wait for the next book.
Reading order
A single Core Canon work: no sequencing question to resolve.
Awards (verified)
- No awards found for this universe.
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Official resources
- Project Gutenberg: public-domain texts of the individual tales
Research details
Ranking metrics: weighted average 4.22 across 1,372 ratings on 1 Core Canon book. See Why is it ranked here? above for the full breakdown, or the full ranking.
How do we know this?
Admission: Zothique admitted; Core Canon = the collected story cycle accepted 2026-08-27
Sources: (see source tier definitions)
- Wikipedia: Zothique Tier 2
- Black Gate: The Fantasy Cycles of Clark Ashton Smith Tier 2
- Hippocampus Press: Zothique: The Final Cycle Tier 1
Last reviewed: 2026-08-27
Rule: Core Canon is the single collected volume gathering all of the Zothique tales, the same single-work treatment already used for other short-story-cycle universes in this database.