Tales from the Miskatonic University Library (2016): edited by Darrell Schweitzer and Jon Ashmead, containing the following stories:
Slowly Ticking Time Bomb by Don Webb
The Third Movement by Adrian Cole
To Be in Ulthar on a Summer Afternoon by Dirk Flinthart
Interlibrary Loan by Harry Turtledove
A Trillion Young by Will Murray
The Paradox Collection by A. C. Wise
The Way to a Man's Heart by Marilyn 'Mattie' Brahen
The White Door by Douglas Wynne
One Small Change by P. D. Cacek
Recall Notice by Alex Shvartsman
The Children's Collection by James Van Pelt
Not in the Card Catalog by Darrell Schweitzer
The Bonfire of the Blasphemies by Robert M. Price
Solid, enjoyable anthology of stories either related to the demon-haunted Special Collection library at Miskatonic University or fictional, forbidden tomes and their dangerous presence on this Earth or any other. Some stories are comic: "Recall Notice" by Alex Shvartsman and "The Way to a Man's Heart" by Marilyn 'Mattie' Brahen are the two most comic-satiric of these.
Some take what initially seems like a comic premise (say, what if H.P. Lovecraft's forbidden uber-tome The Necronomicon were digitized and put on-line?) and exploit it for horrifying rather than comic consequences. The sancrosanct nature of the Interlibrary Loan comes into comic, horrific play; so, too, the problems of hanging onto volumes that don't always feel like being confined to one shelf or one library. And "The Children's Collection" by James Van Pelt strikes a strikingly poignant note about the responsibilities of a librarian in Lovecraft's unusual Massachusetts coastal town of Innsmouth. In all, a lot of fun. Recommended.
That Is Not Dead: Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos Through the Centuries (2015): edited by Darrell Schweitzer, containing the following stories:
- Herald of Chaos by Keith Taylor
- What a Girl Needs by Esther M. Friesner [as by Esther Friesner]
- The Horn of the World's Ending by John Langan
- Monsters in the Mountains at the Edge of the World by Jay Lake
- Come, Follow Me by Darrell Schweitzer
- Ophiuchus by Don Webb
- Of Queens and Pawns by Lois H. Gresh
- Smoking Mirror by Will Murray
- Incident at Ferney by S. T. Joshi
- Anno Domini Azathoth by John R. Fultz
- Slowness by Don Webb
- The Salamanca Encounter by Richard A. Lupoff
- Old Time Entombed by W. H. Pugmire
- Nine Drowned Churches by Harry Turtledove
Fun, often grim collection of Cthulhu Mythos tales spanning about 4500 years and many continents. Lovecraft scholar S.T. Joshi checks in with a rare piece of fiction, one in which Voltaire must face the Great Old Ones in rural 18th-century France. John Fultz crafts a chilling tale of Azathothian cultists in the Spanish West, Will Murray one of false gods in colonial Mexico, and editor Darrell Schweitzer a disturbing tale of the Pauper's Crusade.
There isn't a lot of comedy here -- really, only Harry Turtledove, Don Webb, and Esther Friesner offer even slightly light-hearted looks at the Cthulhu Mythos. A recurring theme is the destruction of a character's personal faith in the gods of men through exposure to the Truth about who really runs the universe. Dick Lupoff does take this in a different direction than the other tales, to a place more of cosmic wonder than terror. More typical is how an encounter with Azathoth destroys a devout Catholic's faith in John Fultz's story.
John Langan's tale of Roman-era Britain and a curious magical artifact is splendid as well, recalling some of the Roman-era-set dark fantasy of David Drake. "Monsters in the Mountains at the Edge of the World" by Jay Lake pits Romans and the fringes of the Chinese empire against the abominable Mi-Go, while "Herald of Chaos" by Keith Taylor sets Taylor's recurring, dynastic-Egyptian priest of Anubis against Lovecraft's Black Pharaoh, Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos, with the fate of the world in the balance.
In all, a highly enjoyable anthology. I even felt like I learned something! Highly recommended.
Black Wings of Cthulhu 5 (2016) edited by S.T. Joshi, containing the following stories:
- Plenty of Irem by Jonathan Thomas
- Diary of a Sane Man by Nicole Cushing
- The Woman in the Attic by Robert H. Waugh
- Far from Any Shore by Caitlín R. Kiernan
- In Blackness Etched, My Name by W. H. Pugmire
- Snakeladder by Cody Goodfellow
- The Walker in the Night by Jason C. Eckhardt
- In Bloom by Lynne Jamneck
- The Black Abbess by John Reppion
- The Quest by Mollie L. Burleson
- A Question of Blood by David Hambling
- Red Walls by Mark Howard Jones
- The Organ of Chaos by Donald Tyson
- Seed of the Gods by Donald R. Burleson
- Fire Breeders by Sunni K Brock
- Casting Fractals by Sam Gafford
- The Red Witch of Chorazin by Darrell Schweitzer
- The Oldies by Nancy Kilpatrick
- Voodoo by Stephen Woodworth
- Lore by Wade German
Another year, another superior Black Wings anthology of cosmic horror from editor S.T. Joshi. The 'of Cthulhu' is added to the trade paperback editions of these anthologies for commercial considerations, by the way. The hardcovers, per the originating H.P. Lovecraft quote, are simply Black Wings.
As is usual for Joshi anthologies, the stories range from good to excellent. Familiar names that include Caitlin Kiernan, W.H. Pugmire, and Darrell Schweitzer offer up superior tales of dark gods and that menacing, indifferent universe of cosmic dread. Sunni Brock offers a fresh take on Innsmouth, complete with what seems like a nod to the Japanese horror story that would become the American movie Dark Water (that story being "Floating Water" by Koji Suzuki). Schweitzer offers an ambitiously circular mise en abyme. Kiernan's background in paleontology informs the unfortunate findings of her characters.
There's a sarcastic cheekiness to Nancy Kilpatrick's "The Oldies" that doesn't undermine the horror of its collision of Old Gods and traumatized people. As flies to wanton boys, and all that jazz. Jonathan Thomas (The Color Over Occam) offers a wry visit to Lovecraft's Kingsport that nods to the odd festival held there, and its odder participants, in a story whose droll tone resembles that of a vintage Clark Ashton Smith story like "The Seven Geases" or "The Tale of Satampra Zeiros."
A couple of stories -- John Reppion's "The Black Abbess" and David Hambling's "A Question of Blood" specifically -- don't quite stick their landings as they embrace a little too much lack of closure. Still, they're worth reading, as the anthology is as a whole. And Wade German's concluding poem is a nice touch, especially given Lovecraft's embrace of weird poetry. Highly recommended.
Cthulhu's Reign (2010): edited by Darrell Schweitzer:
- The Walker in the Cemetery by Ian Watson
- Sanctuary by Don Webb
- Her Acres of Pastoral Playground by Mike Allen
- Spherical Trigonometry by 朝松健 [as by Ken Asamatsu]
- What Brings the Void by Will Murray
- The New Pauline Corpus by Matt Cardin
- Ghost Dancing by Darrell Schweitzer
- This Is How the World Ends by John R. Fultz
- The Shallows by John Langan
- Such Bright and Risen Madness in Our Names by Jay Lake
- The Seals of New R'lyeh by Gregory Frost
- The Holocaust of Ecstasy by Brian Stableford
- Vastation by Laird Barron
- Nothing Personal by Richard A. Lupoff
- Remnants by Fred Chappell
Entertaining anthology goes with the depressing scenario 'What happens AFTER H.P. Lovecraft's Great Old Ones return to reclaim the Earth?' and runs with it in enjoyable albeit often oppressively depressing ways. But some of the stories contain faint hope, and the overall selection ranges broadly from Heist Comedy ("The Seals of New R'lyeh" by Gregory Frost) to hard science fiction ("Nothing Personal" by Richard A. Lupoff) to post-modern stream-of-consciousness ("Vastation" by Laird Barron).
Along the way, stories attempt to portray what the world post-Cthulhu would look like. A writhing mass of endless screaming meat? A patchwork of broken reality? A maze haunted by sadistic smaller versions of Cthulhu? A world in the process of being changed to suit its new masters, the Moon already transformed into a red and glaring five-pointed star in the squirming heavens? A seemingly normal neighbourhood that gets less normal the closer one looks? A baleful orb of anti-matter?
Yes, all this and more!
The stories are all at least competent. Many are inspired. "The Shallows" by John Langan is a modern classic, I think, counterpointing the mundane and the weird both in setting and in the (one-sided) conversation a survivor of the rise of Cthulhu tells to, well, an unusually crabby house-guest. Fred Chappell's "Remnants" offers a slice of hope in what sometimes seems like the first part of an epic, hard-science-fiction series. Recommended.
Black Wings [of Cthulhu] Volume 4 (2015) edited by S.T. Joshi, containing the following stories:
Artifact by Fred Chappell
Half Lost in Shadow by W. H. Pugmire
The Rasping Absence by Richard Gavin
Black Ships Seen South of Heaven by Caitlín R. Kiernan
The Dark Sea Within by Jason V Brock
Sealed by the Moon by Gary Fry
Broken Sleep by Cody Goodfellow
A Prism of Darkness by Darrell Schweitzer
Night of the Piper by Ann K. Schwader
We Are Made of Stars by Jonathan Thomas
Trophy by Melanie Tem
Revival by Stephen Woodworth
Contact by John Pelan and Stephen Mark Rainey
Cult of the Dead by Lois H. Gresh
Dark Redeemer by Will Murray
In the Event of Death by Simon Strantzas
The Wall of Asshur-sin by Donald Tyson
Fear Lurks Atop Tempest Mount by Charles Lovecraft
Maybe not quite as good as previous installments in the Black Wings series ('of Cthulhu' is added in each case for the paperback publication; 'Black Wings' comes from a Lovecraft quotation about cosmic horror, a quotation that doesn't contain 'of Cthulhu,' whose wings I've always figured as being a dark, weird green, in case you were wondering).
Or maybe I read too many new Cthulhu anthologies in too short a time.
There are stand-outs here from Kiernan, Brock, and Schweitzer. The latter's story features the real John Dee on the last day of his life, and it's a solid piece of cosmic quasi-history. The stories range from just this side of Lovecraftian pastiche to more elusive, allusive pieces of cosmic horror.
One thing I'll note again and again is that Lovecraft's literary children tend to be a lot more depressing than their progenitor. Several stories here feature the return of the Great Old Ones and the destruction of humanity, something Lovecraft never went through with. The depiction of these apocalypses never seems to equal what I imagine in my mind, leaving me a bit cold when it comes to the depiction of The Return of the Great Old Ones. Oh, well. Recommended.
