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Book Review: The New Annotated Lovecraft: Beyond Arkham edited with notes by Leslie S. Klinger

The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft: Beyond Arkham edited with notes by Leslie S. Klinger

Liveright Publishing, 2019

ISBN-13: 978-1631492631

Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition

 

The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft: Beyond Arkham is a handsome volume of the master’s short stories. This volume collects 25 of the prolific author’s stories, including such famous titles as “The Music of Erich Zann”, “Pickman’s Models”, “The Tomb”, and “The Horror at Red Hook”. It is a heavy book, and I would definitely recommend making sure you have a clean, clear table to read it on.

When you consider an annotated book, the most important thing is of course the annotations, or notes. These notes are printed in an appropriate and easily readable shade of red. They are clear, and they explain fully each and every detail the reader might not have been previously aware of. Leslie Klinger has clearly done extensive research, hunting all manner of information down to provide us thorough, precise explanations of all sorts of short hand descriptions of things in Lovecraft’s stories.

This is a big, beautiful book. If you are a fan of Lovecraft, or you just like short stories that discuss strange, otherwordly monsters, this is highly recommended. This is definitely for ADULT readers.

 

Reviewed by Ben Franz

 

Posted on January 19, 2020 by , Reply

Musings: 2020 Is Nearly Here! The Classics Are Coming!

phantom       

It’s been a big year for looking back, with the establishment of the Paperbacks from Hell imprint, Looking forward to 2020, it appears that it will be a big year for looking even further back.  The publication of several books of ghost and Gothic tales in 2019 looks like it was the beginnings of a return to the classics of the genre. 2020 will bring the first volume of HWA’s Haunted Library series that will be published in conjunction with Poisoned Pen Press, The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux. In addition, Crystal Lake has just announced that they’ll be publishing Crystal Classics, dark tales from the late 19th and early 20th century,  with occasional titles that “challenge” a classic title, and the covers look lovely. Their December newsletter says the first three of these are out in paperback and will also be available as ebooks: they are The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen, with an introduction by William Meikle;  Dagon Rising, a “challenge” to Lovecraft by William Meikle; and The Willows by Algernon Blackwood, with an introduction by Jasper Bark. I’ve been watching over the past several years now as some of the older or lesser-known writers are starting to be introduced to readers who may never have encountered them before, and I think we’ll continue to see this appreciation of writers from earlier times. Given the publication of books like Monster, She Wrote this year, which set a focus on lesser-known women writers (or women writers whose supernatural work was lesser-known) I think we can be sure that there will be more to uncover and appreciate! Of course, time, and literature, and our fears, move on forward, and I think we’ll see more diversity among contemporary writers in 2020 as well, if what I’m already seeing is any indication. It’s an exciting time to be a writer, publisher, librarian, researcher, and reader, and I can’t wait to see what directions the genre goes in next.

 

Posted on December 22, 2019 by , Reply

Book Review: The Last Seance: Tales of the Supernatural by Agatha Christie

The Last Séance: Tales of the Supernatural by Agatha Christie

William Morrow Paperbacks, 2019

ISBN-13: 978-0062959140

Available:  Paperback, Audiobook, Kindle

 

The Last Séance: Tales of the Supernatural contains twenty short stories of the occult and supernatural penned by the Queen of Mystery, Agatha Christie. While each of the stories has unique aspects, a few stood out over the rest as exceptionally well executed. “The Last Séance” tells the story of an exhausted medium holding a session for a woman with disastrous results. In “Philomel Cottage”, heiress Alix King takes a new husband whose past she knows nothing about. An elderly widow receives messages from her deceased husband through a wireless set in “Wireless”. In “The Strange Case of Sir Arthur Carmichael”, the titular character has taken on the characteristics of a cat that had been killed by the lady of the house. “The Dressmaker’s Doll”, undoubtedly the best story in the collection, involves a doll that suddenly appears in a dressmaker’s workroom, and is found to move about the room when it is unoccupied.

There are a few stories where Christie’s famous detectives, Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, get involved, too. The most entertaining of these takes is “The Flock of Geryon”, in which Poirot aids an heiress in investigating a dangerous cult. In “The Idol House of Astarte”, members of the Tuesday Night Club gather to discuss the strange circumstances of a murder at a fancy dress party, and the club wants Miss Marple’s opinion on the case.

The book contains a bibliography of books and magazines where her short stories were first published, as well as alternate titles for the stories if applicable.

While the subtitle of the book indicates that the stories contained in its pages are supernatural, this is somewhat deceiving. There are aspects of the occult and supernatural in the stories, but most of them have quite logical explanations to them. Another topic to address is language used in the stories. Christie’s treatment of the Asian culture is not what we would call respectful now. By using the term Oriental and associating Asian characters in her stories as mysterious, sly, and similar, it is definitely problematic. Treatment of mental illness is also something readers needs to be aware of with works from this time period. For instance, it is not unusual to see the terms “loon” or “loonies” used.

None of that is to say I disliked the book. On the contrary, I enjoyed this, and it was a quick read. Christie had a unique way of crafting her stories, and there is a good reason why she is called the Queen of Mystery. I would not, however, call her the Queen of the Supernatural. I would recommend this for readers who are Christie fans, or for those who aren’t quite ready to get into horror. This might be good for anyone who wants to explore spooky tales without the extremes the genre can get into. Recommended.

 

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker

Posted on October 30, 2019 by , Reply
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