Tartarus Press has announced that the latest short story collection by Reggie Oliver is nearing completion. It should arrive this September, re-introducing Oliver to the short story scene, after he briefly turned his attention to the first novel of The Dracula Papers: The Scholar's Tale (read the full Dracula Papers review here). His latest collection, Mrs. Midnight and Other Stories, indicates that Oliver shows no sign of letting up in the weird short fiction realm, a form that introduced him to eager readers.
As with other Oliver stories, the titles can suggest almost anything, but why not let the imagination run wild in the meantime? Here's the line up reported by Tartarus for the new volume: "Mrs Midnight", "Countess Otho", "Meeting with Mike", "The Dancer in the Dark", "Mr Pigsny", "The Brighton Redemption", "You Have Nothing to Fear", "The Philosophy of the Damned", "The Mortlake Manuscript", "The Look", "The Giacometti Crucifixion","A Piece of Elsewhere", "Minos or Rhadamanthus."
-Grim Blogger
Mrs Midnight Collection by Reggie Oliver Nears Release
The name D.F. Lewis may prompt plenty of critical and courteous remarks. Indeed, there’s a lot to say, given his extensive experience in writing strange fiction for several decades, and in providing an outlet for the works of others as editor of the Nemonymous series. Fortunately, his novella by InkerMen Press, Weirdtongue: A Glistenberry Romance, lends a powerful distillate of what can be expected from Lewis’ work – a sampling that would otherwise be difficult to obtain by surveying the fifteen hundred plus stories he’s estimated to have written. The slim volume offers a journey like no other in weird fiction or outside of it. It is a destroyer of boundaries in every sense, chiseling away the confines of time, space, identity, and conventional literature.
A Nemophile’s Manifesto
This novella is impossible to define in simple terms, but if it were possible to cross a dream scrambled travelogue with a philosophical tract, you might end up with a similar artifact. While many inevitably focus on its notable wordplay and narrative spider webs, the story’s true power emanates from its heady ideas. The recurring references to Nemophiles as well as the shifting, unstable identities of many characters creates plenty of intellectual fodder.
In Weirdtongue, nothing is certain, a notion which is reinforced in each and every character, each of whom uses the book as a bridge from Lewis head into our own. For instance, the narrative opens from the perspective of Gregory Mummerset, a sufferer of dream sickness who is repeatedly visited by the word slinging apparition known as the Weirdmonger. Later, D.F. Lewis’ famous time traveling, globe trekking cat meats seller, Blasphemy Fitzworth, morphs from a Victorian merchant into a meat cart, becoming the very commodity instrument that constitutes his livelihood.
Beyond the surface of these bizarre occurrences is an unmistakable uncertainty principle at work in every way imaginable. Is the entire storyline the product of Mummerset’s febrile dreams, which he never really escapes from? Or perhaps Padgett Weggs, a wandering vagrant, is responsible for the events on display here. Maybe the entirety of the plot is some ghostly echo of the Glistenberry festival itself, shrieking its imaginary history down through the ages, using D.F. Lewis and his novella as an unknowing tour guide.
In the end, no one can say with any conviction. D.F. Lewis captures the same uncertainty principle wielded by weird fiction masters like Robert Aickman, and uncanny media personalities such as Rod Serling. Yet, it isn’t really fair to liken his work to either gentleman, since Lewis arguably outdoes both in stacking weird layer upon layer, forcing a freakish Tower of Babel into existence for any who care to probe its mysteries.
Recovering in the Narrative Hospital
In some way, every reader who enters the pages of Weirdtongue is invited to undergo a form of literary therapy that just might cure a sickness they may not have known was there. Lewis, like the cat meats seller of his tale, hacks apart the gristly elements of what may have once been independent narratives, arranging together the choicest cuts for our feasting. Still, this volume is not one to gorge on in short order.
The often experimental style that roils its pages is the greatest challenge to bringing the Weirdtongue’s alien ideas into coherence. Lewis isn’t afraid to curl words, insert footnotes, or twist names and places as it suits him. Widespread wordplay punctures the narrative as well, such as the curious references to cell phones, which begin to make sense when understanding the closeness nomophobia (fear of losing mobile phone contact) shares with other terms the author is fond of.
This type of almost mandated meta-fictional interaction between the book and the “real” world will disinterest some readers and delight others. The same applies to Lewis’ half-parodying self-criticism, introduced most notably through Simplon, who shows up with truncated speech patterns to attack Lewis’ flamboyant, unorthodox, and complicated styles. Should a book that sardonically jeers at itself be taken seriously? Opinions may differ, but there is so much else alive in Weirdtongue that the answer is yes.
The reading experience needed to get the most out of this novella is a slow, intent one that’s willing to ride the philosophic and word rich waves issued by D.F. Lewis. Perhaps the author knowingly crafted his story with the intent that it would only appeal to a limited, but energetic fan base. However, Weirdtongue: A GlistenberryRomance is ripe for more niche defying and genre traversing readers than may initially be expected. Its emphasis on bold, unsettling concepts unveiled through a rich cast of strange characters and diverse prose makes it a fine candidate for weird horror regulars and beyond. With patience, the jaunt through this particular world of Lewis’ design is an intellectually lucrative one, and so are repeated visits to the ghostly word-chambers of this narrative hospital.
Books employing Edgar Allan Poe as a character must always veer off into fantasy. Somehow, this is a modest disappointment, since his real life was so tragic, so real, and so bizarre that it makes excellent fodder for the imagination. Eddie: The Lost Youth of Edgar Allan Poe by Scott Gustafson must go one step further, for better or worse.
As a children's volume, the book seeks to present a heroic Poe. It begins well before Poe's troubles like alcoholism set in, effectively masking the more controversial elements of his life from young minds. This allows the author to reinvent the horror master as he pleases. Surprisingly, though, Gustafson's story does not shirk from horror. His version of the youthful Poe is one who deals in intrigue and the macabre equally.
As a cultural artifact, it's interesting that Eddie: The Lost Youth of Edgar Allan Poe is aimed at children. Too often, Poe is introduced, and then quickly left behind. If there's any conspiracy in American English classrooms today, it's a tendency to avoid dwelling on the bleak prose of scribes like Poe in favor of global diversity with a message that is, in some way, uplifting.
This is a shame, since Poe's brutal realism and morose imagery is truly different, and far more enlivening than many modern contemporaries. Although Gustafson's contribution won't necessarily lead kids to pessimistic, strange horror, it will certainly introduce or re-introduce Poe, and possibly lead to a greater exploration filled with literary darkness.
-Grim Blogger
Eddie: The Lost Youth of Edgar Allan Poe by Scott Gustafson
Today may be the anniversary of H.P. Lovecraft's birth, but the gent writer from Providence is the one who keeps on giving. Thanks to a broadening fan base and easy access over the web, several previously rare photographs have surfaced. The Tentaclii blog deserves credit for sharing the first two images.
A weathered looking H.P. Lovecraft stands next to Maurice Winter Moe, a fellow poet, in this little known picture from 1936. Perhaps it's a mere camera trick, but HPL looks exceptionally gaunt and upright in this pose. Since it was taken just a year before his death, one wonders if the ultimately fatal intestinal distress wasn't already playing on Lovecraft's health. However, this seems a little early, before serious symptoms began to rage, according to sources like S.T. Joshi's exhaustive biography, I am Providence: The Life and Times of H.P. Lovecraft.
Meanwhile, a dated photo of New York City's Double-R Coffeehouse appears. In the 1920s, this cafe was a sanctuary for H.P. Lovecraft and his circle. He's not present in this snapshot, but it gives a good indication of this hangout's environment during its heyday. Given his miserable time in the Big Apple, it must have constituted a rare escape from the frightful phobias and disappointing modernity that plagued Lovecraft at every turn. At one point, he penned a poem to it, "On the Double-R Coffeehouse."
Finally, an unknown photo of a true rarity: Lovecraft without a suit and tie on. This jacketed outfit proves beyond any doubt that the Providence author was capable of expanding his wardrobe and mixing it up, whenever the occasion was right. Only odd instances frozen in time, like his visit to see Robert H. Barlow, captured HPL without his coveted formal wear, as I noted in another post about rare Lovecraft photos. It's always interesting to see the human side of this man, even if it raises the risk of detracting from the mystique.
The money strapped Poe House in Baltimore is once again picking up some national attention. In a recent article, the New York Times sheds light on the painful history of the illustrious building. Though not an opinion piece, it does nothing to suggest a way forward for the house.
However, there is a nugget of fundraising potential mentioned in the article. As many know, Baltimore's football team, the Ravens, take their namesake from Edgar Allan Poe's famous poem. Perhaps it's time for professional sports to step up and help save horror and history. With a small promotional boost from a team like the Ravens, there's a decent chance that the Poe House would have no trouble getting together what it needs to keep operating.
Capitalizing on the success of humor in the Cthulhu Mythos, Kenneth Hite's new tome, Cliffourd the Big Red God, is one more illustrated oddity to add to a Lovecraftian collection. The book takes its name from the popular children's character, a big red dog, and adeptly parodies the concept. Humor and horror fall into the mix equally. The book is not quite as in depth or original as Hite's earlier work, Where the Deep Ones Are, but Lovecraft fans with a kick for Mythos laughs won't be disappointed.
The faux children's volume is right in line with the Cutethulhu phenomena too. For years, Kenneth Hite has been a leading observer and arguably an instigator of the Lovecraftian parody that tries to soften the Great Old Ones into Great Cartoons. With the popularity of similar art and fiction online, the Cutethulhu movement shows no signs of slowing.
Consider Cliffourd the Big Red God as the latest installment in Lovecraftiana's curious transition. Fortunately, these comedies turn out better when they are in capable hands like Hite's, and there's certainly more to appreciate in this book than in LOLthulhu like web memes.
The Kardashev Scale is a famous projection of a civilization's development. Analyzing H.P. Lovecraft's Great Old Ones, including Cthulhu, requires unorthodox means. Since Kardashev's estimates include wonders from a lowly industrial age up to godhood level, perhaps his futurist fantasies deserve a closer look in the Lovecraftian arena.
The Kardashev Scale: Power Ranking Civilizations
Generally, the Kardashev Scale endorses four civilization types based on how much energy an advanced society harnesses. Type I civilizations can successfully utilize the power of an entire planet. For our purposes, this scale is the most tangible from where humans sit today. Its beginnings are best observed in the fevered dreams of utopian media, like William Gazecki's film, Future by Design.
Type II beings have tapped into the energy offered by an entire solar system, presumably through advanced cosmic engineering constructs backed by even headier principles. Type III is greater yet, wielding almost unimaginable power on a galactic scale. Finally, the scale tops out at Type IV, where an all consuming power controls all the energy available in the whole universe. Think about the near omnipotent architects in Michael Moorcock's The Dancers at the End of Time series.
Pinpointing the Powers of the Great Old Ones
So, where does Cthulhu and the nefarious cabal he belongs to fit in? Presumably, Cthulhu's power is nearly unlimited. The ability to move through and manipulate multiple dimensions, soar through the cosmos, and use energy on a wide scale for warfare with other extraterrestrials makes him seem godly in comparison to mankind. Particularly, the meek post-Great War civilizations of Lovecraft's own day, which hadn't yet split the atom.
Not that nuclear power does much for humanity. Even a tripling of nuclear power plant input wouldn't put us anywhere close to a Type I society on the Kardashev Scale. It's not an effective defense against Cthulhu either, based on the imaginings of many writers. The Greatest Old One (or at least the best known) is hit by a nuke in August Derleth's The Trail of Cthulhu, and manages to survive without a breaking a runny green sweat.
However, is Cthulhu actually all he's cracked up to be? Clearly, Cthulhu may not be a Type IV being, let alone something greater, since he is subject to well known limitations. Virtually imprisoned in R'lyeh until the stars are right, Cthulhu was on the losing side of an ancient battle with alien forces that were seemingly even more powerful than he is. Multi-dimensional or not, it's hard to imagine any real Type III or Type IV power getting bested. Even Azathoth, who often appears superior to Great Cthulhu, seems little more than a stunted Type II being or less.
Then again, it's worth remembering that the Kardashev Scale is meant to measure civilizations, not individuals. If Cthulhu and the other Great Old Ones are merely high ranking members of an immense civilization that spans several universes, they may well be in the Type III-Type IV range. A better estimation will remain elusive, and only based on the unapproved works by subsequent Mythos writers. Lovecraft's lasting gifts are horror and mystery, despite his frequent forays into sci-fi territory, not detailed scientific histories that give away the secrets of his most famous terrors, as S.T. Joshi notes in The Weird Tale.
In the end, the Kardashev Scale is an amusing thought experiment, but doesn't say much about the Great Old Ones. Not without liberal boundaries and much imagination, anyway. Trying to apply these measurements to Lovecraft's most nightmarish beings seems impossible for boosting any serious artistic or literary analysis, but the clumsiest efforts to classify them are still fun.
-Grim Blogger
The Great Old Ones: Pinpointing Cthulhu on the Kardashev Scale
Alaska is once again home to uncanny strangeness. During the past week, a curious orange goo began washing ashore in a remote village. So far, the substance matches no known natural or man made records. As any H.P. Lovecraft fan knows, mysterious slime heaved up from the sea plays an important role in several tales. "Dagon," "The Call of Cthulhu," and others echo the Providence writer's distaste and horror at what lurks beneath the waves.
Alaska's unique place in weird-dom continues to generate horror. Not unlike its surrounding wastes bordering the Arctic and Pacific territories. It's easy to see why lingering terrors from the sea in the great north continue to populate works by the likes of Laird Barron and Simon Strantzas. We are forcibly reminded, just once in awhile, that far greater monstrosities may lurk in the depths - often out of site, but never out of mind. We look to putrid, untraceable goo and shudder, with nearly the same intensity experienced when reading books such as Occultation and Beneath the Surface.
Remote, unknown regions are certain to provoke unspeakable chills. The human mind is already capable of conjuring the most vivid nightmares based on speculation and blackness alone. Still, imagine the greater horrors that will result in the coming years, a product of an Alaskan village and its token orange gift from hidden quarters.
Ramsey Campbell's best known volume of Lovecraftian stories is back in a new edition from PS Publishing, following a lengthy absence on the weird fiction market. The Inhabitant of the Lake and Other Unwelcome Tenants collects the notable UK horror author's early efforts at producing stories in the Cthulhu Mythos tradition. The new version constitutes a limited print run of signed hardcovers, with a classically Lovecraftian illustration by Randy Broecker.
Campbell's work is well known in the weird horror community today. He is one of the few writers to use Lovecraft as a launching pad to a full blown career in horror fiction. Campbell's relationship with Lovecraft's work has been famously volatile. He vigorously rejected any aping of Lovecraft during the 1970s, almost to the point of denouncing HPL's craftsmanship. Later, Campbell rehabilitated his Mythos based stories as he reached a much more balanced and mature view, and he has continued to produce new stories in a weirdly Lovecraftina spirit since.
Readers who are new to Campbell or on the fence about picking up The Inhabitant of the Lake should treat themselves to his mammoth paperback collection, Alone With the Horrors: The Great Short Fiction of Ramsey Campbell 1961-1991. Love him or hate him, this British author is sure to remain entrenched on the weird and Lovecraftian scene for decades to come. This newest reprinting of his old Arkham House collection only confirms that.
-Grim Blogger
The Inhabitant of the Lake and Other Unwelcome Tenants by Ramsey Campbell
Eureka Productions is scheduled to release another installment of their famous Graphic Classics series shortly. Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery brings together several new illustrated stories previously unseen in their series. It's a full color volume that seeks to breathe new life into Poe's old stories - an increasingly challenging order for artists to fulfill. The decision to ink each story, rather than leave it in black and white, is sure to add a new impressive layer to their well established franchise.
Fortunately, their previous volumes with tales by Poe have been among the better visual art homages to this titan of weird horror. The new book contains over a dozen works, including "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar," "The Man in the Crowd," "The Murders in Rue Morgue," and "MS Found in a Bottle." Although it mixes mystery as well as weird horror, there's plenty of strangeness to make the graphic novel worth the price of admission for literary horror fans.
Look for Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery by late August. It should ship arrive in brick-and-mortar stores and embark from online retailers like Amazon in due course.
-Grim Blogger
Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery by Graphic Classics
It's that time of year again. H.P. Lovecraft's birthday is just around the corner on August 20. While some will dismiss the merits of honoring a dead man who has been in the ground for more years than he enjoyed in the sun, others seek to mark the occasion. Lovecraftian birthday rites are more important for those of us who remain here, as a way to measure the impact his work has had upon our lives.
How to Celebrate H.P. Lovecraft's Birthday
How, then, to honor the occasion of Lovecraft's birth every year it ticks by? Parties, conventions, readings, and tours in Providence have rightly taken place over the years, but the right culinary mood is often overlooked. What's a celebration without the right fare for guests? Only a handful of serious Lovecraftians patch together formal birthday gatherings each year, but for those who do, it's worth examining foods that make an appropriate centerpiece.
Birthday purists will inevitably research what foods Howard Phillips Lovecraft himself enjoyed. HPL was a notoriously cheap and flippant eater, in a time when dietary concerns for obesity and other physiological disorders was barely acknowledged. While it would be unwise, not to mention undesirable, to duplicate his eating habits all year around, celebrating Lovecraft's birthday is one time where his tradition looks tasty and reasonable.
Why Ice Cream?
His enormous sweet tooth is the stuff of legend, forever lifted from his personal correspondence, and enshrined in official biographies like S.T. Joshi's I am Providence: The Life and Times of H.P. Lovecraft. While Lovecraft was extraordinarily partial to sugar saturated coffee, Hershey's chocolate bars, and pie, there's one rich delicacy that really stands out: ice cream. Throughout the roaring twenties and into the austere thirties, he frequented gourmet ice cream parlors as a favorite treat. In a 1931 letter to J. Vernon Shea, Lovecraft writes, "But I more often take ice cream, of which my favourite flavours are vanilla & coffee (the latter hard to get outside New England) & my least relished common flavour is strawberry."
Fortunately, ice cream is neither scarce nor hard to store today, which makes it a perfect way to toast HPL's legacy. The explosion of widely accessible flavors and other ice cream based dessert concoctions means it's highly adaptable, and there's almost certainly something for everyone in this frozen arena. Besides, Lovecraftians who wish to take matters a notch higher will realize it goes well with pie, another sweet temptation of the Providence writer.
Several other factors make ice cream a prime choice as well. In many regions where Lovecraft is best known, the icy dessert is at its popular zenith during the warmest months. Additionally, it can be easily passed out at parties, and makes irresistible bait for organizers hoping to set up an ice cream social based on Lovecraft's work. Finally, bold Lovecraftian cooks have stepped forward in recent years to create Cthulhuvian cakes and other outlandish confections. Ice cream, though, is just as malleable, and offers the ultimate challenge to culinary artists seeking to sculpt unspeakable Cthulhu Mythos horrors.
It's not entirely unreasonable to imagine H.P. Lovecraft sparking a tiny culinary following in the years to come. After all, who can resist the draw of blasphemously delicious Sundaes that double as evil idols?
-Grim Blogger
On HP Lovecraft and Ice Cream: Honoring Lovecraft's Birthday
