Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

It's 2.30 in ye morning -- what am I doing in front of my laptop?
I did a very strange thing to-day -- or, rather, yesterd-day. I joined brianlumley.com! And it's run by his wife, Silky. So I sent her a private message in which I told her that I never meant to hurt Brian's feelings by growing up and seeing my tastes mature to the point where I simply cannot enjoy his fiction. Pretty flipping weird. I have felt guilty ever since he insulted me in front of all of those hundreds of Lovecraftians, because the gist of his message about me was ,"you used to love my work and now you've forsaken me." And I thought, aww, I've really hurt the wanker's feelings. So, I've made the first step and told him I'm sorry that I said some really awful things about him. I expect that their reply will be "Piss off"and they'll have my membership on the web-site canceled. Guess I'm getting mellow in my old age.

I found a Lovecraft site on Facebook that has over 14,900 members! Moft of yem are inactive.

I discovered I can use my bank card to order from amazon.com! Cthulhu help me! I've ordered an audio reading of Oscar Wilde's DE PROFUNDUS -- and -- TEATRO GROTTESCO! I've got a feeling that when I get my next check from my patrons I'll be using a portion of it to complete my Ligotti library.

The really amusing (in a sad, pathetic way) thing about the Blumley site is that, first, moft of ye members are inactive, unlike ye whut are obsess'd with Thomas Ligotti; and -- my gawd, judging from the way they spell in their postings, they are not very -- um -- "literary". I know that sounds snobbish, but the comparison between the intellect of Ligotti admirers and Lumley fans is extremely illuminating. It takes a certain genius, I guess, to appreciate Tom's work. :-}

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I have now completed my reading of Frank Belknap Long's THE HORROR FROM THE HILLS, and I found it a rather good short Mythos novels. I was rather shocked by the first section, in which a man's face is -- transfigur'd -- by way of his encounter with Chaugnar Faugn. It's been perhaps two decades since I last read this tale, and I had forgotten most of its details; but the image stay'd with me, in my subconscious; & thus, years ago, when I was writing my book of tales in which I pay tribute to those gentlemen who were a part of the Lovecraft Circle, I wrote a tale in memory of Belknap that had a character whose face had been alter'd because she was an offspring of the Great Old One. I had no memory of the image of a face with a trunk being used by Frank (although I remember that T. E. D. Klein used this image, in an exceptionally brilliant and chilling fashion, in his tale [also written in tribute to Long] "Black Man with a Horn," whut Jim Turner included in his interesting but poorly named anthology, CTHULHU 2000. (The anthology also includes "The Last Feast of Harlequin" by Thomas Ligotti, "Lord of the Land" by Gene Wolfe, "On the Slab" by Harlan Ellison, "24 Views of Mt. Fuji, by Hokusai" by Roger Zelanzy, "Fat Face" by Michael Shea, "His Mouth Will Taste of Wormwood" by Poppy Z. Brite, "The Big Fish" by Kim Newman, "The Unthinkable" by Bruce Sterling and "I Had Vacantly Crumbled It into My Pocket....But by God, Eliot, IT WAS A PHOTOGRAPH FROM LIFE!" by Joanna Russ. There has been a bit of controversy over the role that Turner played in the course that Arkham House took after Derleth's death; some feel that he was responsible for driving away hardcore collectors and AH fans with his preference for publishing science fiction authors. However, his selection in this anthology and in ETERNAL LOVECRAFT [whut also includes tales by Ligotti, Ellison, Wolfe, and serv'd as my introduction to the wondrous short fiction of William Browning Spencer] shews Lovecraft's huge influence on writers in the sf genre. It has yet to be thoroughly explor'd, the effect of Lovecraft's cosmic fiction, his blending of supernatural horror with science fiction tropes, on modern science fiction authors.)

Centipede Press will be reprinting THE HORROR FROM THE HILLS in their forthcoming omnibus of Belknap's work, which will be a part of Centipede's Masters of the Weird Tale series of books. I have finally order'd and am awaiting my copy of their Lovecraft edition in that series.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

From Enter the Octopus, an H.P. Lovecraft expert on "Masterminds":

http://entertheoctopus.wordpress.com...n-masterminds/

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thank you for that. I used to exchange letters with Brian Lumley in the 1980s. I no longer recall why the correspondence lapsed, but I don't think that we ever had a definite falling out. Your post about the B Lumley site reminded me that his wife was a literary agent, a class of person for whom I'm currently looking. I've sent her message via the B Lumley site. I don't hold out any very great hopes from that quarter, but one never knows. Worth a try, anyway.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

It can only be "The Dunwich Horror". You never forget your first.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thanks, my dear. Life is too short to be nasty and stupid and insulting, and I did feel a bit of guilt about hurting his feelings. I've order'd HAGGOPIAN in hardcover, and I find that I still love those Titus Crow stories. I really enjoy'd reading that book, so I got a hardcover of TITUS CROW VOL. I, with the first two Crow novels included. Silky was extremely kind to me when she replied to my private message, telling me that they did not mind my being there, but that Brian insists that "watch what you say!" I sent them a note of thanx, as they are being very gracious after all the wanker-crap I spouted in anger over things Brian has said about me. It feels really great to try and be a gentleman, a nice person, especially when it comes to dealing with other writers and Lovecraftians. There are so many stupid assholes in the world, people who are mean-spirited and go out of their way to condemn others -- and I never want to be numbered among those losers.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Wow! I just finished reading this thread and what a ride! Great stories, cool old zine art, a well thought out critique and things I never thought I would know.
A Blumley.
How unfortunate is that? Sounds like it follows a Filthy Sanchez.
No wonder I was intimidated by you guys!
You're so old!
Er..um...I mean...experienced. Yeah, that's it. ;E
And you've pretty well covered my choices. I'm a big Chaugnar Faugn fan. Made a statue.
There was a story that has stuck with me by David Hensler called Teacher's Pet. It was published in an issue of Cthulhu Sex (21?) that I also had a story in. I liked the idea and spirit of that magazine, but I can't say I cared much for a good portion of its contents. This story had a quality that stood out, even if I don't recall it being especially good.
It basically involved a pretty college student who had slept her way through, is about to graduate, but can't seem to interest her folklore teacher in that sort of deal.
There is a scene where the professor berates her for thinking she could tempt him with her insignificant flesh that plays out in an unsettling way. The end was a bit silly, but the journey was fun.
Speaking of silly, I was working on an erotic mythos piece called (get this) CUNTHULHU! Three 'foreign' sisters Cun, Thu and (you guessed it) Lhu seduce a man and hold him captive, forcing him to grow strange appendages until he becomes a sort of giant anemone, first fed dreams of pleasure, later visions of necrophilic horror and ultimately used as the key device in an orgiastic ritual designed to open the gate.
Not the worst idea ever, but it still makes me laugh.
As far as Lovecraft goes, I'm a Shadow Over Innsmouth (born in Portsmouth) Shadow Out of Time kinda guy, I think. Makes me feel like I might be a part of it.
Nihilistic optimism and all that.
And I can't leave this thread without recommending a couple of Mythos Movies.
In The Mouth of Madness- The John Carpenter Lovecraft tribute of which you likely already know, but is still a damn scary movie!
And one you might not have heard of called Cast A Deadly Spell.
An HBO Original. It's 1948. Everybody uses magic. Everybody, that is, but Private Detective Phil Lovecraft (Fred Ward). An alternate history, an all star cast, a search for the Necronomicon, a virgin sacrifice and Yog Sothoth comin up outta the ground!
You'll thank me for it.
And thank you once again, TLO, for filling my insomniatic hours with the trivialities of infinity.
Sin cerely,
The Black Ferris

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I used to see CTHULHU SEX in our Borders book store, but haven't seen it there for a couple years at least. I used to try and think of some nasty Cthulhu idea to write for yem, but never found enough interest. The only time I was tempted to write Cthulhu porn was when I was working on the story for John Pelan's THE CHILDREN OF CTHULHU, cos I knew that John liked the sleazy stuff, and so I was gonna have some Deep Ones sodomy -- but then John told us that Del Rey wanted to sell the book to a young Mythos audience and so we couldn't have anything too extreme.

As far as I know, Robert M. Price's TINDALOS CYCLE is still being planned by either Chaosium or Hippocampus, and it will include all of Frank Belknap Long's Mythos fiction, including HORROR FROM THE HILLS, as well as stories by others that touch on Belknap's Mythos inventions. I recently re-read TALES OF THE CTHULHU MYTHOS (the newer edition edited by Jim Turner) and Belknap's two stories therein still entertain me. S. T. Joshi likes to rant about whut an awful story "The Space-Eaters" is, but I've always loved it. I think dear S. T. hates the use of the Christian symbol at the end of the tale -- but it's interesting that Belknap used the cross to ward of Cosmic Terror before Lovecraft used the exact same symbol in "The Dreams in the Witch House."

Too bad that H. P. LOVECRAFT'S MAGAZINE OF HORROR gave up ye ghost and closed. It was nice to have one pro magazine in which, every issue, one could find a new Mythos tale. I cannot really understand why the magazine fail'd, as there are so many Mythos fans out there, so many Lovecraftians, that I would have thought a prozine dedicated to such fiction would have a readership. I don't think the publisher was behind the magazine after the first two issues, and their erratic publication schedule didn't help. Too bad, as Marvin Kaye is one of my favourite weird fiction editors.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Pet,

It's not Lumley's current wife, Silky, who's an agent (at least not that I know of) but his ex-wife Dot (Dorothy). I think she runs the Dorian Literary Agency.

All best
Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Drat! :( Thanks for letting me know, Mark. :)

Still, I might check out the Dorian Literary agency. It might, at least, be a starting point.