Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Yes, ye "es" was supposed to be "esq". I thought of having ye master correct it, but then I thought, screw that, it stands as symbol of my utter hopelessness. & then I thought, whut could it mean, this mysterious "es"; and I found my answer in ye title S. T. gave to ye correspondence of HPL/Derleth: Essential Solitude!:)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I wonder whether anyone here has seen and recalls a story of mine published in Crypt of Cthulhu 88. It was entitled Princess of the Black Asteroid. (Des should have a copy, at least -- he had a story in the same issue.) My tale is not a mythos story, but a story about the future of the mythos.

Here's a bit of it:

The book had not only lost its spine, but the entire cover. Subsequently, I was to find that my first impressions were correct. It had once been a paperback, and those discoloured crumbly pages dated to Derleth's lifetime. The half title was crumpled over the title page, covering the author's name. Smoothing it back, disappointingly, that of H. P. Lovecraft was revealed.

I had, of course, studied Lovecraft in subby -- as part of the literature section of my deka -- he's one of the compulsory authors. This is not to say that I'd actually read his stuff. Like everyone else in the class, I used Coombes' Notes. Once, in the library, I'd paused before Lovecraft's Collected Letters -- whole shelves full of it. I took down a volume in the eighties -- volume 87, or was it 84? No matter, opening it at random, I looked at one of the letters. The thing was addressed to a woman with a funny name -- Taldredge, or something like that -- and thanked him for sending her some press clippings. The impression given by Coombes' Notes confirmed, I snapped the book shut and returned it to the gap on the shelves. That was the closest I'd come to reading Lovecraft.

Deciding to repeat my method of checking Lovecraft's work, I opened the tattered paperback at random. It flipped open to pages 48-49, where I was astonished to see the words "CTHULHU CULT" in block capitals. Turning back a page, I found that this was part of a story called "The Call of Cthulhu". Who would have imagined that H. P. Lovecraft, of all people, had contributed to August Derleth's Cthulhu mythos? Yet here was the evidence in my hand.

I can't be bothered to copy much more but, subsequently, the narrator writes a mythos story called "Hasturoid" and submits it to Cthulhu Chills magazine. She received this rejection letter:

Nice try Cthulhu cub! But not quite nice enough. We like the Cthulhu in space bit, but you haven't developed the romantic interest sufficiently. Of course, the same is true of old August Derleth's stories -- but that's exactly why he doesn't often crop up amongst our "Cthulhu Classics". You need to look at the stories we publish more closely. But -- hey Cthulhu cub -- don't be down hearted! Try again -- beefing up the love stuff. OK?

I think that I was trying both to indicate where I thought the mythos might be heading, and where Joshi's academic approach to Lovecraft might lead.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

My favorite Mythos story was, perhaps still is "The Colour Out of Space," but lately I'm leaning toward "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" -- wait a sec, neither of those tales can really be classify'd as "Mythos" -- I must therefore name them as my favourite Lovecraft story. My favorite Mythos not by Lovecraft. Perhaps "Sticks," or "The Terror from the Depths." But it is a thing of ever-shifting flow, this naming of a favorite tale. Because now I stop and think that my favourite "Mythos" story by HPL is "The Haunter of the Dark," especially now that I've visted Providence.
Now I must log out and get to work revising a Mythos story of my own, "Thy Cryptic Power," for ye revised/expanded edition of Dreams of Lovecraftian Horror that I am writing for Mythos books; & then I want to begin tentative work on "She Who Sees the Dawn," a story inspir'd by Phil's Wilde quote and which portrays the fate of a blind woman named "Gloria S Carnivals"..........................

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Crikey! I'll look forward to that, Wilum.

Be gentle! Be gentle! I have a particular affection for this child o' mine

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I see that I haven't mentioned my favourite mythos tale:

By Lovecraft, "The Whisperer in Darkness" (my favourite Lovecraft story is actually "The Colour Out of Space" but I don't see it as a mythos tale, in that it doesn't draw at all on that body of lore, as I recall).

Not by Lovecraft, "Black Man with A Horn" by TED Klein ("Cold Print" by Ramsey Campbell running a close second).

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o...us/img0031.jpg

http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o...s/img0041a.jpg

http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o...s/img0041b.jpg

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thank you, Des! I just read the whole story from your scan, to check that it was legible -- and it had me laughing out loud. :D

I hope the Cthulhu cutsies on the TLO will hang on to their socks! ;)

I notice, though, that in spite of being set in the future it refers to watching a film on video. DVD has already killed the video star! :confused:

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thank you, wilum. I am greatly flattered. ;)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Me, too!

But I recall telling you all those years ago when I first read this story that 'cutsies' should be 'cutesies' !!
But you never changed it, :-(

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Is her middle name 'Station'? :)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Cannot find ye book, but there are volumes in ye series that I know I have but cannot locate. Last year I moved in with me mum, who fell & broke her hip & is nigh 81 and simply cannot be alone; and I lost a lot of bookshelf. So my library is in a state of utter chaos. If I cannot find BNH 19 I'll go to University Bookstore, which usually has copies of all latter volumes. I absolutely love the series, because it makes available yarns from many sources that are unavailable, and the editor has super taste.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Now that you mention it, I recall your telling me that. Perhaps I'd already submitted the story to Crypt by the time I received your spelling advice. In those pre-computer (for me) days, you and Chambers were my only spell checks. :o

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

A pity it was only a short story. Very very funny.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thanks for posting "The Princess of the Black Asteroid." That was hilarious. I especially liked the "more romance" editorial advice. I actually think there is a Cthulhu Sex Magazine out there somewhere. I'm not kidding.
Just last night I was reading through some old Dagon magazines. I was looking for Dave Carson's great illustration for Black Man with a Horn. And I had some fun reading the old letters pages. Letters from Des, Pet, Mark Samuels, Ramsey Campbell, etc.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Wilum

Please don't go to such trouble on my behalf. Since you kindly offered to critique it, please give me your email address and I will send it over as a Word document for research purposes.

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Due to its success above, maybe 'Princess of the Black Asteroid' by Petal Jeffery in Crypt of Cthulhu 1994 will become a strong contender for the all-time favourite non-HPL Cthulhu Mythos story!? :)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Perhaps someone will reprint 'Princess of the Black Asteroid' incorporating Des' 'Cutesies' spelling correction and updating 'video' to 'DVD' or even 'Blue Ray'.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Would there be any possibility of posting Pet's marvellous Lovecraft tale "The Kindly Elder" here? I'd dearly love to read that one again...

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thank you very much for those kind words, Mark.

It was first published in the very rare first issue of Garrie Hall's Tales After Dark (only about 65 copies printed, I think) and reprinted in Crypt of Cthulhu 85. If Des has either (or both) of those, perhaps he could scan the story and post it here. I think that he may have bought Tales After Dark issue 1-- and I may well have sent him my second copy of Crypt 85. Robert Price used to send two copies to Crypt contributors.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I'd be pleased to scan it (as I did with the Asteroid story but then I knew exactly where it was!).

I'd need to look for those two mags, assuming I've (still?) got them... I certainly recall having the 'Tales After Dark 1' so should still have it...
I'm out this evening and most of tomorrow daytime and would possibly need daylight for at least part of the search, so won't be able to start looking till Friday at the earliest. Lurking things permitting and other denizens of Kadath...
If, in the meantime, someone else here has got a copy of the story and can scan it before I do (if I can)....

I remember it being relatively short(?).
des

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Your memory is spot on. In Crypt, it runs to 2 double column pages. In Tales After Dark, it was 3 single column pages plus a full page illustration. :)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thanks. I've just realised I was in 8 separate CRYPTS. Just been reminiscing.

So, yes, I'll start looking on Friday for CoC85 or TaD1 on Friday, unless someone else intervenes.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

(By popular demand. From Crypt of Cthulhu #85, Hallowmas 1993.)




When I was five the Arabian Nights claimed me, and I spent hours in playing Arab - calling myself "Abdul Alhazred" which some kindly elder had suggested to me as a typical Saracen name.


"Whatever is young Howard doing with that shovel?" asked the young lady in the blue dress.

She stood to the left of a lady in green, beyond whom stood a young man with spectacles. The three were regarding a five year old boy on the hearthrug. The infant had taken the companion set and was menacing the empty air with the miniscule shovel. The lady in green smiled indulgently. "I rather think, Helena, that the shovel is some fearsome Arabian scimitar. Ever since Howard devoured the Arabian Nights he has been playing Arab. Surely there goes another infidel's head! Careful, now, Howard!"

As she spoke Howard made another violent lunge with the shovel and nearly lost his footing.

"I hope he doesn't hurt himself," commented Helena.

"He hasn't yet," replied the lady in green, "but he does get rather carried away by his games. He even has a name for this oriental persona of his. Abdul Abuzrid, or something of the sort."

"Abdul Alhazred, Mrs. Lovecraft," corrected the young man with spectacles.

Helena pouted before replying petulantly, "It seems to me that you pay more attention to the child's prattle than you do to what I have to say." Evidently this speech related to an earlier quarrel which, to judge from the expression on the young man's face, he had hoped forgotten.

Howard settled himself firmly on the hearthrug, the short edge of which he clasped firmly with both hands, as if clinging to a flying carpet. Mrs. Lovecraft was the only one to notice. Helena gazed fixedly at a framed photograph of a lady dressed in the fashion of 1880 while the young man addressed the back of her head: "While the softness - er - gentleness of your voice is - er - no doubt, a most becoming trait in a... er - most becoming..."

"You needn't try to squirm out of it through flattery," Helena coldly informed the fifteen-year-old photograph.

Young Howard, sensing that adult attention was elsewhere, was trying to climb the mantelpiece with the intention of rubbing the gas bracket in the hope of a genie. "Stop that Howard," directed his mother, continuing, to both Howard and the two young adults, "now, now, let's have no more of this."

The young man fixed a rather forced smile on his face. "I am sorry, Mrs. Lovecraft, I did not mean to raise the matter again. But really, it doesn't aid my hearing when Helena turns her back to me whilst speaking."

Helena snorted, possibly in derision, while Mrs. Lovecraft raised her hands and cried, "Enough!"

Howard was making his way over to the table where the oil lamp seemed easily accessible. "I am sorry to have mentioned it," the young man apologised, without a great deal of humility.

The fond smile returned to Mrs. Lovecraft's lips. "Howard has such an active imagination. I wonder what he thinks he's going over to the table for. Perhaps it represents a jewel-encrusted palace... I supposse that he took his Saracen name from some Arabian Nights tale."

"Indeed not," the young man with spectacles corrected her, "I suggested it to him myself. I do not," he added archly, "listen so attentively to the child as some people would suppose."

"Well, if other people devoted less of their attention to becoming experts on heathen nomenclature, they might have more to spare for the discourse of Christians," Helena informed a nondescript sepia landscape print.

Mrs. Lovecraft raised her hands as if attempting to push an invisible object a foot or so before her shoulders. But as Howard, having reached the table, stretched out his hands towards the oil lamp, it was to him that she cried, "No! Come away from that!" as she screwed up her eyes.

The young man apparently heeded her evident distress, for he seemed to change the subject abruptly. "You know those awful old books on the shelves upstairs - the Latin ones?"

Mrs. Lovecraft relaxed visibly. "You mean the old Phillips collection of incunabula - some of them are rather valuable, I believe."

Howard was slowly returning to the hearthrug... Helena seemed bored, irritable and restless. "Valuable?" asked the young man. "It's one word, I suppose... Anyway, the biggest of the lot, the one at the top left hand corner, covered in some evil-smelling skin. I'm sure it's not leather..."

"Father said it was long pigskin," returned Mrs. Lovecraft, encouragingly. "He said that it isn't often used in bookbinding, though there's quite a lot of it about. He didn't say what it was generally used for, and it does have an odd odour."

Howard was back on the hearthrug with each of the tools of the companion set in turn, starting with the hearthbrush. Helena seemed more bored and more irritated. She stalked from the room, ostentatiously yawning. The young man grimaced at her retreating back, addressing his hostess absently, "Sausage skins, perhaps?"

"Very likely," agreed Mrs. Lovecraft.

Helena closed the door behind her, while Howard returned his attention to the small shovel. "Anyway," added the young man, almost as an afterthought, "that's where I got the name from."

"Which name?" Mrs. Lovecraft had obviously lost the thread of the conversation.

"Abdul Alhazred. It's the name on the spine of that book. The book's in Latin but it isn't a Latin name. Abdul Alhazred, it does sound Arabian."

Young Howard Lovecraft had taken up his small shovel once more and appeared to be engaged in a furious battle with invisible demons.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I've been emailing with someone who is interested in publishing a revival of Crypt, and so I try'd sending the email to Bob Price, whom I see every Octobyr at ye Lovecraft Film Festival. (At this past one I was maid-of-honour at his daughter's marriage, which he performed wearing his Dagon Priest hat and a pallid Yellow mask!) He doesn't seem to respond to emails too often, so this may come of naught. I really miss Crypt. Had an interesting relationship with its readership, so I did. That was when I was at the height of my outspoken-ness, and I often said things that piss'd people off. I said some things I really regret now, but knowing how stupid I sounded then gives me an opportunity to not be such a twit these days.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thanks, GSC, for posting that. And, Mark S, for requesting it. It brings back memories of one of PF Jeffery's gems. It is also interesting (for me, at least!), inasmuch as the bit of the story I've left above is also quoted at the end of my story 'Apple Turnover' (a quote attributed to 'PF Jeffery'). 'Apple Turnover' was first published in 'Dead of Night' (1994) - & later re-printed in 2003 in 'Weirdmonger' (Prime Books), meaning effectively (and unintentionally), that 'PF Jeffery' is the only name of a real person that appears in that whole book (other than the author's name).

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Yes, many thanks GSC. It's the first time I've re-read it in a long while. The idea of long pigskin being used for sausage skins made me laugh out loud. :D

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Hey, thanks for posting Pet's tale GSC. It brought back fond memories, and is every bit as delightful as I remember. Des, if you can find it, would it be possible to post the illustration that went with the tale in Tales After Dark #1? From what I recall it was a corker.

I've just sent you an email, Wilum, containing the "Lovecraft" in Mexico tale.

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Typing up "The Kindly Elder" was a labor of love. Well worth the effort!

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

The Kindly Elder
by PF Jeffery

First published 1986 'Tales After Dark #1 - Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos'

1993 (Crypt of Cthulhu reprint) Text above here: THE NIGHTMARE NETWORK - View Single Post - Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story

Illustration from TALES AFTER DARK #1 (by Justin Smith):


http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o...ndlyelder2.jpg

Other PF Jeffery related links:
Who Killed St John? (Crypt of Cthulhu 1987)
The Princess and the Black Asteroid (Crypt of Cthulhu 1994)
Golden Goddess and Bloody Times (2006)
ODALISQUE (2008)




==================================

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

What's that I see in Cthulhu's eyes? Mercy? Now I've seen everything!

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Bear in mind the concept of crocodile tears...

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

How strange! I (now) remember that illustration (and thanks for reproducing it here Des) but for some reason I thought it was it was going to be one of Lovecraft as a young boy. Memory plays tricks. Perhaps I'm remembering the cover of the Necronomicon Press Juvenalia.

Something disconcerting, in any case, about Cthulhu with human eyes...

Brrrrrr.

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

I've just awakened from a wee kip, and I'm so groggy that I've already lost my first attempt at commenting when I went to look up the meaning of "mestizo", which brought to mind what I seem to remember was a very strange film, "The Mestizo Waltz." I shall try to be coherent (fat chance), but this is going to be a time-consuming post cos I've already made a plethora of typos.

I was extremely impressed, Mark, with "A Gentleman from Mexico"; and I do indeed remember it from having read it in BNH, so I've got the flipping book here somewhere. Of course, I'm always looking for Lovecraft's influence in a tale of this type, and may see it where it was not intended; per example, the silent taxi driver at the beginning recalled to mind the silent Joe Sargent in "Innsmouth." Intended or not, this gave the story an immediate HPLish taint.

Armstrong is beautifully portrayed, and I love his transition. At first, he is like some nondescript narrator in the background, there merely to tell the tale. Slowly, he evolves, becomes tainted by the events, and by his knowledge of the Mythos literature. San Isidro is delightful, and plays the vital role of "source" of nameless incident, like unto Marco in Bloch's "The Skull of the Marques de Sade." One can well-believe that he is a "so-called" underground poet, for he never seems poetic in any way. Perhaps, like Rimbaud, those days are well behind him, debauched by drink, if ever they actually existed.

Felipe Lopez is the delight of the story, strange and beguiling. His entrance into the tale ushers forth the sense of the outre, that single note of arcane invasion that stalks into the realm of normalcy. He is the single weird incident that Lovecraft schools us to introduce into the average, everyday world. The thing from a different realm. He has numerous wonderful touches, such as when he orders the double-shot expresso (I can see the modern-day Lovecraft writing his postcards, not on a bench in Prospect Terrace, but at a table in Starbucks). His introduction into the story triggers the transition of Armstrong's viewpoint and personality: once so cool and in control, now inexorably tainted by this odd author of Lovecratian voice. The little touches thyat reveal who Lopez is are amusing and spot-on, such as the meeting at Cafe la Habana, where he is dressed in a cream-coloued suit and sporting a panama hat. It is these careful little touches that especially delight the knowledgable Lovecraftian.

I think I'm running out of room. I shall stagger to another box.:drunk:

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

This is a continuation of ye previous entry.

You have the Lovecraftian language down pat, to the point where I wanted to try and check if any of that which Lopez utters is directly from the letters. (In his amazing novel, The Lovecraft Chronicles, Peter Cannon has used Lovecraft's own words for every uttered line that flows from HPL's mouth in the dialogue of the book.) The wonderful twist comes when Armstrong becomes, subtly, the deluded believer that he imagines Lopez to be. (I cannot be too specific in case those reading this have not yet read your fantastic tale; in which case I chide them to stop reading this and procure the story in their copy of Best New Horror.)

My favorite line from the story: "There are a lot of sad crazies out there, thought Armstrong, who believe in nothing except the power of their own imaginations to create whatever they want to create from a supposedly malleable reality." This is a vital point in the story. Not only does it herald Armstrong's Lovecraftian doom, to become the thing he mocks, but it also suggests that one cannot trust any point of view inthe tale. What is reality, what imagination. Who is crazy, who sane? This is a device that Lovecraft uses, sometimes too blatantly and obviously.

Finally, the horror of the story is deliciously cosmic, authentically Lovecraftian. It is a chilling and incomprehensible doom that casts it dark infiltration upon the insects known as humanity. Bravo!:cool:

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

This is a continuation of ye previous post.
From a personal standpoint, the story stirred up a lot of ichor within my being. This whole critique of Armstrong's about those who ape Lovecraft's voice and personae in their own fiction -- this touches me deeply, personally. It is my goal -- crazy or no -- as an author to be buried in Lovecraft's titan shadow. I want, if I am to be remembered at all, to be remembered as an author of Lovecraftian horror. It is my firm belief that what begins as adolescent mimicry can, with time and effort, blossom into something rich and fine -- if one has the devotion and talant, and I certainly have the devotion. Too, I believe that if I stay true to my pursuit to write mature and original tales of Lovecraftian terror that I will find, in time, my core readership, the people who know and appreciate what I'm about. I write for Lovecraftians, for those who enjoy Mythos fiction. But my hope is that, by now, I am writing my own stories in my own voice. I remember being astounded when the hardcover of HAUNTS was reviewed in Fangoria 225, wherein the reviewer praised me thus: "W. G. (sic) Pugmire does one of the most accurate Lovecraft pastiches...that I have ever read. Each of these stories...could easily be mistaken for the work of the Master of Cosmic Horror. If the stories had been printed sans any reference to the author, I would be fooled, if it weren't for the odd reference to punk rock and homoerotic themes." I did not know whether to howl with diabolic laughter or weep with anguish'd rage.

Begging to remain,
Ever thy humble obt. srvt.
--hopfrog, esq.;)

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thank you very much indeed for that detailed analysis, Wilum. I'm touched that you've gone to such trouble over the tale, but am delighted, since it's my favourite from the batch I've most recently had published.

I suppose I have an "ear" for authorial voices. I once wrote an imaginary letter from Arthur Machen to H.P. Lovecraft (I believe it might be available somewhere online over at the Lost Club/Tartarus Press website). So, all the Lovecraft dialogue was drawn from my imagination. Felipe Lopez may, or may not, actually be Lovecraft in the tale, or he may be in the process of becoming Lovecraft, or even (horrible final revelation!) some kind of Old One. But as you say, the question becomes unanswerable when one recognises that the undermining of reality itself is the central process that is taking place. And all that remains is a form of decayed futurity.

I wish I had some of your fiction to read. My copies of Crypt of Cthulhu (though I only possess seven or eight) are back in England, along with one or two other Cryptic Publications, such as Tales of Lovecraftian Horror. But when I return to England in March, I'll make a point of ordering your revised Tales of the Sesqua Valley. I do so wish that many others who write Cthulhu Mythos fiction shared your devotion to producing authentic, rather than solely derivative, work in this field.

Again, thank you for the kind remarks!

Un abrazo muy fuerte,

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Mark, I find that I have one extra copy of THE FUNGAL STAIN & OTHER DREAMS, which I placed among my Hippocampus titles rather than in ye milk crate that houses my own books. Email me your home address & I'll post it as soon as the surrounding snow, which affects both asthma and anemia, hath melted. (I've been trapped in this house for days, unable to poft parcels to Nicole and Berglund &c, and I'm going flipping bonkers.) I've just been inspir'd to write a new sequence, based on HPL's Commonplace Book -- a series of vignettes and prose-poems which I am going to call "Uncommon Places." If I'm silent for ye next few days 'tis because I am loft in scribbling, my favourite of realms.:D

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Thanks Wilum. I'll email you pronto. It might be an idea to wait until I'm back in the U.K. before you post anything to me though. I'm here in Mexico until 3rd March 2009 and am travelling around quite a bit (the next couple of days, for example, I'm here in Tapalpa, high in the mountains not too far from Guadalajara). Right now I can hear fireworks and a street party going on outside ...

I'll then be back in Guadalajara briefly, then Guanajuato, then San Miguel de Allende, back to Mexico City for a bit, then Oaxaca (well, you get the idea).

Also, when I'm back in Blighty, I'll have access to my copies of Glyphotech (or Discotheque, as it was once described :D) and can send you one of those by way of reciprocating your kindness.

Mark S.

Re: Your Favorite Cthulhu Mythos Story
 

Centipede Press will publish, next year, a huge omnibus of the fiction of Frank Belknap Long. Long was one of Lovecraft's best buddies, and he is the author of what has long been acknowledged the first Mythos story written by someone other than Lovecraft, "The Space Eaters." This was one of my favorite Cthulhu Mythos stories for many years when I first got hooked on Lovecraftian fiction. This may also have been the first story in which a character was based on Lovecraft and named "Howard" therein. (Poppy Z. Brite named one of her characters in "His Mouth Will Taste of Wormwood" Howard, but that was an acknowledgement {as if one was needed!} of the story's debt to Lovecraft and "The Hound," rather than a modern imagining of Lovecraft as character.) S. T. Joshi has often panned "The Space Eaters" as bad fiction -- and many seem to have a problem with the ending and the "heroic" appearance of a cosmic cross. The ending is indeed absurd, but one must remember that Lovecraft also used the holy cross as defense against daemons in "Dreams in the Witch House" (1932; Long's story was written first, in 1927 -- and who knows but that this use of the Christian symbol by Long "inspir'd" HPL?). I still really like "The Space Eaters," especially the first portion in which the thing falls from a tree and nests inside some bloke's noggin. The story is easily available in the Del Rey trade paperback edition of Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos. And it is scheduled to be reprinted in The Tindalos Cycle, edited by Robert M. Price and scheduled to be published by Hippocampus Press.

The Centipede Press omnibus will be the largest collection of Long's writing, and it will include the short novel, The Horror from the Hills, in which the central portion is written not by Long but by Lovecraft, being a transcription (from a letter that Lovecraft wrote to Long) of a dream. It is, therefore, more of an authentic collaboration than any of the fake posthumous works "by" HPL & Derleth. The omnibus will be beautifully illustrated and include, I believe, an introduction or afterword by John Pelan. It will be a huge book, and for lovers of the Cthulhu Mythos it will be a gem indeed.:D