Audible Review, “Differently Morphous”

Book Details

“Differently Morphous” is the latest story by writer and critic Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw, who had previously written “Mogworld”, “Jam”, and “Will Save the Galaxy for Food”.  Each of his books put a humorous spin on the usual genre tropes associated with fantasy, disaster, science fiction, and in this latest case, cosmic horror (you know, like HP Lovecraft).

This is an Audible original, with the print release coming down the line.  It is read by the author, who is a good voice performer, honed from years of recording his stuff onto internet videos.

You can find it here.

Review in Short

I blazed thru “Differently Morphous”. It is perhaps the fastest I have gone thru a book of this length.  Really good if you like genre comedy.

The Plot?

The story has numerous twists, starting out as a "secret world" narrative, where you think the story will involve keeping the secret monsters/magic from the public while fighting it, “Men in Black” style.  He then throws that out the window.

The book will then start to focus on a particularly fun and funny character, showing them doing silly things but also showing how they have much more going on beneath the façade, so you think the story will be about dealing with his over the top methods after the paradigm shift.  Nope, he is a side character.

The real plot is a murder mystery, where the victims are blob monsters from another dimension that have taken asylum on Earth.  That is pretty nuts.

All of the turns keep things moving and I was surprised and entertained by the ultimate reveal of the villain.  The explanation for why things have been happening is a lot of fun and the final action scene confrontation is exciting.

The Jokes?

The comedy is not just silly either. It has silly elements, but it also has an edge to it with discussions of social justice and refugees.  Most of it pivots on colorful characters exchanging dialogue which is quick and often clever.  I especially liked the buddy cop vibe between the two field agents of Adam and Victor (I am not sure but that could be a reference to Victor Frankenstein and the monster, Adam… But that would not make any sense as they have nothing to do with that).

“Differently Morphous” also talks somewhat seriously about the ideas of monsters and what their place in the world would be if they suddenly showed up.  Monsters who interact peacefully with the public and do nothing but eat rubbish could just be seen as people, but there are still monsters that look a lot more human that are just monsters.  It is smart with its silly comedy, using jokes to have a discussion about things.

Complaints?

If I do have a criticism (and it is not really a criticism), it is the same one I had for his last book "Will Save the Galaxy for Food".  It is this: “Differently Morphous” feels like the start of something much bigger.

This feels like the novelization of a TV movie, that also serves as the pilot to a TV show. It explores and explains all the rules of the world, it introduces a cast of characters and focuses on their dynamic, it then shows how those rules and those characters can be stretched and bent.

It is a lot of set up, so I kind of felt let down that it didn't just keep going.  Not really a complaint, to want something to keep going, but if you are the type of person that is looking for a complete story... This doesn't have that.

The book ends (like "Will Save the Galaxy for Food”) with plenty unanswered and set up for a sequel… THOUGH EVEN MORE SO, because “Galaxy” was the type of story that could end on a wistful “where do we go from here” note.  “Morphous” ends on a dramatic revelation that provides new contextualization to the whole rest of the story.  That is a little annoying.

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            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

HP Lovecraft's "The Secret Cave" part 2

            Yesterday was the birthday of cult horror icon, HP Lovecraft.  Thru his writing, he has indirectly had massive impact on the world of fiction, so I decided to do another rewrite on one of his old works.  I have done this writing exercise 3 times prior, One, Two, and Three.

Yesterday was part 1 of this story.

Standard Introduction

            I am a fan HP Lovecraft.  Not his god-awful racism of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way.  I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of adjectives".  But the ideas in the stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern horror are often great.

            The idea of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.

            What is also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain.  They can be re-printed, referenced, and even re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist.  (Seriously, why did you name the cat that Howie?  Did you think it was funny?)

Today’s Entry

            Today’s entry is a continuation of yesterday’s.  As I said, the stub of a story “The Secret Cave” was written by HP when he was 7 and could easily have been adapted to be a much larger story in his adult years, but instead it was only published as the unfinished work of a literal child long after HP’s death.

            I have already proven the story had more legs than the stub gave it credit for as this is Part 2, each part of which is longer than the original.  I hope this story makes sense and is enjoyable.

            If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least his work in horror.  I believe he wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.

            Anyway, here is the story.  I hope you enjoy it.

The Secret Cave or John Lee's Adventure, pt2

            The melody returned for a moment and then faded.  John and Alice began walking with quick steps as fast as they could without their candles flickering out from the movement.  They could hear the melody again every few minutes, but kept step in a straight line as best they could and eventually reached water.

            “What?” asked John.

            “Look,” said Alice pointing at something, the light of her candle reflected off a metal plate hanging from a chain on the side of a rowboat.

            They moved toward the boat.  It was old but in good shape, there were oars, some dusty bottles, rope that looked stretched from overuse and near its breaking point.  It had all the things a little boat would have.  It also had the small locked box from before.

            “What is that doing here?” asked Alice.

            “I don’t know,” said John, setting down his candle and picking up an oar to brandish like a too long club.  “But whoever put it here must be strong.”

            They stood there thinking over what they should do, “We should get in,” said John.

            “What,” asked Alice.

            “We should get in and leave,” said John.  “If there is a boat it must be able to get in here, so there is a way out.  We should get out.”

            “This shouldn’t be here,” said Alice.  “You said it, we went away from the sound of the ocean, there shouldn’t be water.”

            They heard the whistling melody, it was louder and clearer.  It was closer.

            “Yeah, we should get in and go,” said Alice.

            They pushed the boat into the water and ever aware of the loud splashing sounds they made tried to haul themselves into the little craft.  Alice dropped her candle into the water but John’s stayed lit and they used it to light another, the last candle, from the box.  John began rowing, but being 10 is not being an adult, he was too small and not strong enough for powerful strokes.  They moved too slowly out into the darkness of the still water, away from the shore of the cave, and away as best they could from whatever was making the melody.

            The water was salty, warm enough that they knew it was from outside.  But the water was so still and so dark.  Where was the movement water splashing in from a beach should have?  Where was the current and tide?

            Then they heard it, the sound of something large dive into the water from the shore.  Something was coming for the boat, and they were not far enough away to be safe.  They felt the small waves of something moving toward the boat smack the sides of the craft.  John pulled up the oars and again brandished one as a club but the unsteadiness of the boat kept him from standing for a power swing.

            As the light of the candles reflected off the ripples cast in the water, the figure took shape.  It looked like a broad-shouldered man, weighed down by heavy clothing like a black coat, bobbing wordlessly thru the water toward the boat.

            “What do you want?” yelled Alice at the wordless figure.  The figure’s arms moved him closer to the boat with each wide stroke.  “What do you want!?”

            His hand.  No, it’s hand, clasped to the rim of the boat.  The black skin and blue fingernails of its grip started to tilt the whole thing to one side.

            “No!” yelled John smashing the fingers with an overhead swing of the oar.  The black skinned hand pulled back into the water and everything was still once more.

            “Where did it go?” asked John.

            “Down,” said Alice.  “I think.”

            The water was still and the boat floated along its surface in the darkness with no more sound than a leaf on a pond.

            “John,” said Alice.  “Look up.”

            John turned his eyes to what should have been the blackness of a cave ceiling, what he saw instead were stars.  It was a night sky glittering above them.  “What?” he said.

            “I don’t know,” said Alice.  “We didn’t leave the cave.  And even if we had, it wouldn’t be night time.”

            Gazing harder John saw one star in particular glowing bright green.  “That shouldn’t be there,” said John.

            “What?” asked Alice.

            “Do you see any constellations?” asked John.  “I don’t see Orion or the Big Dipper.”

            “I don’t know any constellations,” said Alice.  “But I don’t see the moon.”

            The boat started listing.  Something was knocking it from side to side from underneath.

            “John!” screamed Alice.

            “Get ready!” John yelled.  “We might have to make a swim for it!”

            “I can’t,” screamed Alice.

            “Just hold on to me!” said John as the boat barrel rolled.

            The candles extinguished as they hit the water, but the world did not go dark, instead the starlight seemed to intensify and the water became clear like the fresh air of a glade with rivulets of light cast thru the surface, like beams of the sun thru a tree canopy.

            Alice flailed trying to orient herself but seemed to be tumbling thru the water in terror.  The heavy lock box sank a short distance and then hung under the water.  The rope unspooled in the water like the roots of a lily pad.  The oars and boat were floating along the surface along with all the bottles.  The man in the heavy cloths outlined against the light of the night sky was still visible, gripped onto rim of the now upside down boat.

            John was a strong swimmer, he was able to dive for longer than a minute and knew a half dozen different strokes. Alice was set to start swim lessons in the summer and aside from treading to the edge of where her toes touched the floor of the beach, she had never swam before.

            I need to get Alice to the boat, she can float in the air pocket, thought John.  The plan was good, but incomplete.  First, I have to get that thing away from the boat.  He lamented that he did not have Alice to advise him on how to do that.  She would have a plan before needing to take another breath.

            As he hovered in the water looking at the flotsam drifting thru the still water in the starlight, it all came to him at once.  His hand snatched out and took hold of the drifting rope and started moving toward the thing while creating a looping knot.  The thing kicked in the water at John, but was slow in the water logged heavy cloths and only succeeded in getting its leg lassoed.

            John dived away from its grasping black hands and toward the heavy box that hovered in the water.  Like the boat an air pocket was keeping it from dropping any lower in the water, John would fix that.  He lashed the other end of the rope to the box while casting a glance to Alice who had managed to reach the surface but was still flailing trying to keep her head above the surface.

            The rope secured he took hold of the latch and yanked it hard.  The skin on his finger broke with blood from an edge on the metal, but he didn’t notice the blood for the whoosh of bubbles escaping the box and it dropping down beyond the reach of starlight.  The rope pulled tight and the figure that had the shape of a man and the black flesh of a monster gripped the edge of the row boat, but its grip was wet and slipped from the boat's lip.
            It found something else to grab, the foot of Alice.

            It began to sink ever lower and now Alice was pulled with it below the surface.  They only slid down a few feet below the surface, hovering in the water as if frozen, Alice no longer clawing to get above the surface, just stretching up as there were no more bubbles coming from her mouth and her eyes lost the light of consciousness.

            Dangling below her, caught between the weight of the box and the buoyancy of the girl was the thing stretched out and completely unobscured by bubbles.  Lit by starlight, John could almost see its face.  The skin was black as coal, gaunt as a skeleton, and flesh stretched tight as a leather rack.  The hollows of its skull where eyes should be showed no emotion, and the place where a mouth should be agape and screaming in fear, there was only a smooth place where no sign of lips had ever been.

            John floated there in the water taking in the image and another idea came to him then.  He swam to the surface and snatched a floating bottle and smacked it hard against the upside-down boat shattering it, nearly dropping it with his already bleeding hand.  John dove back down, kicking down deeper into the water, and taking hold of Alice’s leg to steady himself.

            John slashed at the creature’s hand with the broken bottle, drawing a small mist of blood but no sign of pain from the monster.  John began driving the sharp glass into the thing’s fingers, sawing at them.  Breaking the flesh, then tendon, and tearing at the joint.  The first two fingers came free with a much thicker gout of black blood clouding the water.

            John was halfway thru the thing's third finger when Alice’s foot slipped free.  The weight of the creature no longer pulling her down, Alice floated quickly to the surface.

            Down, down, down, and out of sight went the eyeless, mouthless, coal blooded thing.

            John turned away from the abyss and swam to his sister, who was now floating face up in the water, eyes shut.  The water remained still as he pulled her over to the upturned boat and shook at her.  “Alice!”

            A sudden spurt of water and gunk sprayed from her coughing mouth as she burst back to consciousness and shrieked with her sore throat.

            “Alice,” John said.  “It’s me!”

            “John?” she was still yelling and flailing in the water.  “It’s here!”

            “No!” John yelled.  Taking her hand and pulling her to the boat.  “It’s gone!  It’s gone.”

            Taking hold of the boat Alice was crying and John was dropping off an emotional high.  They had been stalked, been upturned, fought, drowned, and he had sent something to the bottom of… an ocean?  The water was brackish in his mouth, less salty and warm than it had been in the cave.  It was not ocean water.  Were they in a sea or lake?

            The sky?  The cave?  Where are we?  John thought.

            “Alice,” said John.  “I want to go home.  I think I have had enough adventure.”

            “Yeah,” she said thru tears, almost laughing, then coughing sickly to get more drool and water out of her chest.  “Me too.”

            They heard a ‘thump’ as their boat bumped into a large stone in the water.  It was massive and smooth, the type they might put off shore to break up too strong a wave and protect the coast.

            Alice and John climbed up on the stone, marveling at it, wondering how far they had drifted under the sky of strange stars.  They left the boat to float near the stone.  As they stood atop it the starlight allowed them to look out and see, peeking out from the water were more stones, the children were standing on the out most ring of boulders arranged in some kind of pattern.

            “Wow,” said John.  “What is this?”

            “I don’t know,” said Alice.

            This was when the starlight began to fade as clouds rolled over the sky and darkness covered everything.  John and Alice held hands and sat on the stone to wait out the night.

            “John!” There was a man’s voice calling out.  “Alice!”

            The call echoing as if off the walls of a cave.  It was the voice of their father.  The light of a lantern rested on the two children in the darkness revealing them in their soaking cloths to their parents.

            John and Alice’s mother and father rushed to sweep them into hugs, followed by kisses, and then admonishment for going in the cellar, and then more hugs and kisses, and then more admonishment for going into these tunnels, “This is so dangerous you are not doing anything or going anywhere for months!  Years!” was the ultimate sentiment.

            The lantern’s light also fell on something no one thought to notice till all of the, ‘we’re-so-happy-you’re-all-rights’ and ‘we’re-furious-with-you-twos’ were said.  The lantern light fell on a series of stones arranged in the pattern of a twisted and curling star and the wall beyond the pattern, covered in glittering bits of stone set into the wall and a gleaming green gem as a point of prominence.

            There was a message, written in an old romantic language carved into the rock with some old lost tool.  It read, “Las estrellas son realmente preciosos”.

            The stars are truly beautiful.

            The End

Additional Commentary

            My rewrite is lightyears different than the inspiring material.  So much so that I almost regret associating the two.  If you at all enjoyed this story, please comment below and share it with other who enjoy such adventure stories.  Thank you for reading.

______________________________

            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

HP Lovecraft's "The Secret Cave" part 1

            Today is the birthday of cult horror icon, HP Lovecraft.  Thru his writing, he has indirectly had massive impact on the world of fiction, so I decided to do another rewrite on one of his old works.  I have done this writing exercise 3 times prior, One, Two, and Three.

Standard Introduction

            I am a fan HP Lovecraft.  Not his god-awful racism of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way.  I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of adjectives".  But the ideas in the stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern horror are often great.

            The idea of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.

            What is also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain.  They can be re-printed, referenced, and even re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist.  (Seriously, why did you name the cat that Howie?  Did you think it was funny?)

Today’s Entry

            While I previously went with his more accessible writing, and shorter stories at that, today I am working from a fragment that is just junk.  I guess his estate or old publisher was just binding together whatever they could at this point, because even though it was written in 1897 when Howard was a literal child and did not know how punctuation worked… it was published in 1959 by vultures attempting to capitalize on Lovecraft’s cult fame.

            “The Secret Cave or John Lees Adventure” is a fragment published after Lovecraft’s death.  Taken for what it is, a short adventure story about finding a mysterious cave in one’s basement as a child... it is fine.  It was written by a little kid.  Howard clearly had a bigger vocabulary and imagination than he knew how to express, but that doesn't make it good and it definitely didn't fit into what people know as "Lovecraft".  I had to hammer this thing like nobody’s business to work it into anything approaching a complete story.

            This is an exceptionally short work, but could have easily served as the outline for a scary children’s story in his adult life had he bothered to write it out more and put, “inspired by a story I wrote as a child” in the introduction.  You know how I KNOW it could have been more?  Because I turned it into a multipart story, each part of which is much longer than the original story.

            For more info, here is a link to the story, and here is a link to the Wikipedia entry.

            If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least his work in horror.  I believe he wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.

            Anyway, here is the story.  I hope you enjoy it.

The Secret Cave or John Lee's Adventure

            “Be good while I am away,” said Mrs. Lee “And don’t get into trouble.”

            “Yes Ma’am,” replied John.

            “Bye, Mama,” said Alice.

            Mr. & Mrs. Lee were going off for the day, and for the first time were going to leave John, who last week had turned 10, in charge of his little sister Alice, who was 8 but wiser than her brother.  As soon as the elder Lees were away the younger Lees went down cellar and began to rummage among the rubbish.  This rummaging would have been frowned upon by their parents.

            “John, we aren’t supposed to be down here,” little Alice leaned against the wall watching John.  “Mom doesn’t want us breaking things or getting hurt.  Let’s just go play pretend upstairs.”

            “Mom and Dad don’t let us play down here when they are here,” John said while making a boat out of barrel staves.  “So, we should play around down here when they are not around.”

            “They don’t let us play down here because they don’t want us hurt,” said Alice.

            “We won’t get hurt,” said John.  “And when they get home I can show them that I built a boat down here without getting hurt and after that they will have to let us play down here because we will have shown them that we won’t get hurt.”

            Alice gave a piercing cry as the bricks behind her crumbled away and she fell back into a hidden passage.

             “Oh, god,” said John as he rushed up to her and lifted her out.  “Tell me you aren’t hurt.  We don’t want to get in trouble.”

            As soon as her scream subsided she said, “The wall went away.”

            “Yeah, it did, didn’t it?” said John going to the hole and looking down a long passage.  It looked cold, it looked damp, and there was something else about it.  “Something is weird about this, let’s go down and see what this is.”

            “What?  No,” said Alice, moving to step back into the cellar.  “Hold on.  It’s too dark to just go down there.”

             Alice ran back upstairs to the kitchen and got a box of oversized candles left over from John’s birthday, climbed up to the high shelves for a little box of matches, and then went back to the cellar passage.

            “Here,” Alice said, handing the candles and matches to John.

            “Alice, you are so smart,” John said.  Alice blushed.

            The two once more entered the passage, lit by candles in tiny hands.  They could see the walls were plastered, that this hall had been part of the house ages ago.  They wandered deeper down the passage into what John suspected were bat caves, or when his imagination started taking hold pirates’ cave like from “Treasure Island”

            “We could find a mountain of treasure,” said John.

            “Or we could get bitten by rats or something and have to get shots,” said Alice.

            After walking further in, the plaster disappeared.  Lighting new candles they could see that the walls were hewn stone and the floor was packed earth and sand, signs that this had been part of a house disappeared.  They came to a wider open space in the earth, the light of their candles unable to show them the whole of what must be a cavern of some kind.

            “Where do you think we are?” asked John.

            “In a cave dumb-dumb,” said Alice.  “Did you forget?”

            “I mean compared to the house,” John said rolling his eyes.  “I would have thought we would reach the beach by now.

            “Let me see,” said Alice kneeling to the sandy floor.  She drew a square, “Here is the house,” she drew a long line off to the side, “There is the cliff over the beach,” she then turned her head, stood up and walked around her little drawing, “Which wall was the hole in?”

            John started thinking and pointing first to his left, then his right.  “Here?” he asked pointing.

            Alice nodded, “Okay,” she then drew a long line that was not quite side by side with the line for the beach cliff, “Guess this is the tunnel then,” and she put a wide mouth at the end of the line, “and this is the big part of the cave we are in.”

            “Listen,” said John.

            “What is it?” said Alice tensing and reaching to hold John’s hand.

            In the candlelight they both heard a hiss noise, or maybe more like heavy breathing.

            “It’s the beach,” said Alice.

            “Good,” said John.  “Hey, follow me.”

            “John, we are really deep,” said Alice.  “And this cave is too big for us to know how to find our way out.  We can’t even see one wall from the other.”

            “It will be alright,” said John.  “Here,” he wrote in the sand an arrow pointing to the hall out and started shuffling his feet, “we’ll leave a trail, and every so often we’ll make an arrow to point back the way we came.”

            Alice was anxious, but John’s plan made sense, “Alright,” she said.

            As they shuffled along the sound of the water became clearer and nearer.  Stopping every so often to draw an arrow, to light new candles, or to shake the sand from their shoes as, “I should have brought a stick from the basement for this” got muttered by each of them at various points.

            They finally stopped when they found a small locked box, sitting somewhat deep in the sand.

            “I knew this had to be a pirate cave,” said John.

            “What?” asked Alice.

            “This is a treasure chest,” said John.  “These are pirate caves.  They would come in thru the cave’s mouth on the beach, take their stuff up to whatever building was there before our house and sell it or hide it.”

            “That sounds crazy,” said Alice.

            “This must just be something they left down here and never got the chance to come back for,” said John.

            “Why would the leave it?” asked Alice.

            John handed his candle to Alice and pulled up on the box.  Hauling at it the thing eventually pulled free of the sand as he dropped back on his butt, “they left it here because it is heavy,” he said.  “They probably wanted to get a wagon or something and then just put it off.”

             “Okay, that makes sense,” Alice said nodding.  “How about we do that?”

            “What?” asked John.

            “I think we have gone far enough,” said Alice.  “And the box is too heavy to pull back with us.”

            “No, come on,” said John.  “This is an adventure, Mom and Dad would never let us do something like this again.”

            “That is one of the reasons we should go back,” said Alice.  “The other being we are going to run out of candles.”

            “Oh, yeah,” said John.  “That would be bad.  Let’s go get a lantern and tools or something.”

            “Yeah,” said Alice, in the tone that said she would not want to come back down again, whether they brought a lantern, tools, a team of dogs, or even with a bunch of grownups.

            John began to sulk as they turned back and began following back the trail of disturbed dirt and sand.  Counting the arrows and listening to the sound of the ocean start to fade.  It was of course faster to go back, knowing where you are going and not having to leave a trail is always faster, but something about it was off.  John was starting to hear the ocean louder again.

            “John,” said Alice.

            “I know,” he said.  “The ocean is getting louder.  Is the tide coming in?”

            “No, look,” Alice said, pointing to one of the arrows drawn in the sand.

            John gazed at it.  It looked wrong.  The lines were too wide, and it wasn’t as smooth as his sister’s clean lines.  They hadn’t drawn this arrow.  His eyes turned to the path.

            “This isn’t our path,” said John.

            “How could it not be?” asked Alice her voice raising and the slightest shiver in it forming.  “We made it.  It’s ours.  We are down here by ourselves.  We are by ourselves.  We’re by ourselves.” Alice started shaking and the light of her candle started to flicker.

            Alice became deathly quiet and John’s ears perked as they heard the unmistakable sound of a distant whistle.  It was clear and carried a melody that neither recognized.  The sound echoed and disappeared below the sound of the ocean.

            “What do we do?” asked Alice.  “What do we do? What do we do? What do we do?”

            “Stop,” snapped John.  The sound of the ocean was all they heard.  “Don’t follow the path.”

            “But--” Alice started to retort.

            “Listen,” said John.  “We started hearing the ocean more, so we got turned around.”

            “Okay,” said Alice, her mood cooling.  She took a deep breath and let it all out.

            “So, let’s turn around,” he said, taking Alice by the hand.  “And go away from the sound of the ocean.  We’re going home.”

            “We’re going home,” said Alice.

To be Continued in Part 2 tomorrow.

______________________________

            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

HP Lovecraft's "Azathoth"

Standard Introduction

            I am a fan HP Lovecraft.  Not his god-awful racism of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way.  I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of adjectives".  But the ideas in the stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern horror are often great.

            The idea of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.

            What is also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain.  They can be re-printed, referenced, and even re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist.  (Seriously, why did you name the cat that Howie?  Did you think it was funny?)

  

Today’s Entry

           I figured I would take one of his more accessible stories and rewrite it a bit as an experiment.  “Azathoth” is a fragment published after Lovecraft’s death.  It was the opening to what was supposed to be (I think) a “John Carter of Mars” type space travel story about a man who gains the ability to astral project himself to other worlds after years of stargazing to escape the drudgery of his day to day life.

            As this reads like a semi-poetic epilogue I didn’t have to change or add much, just a lot of restructuring, as the original text was 3 massive paragraphs that were physically hard for me to read.  For more info, here is a link to the story, and here is a link to the Wikipedia entry.

            If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least the horror ones.  I believe he wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.

            Anyway, here is the story.  I hope you enjoy it.

Azathoth

            When age fell upon the world and wonder went out of the minds of men.  When grey cities reared to smoky skies, tall towers grim and ugly in whose shadow none might dream of the sun or of spring's flowering.  When learning stripped the Earth of her mantle of beauty and poets sang no more of twisted phantoms seen with bleared and inward looking eyes.  When these things had come to pass, and childish hopes had gone forever, there was a man who set upon a quest to the spaces whither the world's dreams had fled.

            This man’s name and abode remain cloaked in mystery, for they were of the waking world.  It is enough to say that he dwelt in a city of high walls where sterile twilight reigned, that his days were filled with toil and drudgery among shadow and turmoil.  Returning in the evening to a home whose one window opened not to green fields or vibrant groves, but on a dim courtyard where other windows stared back in dull despair.

            From that casement one might see only walls and windows, except when given to lean far out to gaze up at the small stars that turned past the open top of the yard.  For those who dream and read much, mere walls and windows must soon drive a man to madness, and that dweller in that room lean out night after night to peer aloft glimpsing some fragment of things beyond.  Beyond the waking world.  Beyond the tall cities.  Beyond the dull despair.

            Over the years, he found names for the slow sailing stars, and to follow them in fancy when they glided regretfully out of sight.  Hypnotized by their splendor he gazed on them and thru them.  At length, his vision opened to many secret vistas whose existence no common eye suspected.

            One leaning, stargazing night a mighty gulf was bridged in the eye of his mind.  The dream haunted skies swelled down to the lonely watcher's window to merge with the close air of his room and to make him a part of their fabulous wonder.  He could see his stars about his as he gazed in his room.  Surrounded by the many points of light he had learned the names of over so many evenings of longing.

            There came to that room wild streams of violet midnight glittering with dust of gold.  Vortices of dust and fire swirling out of the ultimate spaces and heavy perfumes from beyond the worlds.  Opiate oceans poured there, lit by suns that eyes of men would never behold and having in their whirlpools strange dolphins and sea-nymphs of depths beyond.

            Noiseless infinity eddied around the dreamer and wafted him away without touching the body that leaned stiffly from the lonely window; and for days not counted in men's calendars the tides of far spheres that bore him gently to join the course of other cycles that tenderly left him sleeping on a green sunrise shore.  A shore fragrant with lotus blossoms and starred by red camalotes.  He breathed deeply the scents and listened to the distant thrum of that green star telling him of vast infinities now open.

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            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

HP Lovecraft's "Memory"

Standard Introduction

            I am a fan HP Lovecraft.  Not his god-awful racism of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way.  I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of adjectives".  But the ideas in the stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern horror are often great.

            The idea of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.

            What is also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain.  They can be re-printed, referenced, and even re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist.  (Seriously, why did you name the cat that Howie?  Did you think it was funny?)

Today’s Entry

            I figured I would take one of his more accessible stories and rewrite it a bit as an experiment.  “Memory” is a post-apocalyptic fiction about a pair of monsters dwelling in a ruin.  I imagine had Lovecraft taken more time with it and put it to verse it could have made an excellent poem, I too did not spend that much time on it.  I did take the time to clean it up a lot, reordering the sentences to a more modern flow.  I hope you enjoy it.

            If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least the horror ones.  I believe he wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.

            Anyway, here is the story. 

Memory

            In the valley of Nis, the waning moon shines thinly.  The accursed light tearing with feeble horns thru the lethal foliage of a great golden tree. Deeper within the valley, where that light reaches not, shift and lurk forms unseen and those best left un beheld.

            Stinking and vile is the herbage on each slope.  Where thorny vines and creeping poisoned leaves crawl amidst the stones of ruined palaces, twisting tightly about broken columns and strange monoliths, and heaving up marble pavements laid by forgotten hands.

            In trees that grow gigantic in crumbling courtyards leap little apes, while in and out of deep treasure-vaults writhe serpents and scaly things without names, venom dripping from lipless fanged mouths.

            Stones sleep beneath coverlets of dank moss, vast and mighty were the walls from which they fell.  For all time did their builders erect them, for futures so distant as to exist beyond imagining, and in sooth they still serve nobly.  Beneath them the grey toad makes his habitation.

            At the deepest bottom of the valley lies the river Than, whose waters are weed choked and nearly all slime.  From hidden springs this river rises and to subterranean grottoes it flows.  The Demon of the Valley knows not why its waters are red, nor whither they are bound.

            The Genie that haunts the moonbeams coxed the Demon of the Valley to converse, saying, "I am old, and forget much.  Tell me the deeds, the character, and the names of them who built these things of Stone."

            "I am Memory,” the Demon replied.  “I am wise in lore of the past, but I too am old. These beings were like the waters of the river Than.  Not to be understood.  Their deeds I recall not, for they were but of the moment.  Their aspect I recall dimly, it was like to that of the little apes in the trees.  Their name I recall clearly, for it rhymed with that of the river.  These beings of yesterday were called Man."

            With that reply the Genie flew back to the thin horned moon, and the Demon looked intently at a little ape mulling about in a tree that grew in a crumbling courtyard.

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            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter (click that link to follow me), Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

(Image 1, Image 2)

HP Lovecraft's "The Terrible Old Man"

Standard Introduction

           I am a fan HP Lovecraft.  Not his god-awful racism of course, but the fact that he wrote in such a stilted un marketable way.  I think it was Neil Gaiman (Though I can’t find the interview) that described HP’s work as "a churning morass of adjectives".  But the ideas in the stories, the mysterious and weird parts that lend themselves so well too modern horror are often great.

            The idea of humanity not being important at all, that the universe is chaotic and hostile, and that even knowing about these things leave the protagonists of the stories insane from the knowledge, those are all cool.

            What is also cool is that all of HP Lovecraft’s writings are public domain.  They can be re-printed, referenced, and even re-written by those (like me) who are fans of the ideas but want to make the writing cleaner, or tighter, or just less racist.  (Seriously, why did you name the cat that Howie?  Did you think it was funny?)

Today’s Entry

            I figured I would take one of his more accessible stories and rewrite it a bit as an experiment.  “The Terrible Old Man” is a classic horror set up.  Nothing too strange.  Aside from cutting out the word “very” a few times and reorganizing some sentences it is almost the same tale.  I hope you enjoy it.

            If you want to do this yourself, here is a link to HP Lovecraft’s complete works, or at least the horror ones.  I believe he wrote some romance stories too and I have no idea where to find those.  “The Terrible Old Man” also has an animated presentation I have seen on youtube using their own modifications, so check that out too if you wish.

            Anyway, here is the story.

He has also been a game character.

The Terrible Old Man

            It was the design of Ricci, Czanek, and Silva to call on the Terrible Old Man. The one that dwells all alone in an ancient house on Water Street near the sea.  The one reputed to be both exceedingly rich and exceedingly feeble; which forms a situation so attractive to men of the profession of Ricci, Czanek, and Silva.  Their profession was dignified trade robbery.

            The inhabitants of Kingsport say and think many things about the Terrible Old Man which generally keep him safe from the attention of gentlemen like Mr. Ricci and his colleagues.  Rumors swirling like leaf’s obscure the near certainty that the Terrible Old Man hides a fortune of indefinite magnitude somewhere within his musty and venerable abode.

            To hear accounts, the Terrible Old Man is a strange person.  Believed to have been a captain of East India clipper ships in his day; old, so old, that no one can remember when he was young; and so taciturn and recluse that few know his real name.

            Among the gnarled trees in the front yard of his aged and neglected place he maintains a strange collection of large stones, oddly grouped and painted so that they resemble the idols in some obscure Eastern temple. This collection frightens away most of the small boys who love to taunt the Terrible Old Man about his long white hair and beard, or to break the small-paned windows of his dwelling with wicked missiles; but there are other things which frighten the older and more curious folk who sometimes steal up to the house to peer in through the dusty panes.

            The rumors say that on the ground floor, in a bare room, a table sits with many peculiar bottles.  In each bottle, a small piece of lead hangs suspended, pendulum-wise from a string.  They say that the Terrible Old Man whispers to these bottles, addressing them by such names as Jack, Scar-Face, Long Tom, Spanish Joe, Peters, and Mate Ellis, and that whenever he speaks to a bottle the little lead pendulum within makes certain definite vibrations as if to answer.

            Those who have watched the tall, lean, Terrible Old Man in these peculiar conversations, do not watch him again.

            Angelo Ricci, Joe Czanek, and Manuel Silva were not of Kingsport blood; they were of that new and heterogeneous alien stock which lies outside the charmed circle of New England life and traditions.  They saw in the Terrible Old Man merely a tottering, almost helpless grey-beard.  A pitiable old recluse who could not walk without the aid of his knotted cane, and whose thin, weak hands shook with some withering condition of age.

            They really were quite sorry in their own way for the lonely fellow, whom was the source of deriding gossip and otherwise shunned, the ancient villager at whom all the dogs barked and snarled.

            But, as it is known with ironclad certainty, business is business.  To these robbers whose souls were in their profession, there is a lure and a challenge about an old and feeble man who has no account at the bank, and who pays for his few necessities each visit to the village store with Spanish gold and silver minted two centuries ago.

            Ricci, Czanek, and Silva selected the night of April 11th for their call.  Mr. Ricci and Mr. Silva were to interview the poor old gentleman, whilst Mr. Czanek would be waiting for them and their purloined burdens with a covered motor-car by the gate in the tall rear wall of their host’s grounds on Ship Street.  They desired to avoid needless explanations in case of unexpected police intrusions, a made these plans for a quiet and unostentatious departure.

            As prearranged, the three adventurers started out separately so as to prevent any evil-minded suspicions afterward.  Ricci and Silva met in Water Street by the old man’s front gate.  Although they did not like the way the moon shone down upon the painted stones through the budding branches of the gnarled trees, they had more important things to think about than mere idle superstition.

            They feared it might be unpleasant work making the Terrible Old Man loquacious concerning his hoarded gold and silver, for aged sea-captains are notably stubborn and perverse. Still, he was old and he was feeble, and there were two visitors with intent to ask the hard and probing questions.

            Ricci and Silva were experienced in the art of making unwilling persons voluble, and the screams of a weak and exceptionally venerable man can be easily muffled.  So they moved up to the one window on the house that cast light and heard the Terrible Old Man talking childishly to his bottles with pendulums. Then committed to their task, they donned masks, and knocked politely at the weather-stained oaken door.

            Waiting seemed very long to Mr. Czanek as he fidgeted restlessly in the covered motor-car by the Terrible Old Man’s back gate in Ship Street.  He was more tender-hearted than most robbers, and he did not like the hideous screams he had heard in the ancient house just after the hour appointed for the deed.  Had he not told his colleagues to be as gentle as possible with the pathetic old sea-captain?

            Nervously he watched that narrow oaken gate in the high and ivy-clad stone wall. Frequently he consulted his watch, and wondered at the delay.  Had the questioning proved too hard and the old man died before revealing where his treasure was hidden?  Had a thorough search become necessary?  Were floorboards, closet doors, and old furniture being pulled away and open in a mad search?

            Mr. Czanek did not like to wait so long.  He did not like waiting long for coffee in a café.  Here, in the dark, in such a place, any and all waiting seemed too long.  Then he sensed a soft tread or tapping on the walk inside the gate.  A gentle fumbling at the rusty latch.  He saw the narrow, heavy door swing inward.

            In the pallid glow of the single dim streetlamp Mr. Czanek strained his eyes to see what his colleagues had brought out of that sinister house which loomed so close behind.  But there he did not see his colleagues, only the Terrible Old Man leaning quietly on his knotted cane.  The Terrible Old Man smiling hideously.

            Mr. Czanek had never before noticed the color of that man’s eyes, but now in the dark they shone yellow.

            Little things make considerable excitement in little towns.  The rumors swirled.  The people of Kingsport talked all that spring and summer about the three bodies that had washed in with the tide.  They had been horribly slashed as with many cutlasses, mangled as by the tread of many cruel boot-heels, and were scarcely identifiable as human.

            Some spoke of things as trivial as the deserted motor-car found in Ship Street.  Some of inhuman cries they had heard late one night, probably of a stray animal or migratory bird, night owl citizens shared gossip too after all.  But in this idle village gossip the Terrible Old Man took no interest at all.  He was by nature reserved, and when one is aged and feeble, one’s reserve is doubly strong.  Besides, so ancient a sea-captain must have witnessed scores of things much more stirring in the far-off days of his unremembered youth.

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            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.