Friday Fun: December Belongs to Cthulhu...

...on Tor.com!

Check it out:

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn...

In deference to the Great Old Ones, Tor.com has devoted this December to everyone's favorite cosmic tentacled thing-that-cannot-be-described from Vhoorl. All month long we'll be posting articles, stories, and comics relating to the Lovecraft Mythos, and we've invited scholars, editors, and fans of the snuggly beast to contribute. We're thrilled to welcome as bloggers Ellen Datlow, Stephen H. Segal, Seamus Cooper, and others on Tor.com for this very special occasion (along with our regular lineup, natch).

We'll also be hosting a heap of writhing, sliming giveaways, for your Cthulhumas pleasure. So stay tuned, and remember, kids:


That is not dead which can eternal lie.
And with strange aeons even death may die.

The linked post is the table of contents for the whole month's worth of posts. There are tons of great posts worth checking out!

I'll just note here Seamus Cooper's terrific 12 Days of Lovecraft posts as he reads through some of Lovecraft's best known stories, covering the good, the bad and the ugly.

So far:

And speaking of the ugly aspects of HPL's work, check out Elizabeth Bear's Why We Still Write Lovecraft Pastiche for an interesting examination of why he still holds such fascination for the modern reader.

More like this

That is not dead which can eternal lie.
And with strange aeons even death may die.

And with those words, delivered to me in 1986 via Metallica's "The Thing That Should Not Be", I was compelled to pick up an old, moldy-smelling (appropriate) copy of Dagon and Other Stories from my local library.

It was that defining literary moment for me. It was the perfect synthesis of my existing love of horror and science fiction.

His writing may not be the best, but it is original, and so highly influential to me.

I always enjoyed The Case of Charles Dexter Ward the best of his long-form stories, and The Lurking Fear for the shorts.

Thanks, Scott.

I think my first Lovecraft book was an old Scholastic (!) edition of Shadow over Innsmouth and it was really transformational for me. I read a ton of Lovecraft during my late teens and early twenties and have really enjoyed dipping back into his work ever since. I also have vivid memories reading CDW late at night alone in my basement bedroom....

At this point in time, I have a hard time imagining Scholastic or any other YA publisher doing a Lovecraft book. Here's the cover of that book. And the CDW cover.