The call of 'Cthulhu's Reign'

Collection explores, adapts

Lovecraftian horrors

By Allen Adams
edge staff writer
aadams@themaineedge.com

H.P. Lovecraft is considered by most to be one of the best horror writers of the 20th century. His Cthulhu Mythos is certainly among the most influential works written in the genre. And those dark, tentacle-laden stories of the Old Ones have certainly inspired generations of writers to put their own twist on Lovecraft's creations.

But most of these stories focus on the precarious balance between this world and the other, darker dimensions. In the new collection "Cthulhu's Reign" (DAW, $7.99), edited by Darrell Schweitzer, however, 16 authors offer up their visions of what might remain of the world after the battle goes to the bad guys.

These tend to be the stories of people dealing with the aftermath of extraordinary circumstances " namely, the end of civilization as we know it. Whether it's the strangeness of a Cthulhlu shelter built entirely without angles in Ken Asamatsu's "Spherical Trigonometry," the complex journey of a psychic remote viewer through a Cthulhu cult-ruled landscape in "What Brings the Void" by Will Murray or the neo-noir Bergmanesque heist story of Gregory Frost's "The Seals of New R'lyeh," the reader gets a glimpse of what might have come after Lovecraft's visions.

And of course, as with any collection, some of the stories are better than others. As can be a danger with themed collections, there's an occasional offering that comes off as formulaic, as if it would have worked just as well for any number of similar collections with little more than a few name changes. Standard spooky magical end of the world stuff without a lot of specificity regarding Lovecraft's work.

But there are also highlights. A personal favorite is Matt Cardin's "The New Pauline Corpus," a story written in triptych built around a new gospel reconciling the rise of the Old Ones with the foundations of Christianity. We get a theologian's proof equating Cthulhu to the Old Testament God, a "fictional" recounting of the time of the change and a diary-style account of a church official attempting to construct a new gospel from the pieces of the former two. It's an interestingly-written piece that has some seriously strong connections to Lovecraft's work. Probably the best one of the bunch.

If you're a fan of Lovecraft, "Cthulhu's Reign" should probably be on your book list. It's an excellent chance to enjoy a deeper exploration of a classically creepy world. If you're a stranger to Lovecraft, you might have difficulty getting into some of these stories. However, even if you have only a passing familiarity with the mythos, you'll find plenty to enjoy in this one.