The contemporary writer who has embraced the Cthulhu Mythos most ardently is Brian Lumley. He has written dozens of stories with Lovecraftian themes. The House of Cthulhu features wizards and spells and books of forbidden knowledge: all the trappings Lovecraft loved to play with in his stories. Lumley’s stories are like potato chips: you can’t just stop with one. Cthulhu shows up in several of these stories to wreck destruction on those foolish enough to summon him. If you like classic story-telling with magic and menace, you’ll enjoy The House of Cthulfu.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction 11
How Kank Thad Returned to Bhur-Esh 33
The Sorcerer’s Book 57
The House of Cthulhu 87
Tharquest and the Lamia Orbiquita 104
To Kill a Wizard 124
Cryptically Yours 142
Mylakhrion the Immortal 162
Lords of the Morass 173
The Wine of the Wizard 219
The Sorcerere’s Dream 248
All this Lovecraft stuff makes me wish October was here for the return of ASH VS. EVIL DEAD.
Jeff, you’re right about Lovecraft and October weather!
Lumley. like fellow Brit Ramsey Campbell, was a Lovecraftian from the git-go. Both started out with books published by August Derleth’s Arkham House. Their early works, sometimes crude, remain highly readable. For a horror fan, reading any of Lumley’s work is a great treat.
Jerry, I’m fond of reading Ramsey Campbell and Brian Lumley when they’re in Cthulhu Mythos mode! I wish H.P. LOVECRAFT WEEK had more than seven days so I could include some Ramsey Campbell. Maybe next time…
You know, I really prefer Lumley when he’s completely broken away from Lovecraft, such as “Fruiting Body”…Campbell, like Bloch, was glad of what he learned from writing Lovecraftianly but even gladder to find his own voice early in his career. See, among others, Campbell’s interview with Darrell Schweitzzer in SPEAKING OF HORROR…
Todd, I’ll find a copy of SPEAKING OF HORROR and check that Ramsey Campbell interview. Thanks for the recommendation!
I liked his Titus Crow books. I have a couple of his early short story collections published by Arkham , too. He’s one of the better neo-Lovecraft writers continuing on the ever growing mythology of “the Old Ones”. Better than Derleth, I’d say. I wonder why there hasn’t a been a TV series about Cthulhu and the rest of those creatures along the lines of X Files. There certainly are a lot of screenwriters who are enamored of this kind of horror writing. Maybe there has been on the SyFy channel or some other non-network place. I’m clueless about cable TV and all the other outlets now available since I refuse to pay for TV programming like that.
JF, I totally agree with you. Lumley knows his Lovecraft and writes stories that use the elements of the Cthulhu Mythos effectively. I know plenty of TV shows that have used the NECRONOMICAN and Lovecraftian themes, but no one has based a series purely on Lovecraft’s Mythos. I’d watch it.
When it comes to direct Lovecraft heirs, I tend to think of Bloch and Leiber as the obvious best of the first gen, Campbell and Fred Chappell in the second gen, and T.E.D. Klein and Thomas Ligotti in the third…I suppose I should pick someone, or a pair, among those who’ve popped up since…Mike Mignola of HELLBOY seems to have been (wisely) even more influenced by Bloch directly than by Lovecraft…
Todd, you’re right about Robert Bloch and Fritz Leiber, but one of my favorite Lovecraftian stories is “The Hounds of Tindalos” by Frank Belknap Long.