Horror writer H.P. (Howard Phillips) Lovecraft, like Edgar Allan Poe, died young and achieved fame posthumously. He lived most of his life in Providence, R.I., where both of his parents spent time in the Butler Hospital for the insane.
This might explain Lovecraft's weird and dark fiction, much of which was published in pulp magazines of the 1920s and '30s and later went on to influence writers such as Neil Gaiman, Stephen King and Joyce Carol Oates.
Lovecraft set many of his stories in the city of Arkham, an invented New England backwater on the banks of the Miskatonic River. The local color is dark — very, very dark. He infuses his stories with archaic words such as eldritch, foetid and shewed. Fortunately, it's not overdone and is just enough to make time feel out of joint. As for his monsters, they are the Ancient Ones, an elder race of giants that never die. We awaken them or call them at our peril, for they bring cosmic nihilism and utter hopelessness.
Leslie S. Klinger's thorough annotations in this volume explain the arcane and add contextual depth to the stories, but pace yourself. Too much Lovecraft in one sitting and you'll want to chill out with something light, such as binge-watching "The Walking Dead."
JARRETT SMITH
