Which book are you reading currently? #7

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Yeah, I don't know. It's The Best of H.P. Lovecraft : Bloodcurling tales of horror and the macabre and it's edited by Robert Bloch.

The stories included are : Rats in the wall, The picture in the house, The outsider, Pickman's model, In the vault, The silver key, The music of Erich Zann, The call of the Cthulhu, The dunwich horror, The whisperer in darkness, The colour out of space, The haunter of the dark, The thing on the doorstep, The shadow over Innsmouth, The dreams in the witch-house, The shadow out of time.

Are there a lot of popular stories not in there?

 

I completely disagree with terming this "the best", but it's a decent collection (there's even a few that I haven't read). Some of these are his most famous, including Silver Key, Innsmouth, Dunwich, Dreams in the witch-house (I love this one by the way), and of course Call of Cthulhu. The shadow out of time is one of my favourites for a reason that I will not mention because it spoils the whole story; suffice to say it has one element that AFAIK is unique among his stories.

 

Ok, first I'd like to mention that Lovecraft was Bloch's mentor. Bloch imitated Lovecraft and submitted stories to him so it is sometimes hard to assess the actual degree of authorship in Bloch's stories. August Derleth was another of Lovecraft's friends and he published a certain number of stories based on fragments left by Lovecraft when the latter died in 1937.

The stories you've listed are quite good but they represent only a part of Lovecraft's writings. I believe that you should consider reading other stories like The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, At the Mountains of Madness, Herbert West - Reanimator, The Cats of Ulthar, The Doom that came to Sarnath... That list could go on.

In order to get a comprehensive view of Lovecraft's writings you have to read more than the short selection in that collection.

Sorry if I got carried away but there are a few things in life that I take very seriously and obviously that's one of these things.

@Ziad: Lovecraft is very popular in France and I couldn't believe how it was difficult to get an exhaustive collection of his writings in English. I actually stumbled upon the Omnibus Collection when I was in a bookshop in London and as far as I know it's the most comprehensive edition of Lovecraft's work in English. You should definitely give it a try if you've missed some of them.

 

And, y'know, Lovecraft's works are public domain these days. And, y'know, you have the intertubes.

Speaking of Lovecraftian awesomeness, allow me to share a passage from Charles Stross' The Atrocity Archive which I believe is incontrovertible proof that everyone in the history of ever should read the book:

That's right Englanders, your CCTV camera network's real purpose is to protect you from cosmic horror. Your government really is looking out for you.

What, even the racism?

 

If you really want to go there I suggest you make a new thread (preferably in the Alley). I certainly won't discuss it here and I won't hijack this thread either.

 

I'll add my votes to these, they're all excellent.

Thanks, I'll keep an eye out for it. It would be good to read some of his stories that I missed. Funnily enough my first experience with Lovecraft was reading Call of Cthulhu in French

 

I'm reading Unseen Achedemicals, the new Terry Pratchett book. It's really good. I'm having to stop myself doing my usual trick of racing through it!

 

"Reading the Gathering Storm" by Robert Jordan/Brandon Sanderson the first volume of the supposedly finishing book of "The Wheel of Time". I am enjoying it, Sanderson is catching Jordan's feeling for good and bad I must say. I now remember one problem I had with Sanderson's writing, he writes good stories but he tends to fill page after page with more or less nothing just like Jordan did at times except that I think Sanderson does it even more. Have yet come to any cataclysmic scene which Jordan did so well so my real judgement is pending I am however enjoying it as it is. Might be in large part due to WoT having been such a big part of my life for a long time, not so much in recent years but it is still the series I have loved the most no matter how much better I might find later ones WoT and the characters therein have a special and big place in my heart.

 

Have you read Sanderson's other stuff?

 

Yes.


Finished the book and I must say that Sanderson has done a great job in continuing WoT. If I did not know that it was another writer I would not have guessed or suspected a thing. For good and bad Sanderson continues in Jordan's spirit. Anything you disliked with Jordan's WoT you will still dislike in Sanderson's WoT but everything you liked about Jordan's WoT is still there in Sanderson's version of it. I am pleased, seems like I can get closure on a series of books that have meant a lot to me and no matter how much filler material or how slow moving the pace of the books are I do want to know what happens to Rand, Mat, Perrin and all the others. And yes, Sanderson's women are every bit as annoying and one dimensional as Jordan's.

 

Would you say that Brandon Sanderson's other stuff also has a lot that isn't necessary (Elantris or Mistborn, for example)?


I am currently reading Lady Audley's Secret... I need to read 400 more pages by monday.

 

Mistborn certainly had page after page of what I call filler material that dragged the pace down to zero. The story was good but it could have been condensed quite dramatically and been better for it. Have not read Elantris yet, bought it and will read it next week or so.

 

Elantris is good. Has a bit less of filler than Mistborn, although I don't recall being turned off by the pacing; I like the series a lot. Perhaps they need a re-read.

 

Well, don't know about pace but I am not fond of pages of characters musing and whatnot. Characters thinking generally makes me skim until they actually start doing stuff.

 

I prefer dialog myself and hate it when I read a book and get to multiple pages of location description...

 

During the day I'm reading "Watching the English" by Kate Fox. And at night, The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown.

 

I thought Watching the English was hilarious. I read it when I was still in Britian and there were so many things in it that I just dismissed as "too silly" and "that's not how people really are"... until I started paying more attention and looking for these traits, at which point they were impossible to miss. Worse, I then noticed that I would occasionally behave in the ways she describes...

 

haha awesome. Many of my football mates and people I'm hanging out with this semester are English so I'm hoping to have the book done by the end of the month so I can see if it applies to them.

I've only just started and gotten past weatherspeak and I definitely agree with that part. Even I do it. I did it just this morning in fact, heh.

 

Just wait until you get to the "pub rules" chapter

 

About to start reading "Rosemary's Baby," for class.