I’ve just gone on a bit of a Lovecraft kick. A long time ago, I read Call of the Cthulhu and The Shadow over Innsmouth. Recently I was inspired to seek out other Lovecraft stories, and I’ve been reading them and listening to some on my commute as audiobooks or radio plays. I’ve got a bit of a completist impulse, but I realize that a lot of what Lovecraft wrote was simply pulpy dreck. What are his must-read stories? I’m also interested in stories by other authors who worked in the same milieu.
Here’s what I’ve read so far:
The Call of the Cthulhu
The Shadow over Innsmouth
Pickman’s Model
The Color out of Space
The Dunwich Horror
At the Mountains of Madness
The Shadow out of Time
What am I missing?
(Feel free to use this thread for any Lovecraftian hijacks… I did a search and it looks it’s been a while since the last Lovecraft thread)
Speaking of which, I just discovered Neil Gaiman’s story, “A Study in Emerald,” which combines the Holmes universe with the Lovecraft Old Ones. It was dynamite - really a delight to read.
Another vote for “The Rats in the Walls.”
I also like “The Statement of Randolph Carter” and “The Dreams in the Witch House.” “Cool Air” is kind of fun, but would be much better if my exposure to similar ideas in subsequently written fiction didn’t make the reveal painfully obvious.
I also enjoyed the pulpy Prey, by Graham Masterson, which takes off on ideas from Dreams in the Witch House.
Pretty sure that one is in “Shadows Over Baker Street”, which was a collection of short stories that combined Sherlock with the Mythos. It was a pretty decent read.
“Herbert West: Re-Animator” is far, far better than the movies it spawned. Should give you a case of the hella-creeps, the sensation that icy-toed lizards are running up your spine to hide in your hair.
I haven’t read much Lovecraft but I really liked The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath. This is part of the Dream Cycle, and may not be to the taste of people who like the Cthulhu Mythos.
For those of you that are curious, I’ve been listening to these dramatizations. They work quite well with Lovecraft’s narration-heavy style, and I highly recommend 'em. They’re well acted, which helps the rugose prose have an impact. As I’m reading with a modern perspective, accustomed to all sorts of horrible creatures from other books and movies, it’s a bit hard to get worked up by a description of a giant squid dragon. Yawn, lots of tentacles, seen it before. But it’s a lot more gripping when you pick up bits of the description from a gibbering madman.
I had started reading The Rats in the Wall but lost interest… I’ll have to give it another try, this time without other distractions so I don’t miss any of the setup.
Also I just moved from Boston to southern Massachusetts so that I can work in Providence… and I’m loving all of the little details that I can now pick out. I think that this particular binge was inspired by some of the funny-lookin’ locals in a slightly creepy nearby town, so naturally I went and found a copy of The Shadow over Innsmouth. I do wish that I had read Pickman’s Model when I was riding the Green Line to work every day.
That said, I have a hard time finding the horror sometimes. Reading it now, so much of the stories are so obviously rooted in 100-year-old WASP anxieties. I.e. “The British empire isn’t the pinnacle of all civilization? OH GOD!” and “Oh no! The heathens with their ancient cults were right and there is no Christian god to save us!” That sort of thing. In some of the stories I’m waiting for some twist, and I’m just dissappointed when the big reveal at the end is simply when the narrator finds evidence of his “insane” dreams. Ah well, it’s still good stuff.
Oh, I just remembered that “Imprisoned with the Pharaohs” (a/k/a “Under the Pyramids”) is one of my early favorites. Written for and about Houdini, it’s a fun ride.
If you want to go back the way, William_Hope_Hodgson was a forerunner of Lovecraft and apparently a big influence. His two main books are ‘The Night Land’ and ‘The House on the Borderland’. They’re extremely good - even with a rather dated prose style the creeping horror still makes itself felt.
I’ve not read Wolfe’s Detective of Dreams mentioned by Tom Scud (its in a pile waiting for me to get to it), but am pleased to hear an endorsement. Wolfe’s previous one An Evil Guest also had Lovecraftian overtones and was really poor IMO.
