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Lovecraft Unbound

4.15 of 5 stars 4.15 · rating details · 949 ratings · 65 reviews

The stories are legendary, the characters unforgettable, the world horrible and disturbing. Howard Phillips Lovecraft may have been a writer for only a short time, but the creations he left behind after his death in 1937 have shaped modern horror more than any other author in the last two centuries: the shambling god Cthulhu, and the other deities of the Elder Things, the...more

Paperback, 421 pages

Published October 1st 2009 by Dark Horse Comics

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Apr 05, 2010 Zach rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: horror

This is a terribly-titled book, because most of these stories have little to nothing to do with HPL. Cthulhu isn't even mentioned at all! Wrap your head around that (if you can).

Also, even for an anthology, this seems particularly uneven. More on that below:

1. "The Crevasse" by Dale Bailey and Nathan Ballingrud
A dog-sled team in the Antarctic encounters evidence of a buried civilization under the ice. OR DO THEY?!? I really enjoyed this one, it did a great job of pulling off the creepy somethin...more

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May 23, 2010 Henrik rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: anthology, horror

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Probably this year's most praised book already. So far I am very impressed by this anthology! The authors have really managed to take inspiration from HPL without stripping away their own, unique voice and approach to storytelling, and--bless the Old Ones!--without descending at all into pastiches.

OCTOBER 28:

"That of Which We Speak When We Speak of the Unspeakable" by Nick Mamatas:

At first it is a little unclear what is going on, besides the three characters being in some cave, sort of hiding an...more

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Jul 07, 2010 H. Anne Stoj rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: horror, anthology

I have to admit that I'm a huge fan of reading works based on Lovecraft's or influenced by him and I tend to really enjoy Ellen Datlow as she draws typically wonderful pieces together from all over the place. This, in that regard, wasn't an exception to the rule. Nearly all of the stories were well done and the influence of HP could truly be found. Oddly for me the ones that I liked best (with the exception of Mongoose which took place in space) were set in Antarctica and Lovecraft's own Mountai...more

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Oct 22, 2012 Juushika rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: genre-fantasy, status-owned, genre-short-fiction, genre-horror

All short story anthologies are doomed to ups and downs; this is no exception. Lovecraft provides wide but often transparent (more often in theme than in mythos) and occasionally repetitive inspiration, especially in the stories written expressly for this collection, a problem exacerbated by post-story blurbs where authors provide two-penny insights into Lovecraft's work. But Datlow is an accomplished collator: the selection is broad, the variety of styles--sometimes ranging too far: there's a f...more

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Nov 17, 2011 Clint rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

I really wanted to like this book, and I usually love Mythos stories by other writers. The Mythos is so badass that it's kind of hard to fuck it up. But these stories, mostly they had nothing at all to do with Lovecraft. I know that one of the stated aims of the editor in the introduction was to, you know, see how far they could go with Lovecraft, but after a certain point it just becomes supernatural fiction, and you get the feeling that this book was named Lovecraft Unbound to get it to sell....more

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Aug 11, 2011 Bethany rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: short-stories

"ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"

Now that that's out of the way, I admit it: H.P. Lovecraft isn't really my thing. It's not that his ideas aren't brilliant and genre-bending (not to mention a bit mind-breaking), but I've only ever been able to truly enjoy him when I consider his works in a historical context rather than as works of fiction, because otherwise I find his prose, well, purple. It is only by taking into account the era in which he was writing and the prevalent lite...more "ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"

Now that that's out of the way, I admit it: H.P. Lovecraft isn't really my thing. It's not that his ideas aren't brilliant and genre-bending (not to mention a bit mind-breaking), but I've only ever been able to truly enjoy him when I consider his works in a historical context rather than as works of fiction, because otherwise I find his prose, well, purple. It is only by taking into account the era in which he was writing and the prevalent literary styles of the time that I can willfully disregard the two lines of adjectives that accompany every preternatural, eldritch noun he uses.

I would not have picked this book up at all if I hadn't come across it used and it hadn't had thick pages that could stand up to being sweated on while working out at the gym. The idea of reading a multi-hundred page book of short stories based on or inspired by Lovecraft fills me with a certain horror that could probably use a few more adjectives and decorative 'postrophes (for mood, you understand). Fortunately, the editor of this collection is a true admirer of Lovecraft's works and every bit as leery of allowing any old high school fanfiction into their book, which is not to say I've heard of most of the authors in the book.

In fact, I think I'd only heard of one or two, but since supernatural horror isn't my usual cup of tea I will give them the benefit of the doubt and pretend that they're very famous in their field and the only reason I don't know them is that I am an incurious neophyte to the genre. However, judged by my standards it doesn't surprise me that I've never heard of the majority of them. None of the stories particularly stand out in my mind except for one involving bandersnatches and momraths in some sort of space setting. It mostly stood out because I couldn't help thinking as I read it that they'd gotten the wrong drug-addled, brain-damaged author to base their story on. The rest were mostly forgettable and I spent my time reading them counting the pages until I could get to the next mediocre tale of the macabre.

My favorite part of the collection, to be honest, was reading the different authors' descriptions of how they discovered Lovecraft (the average age being twelve) and then going on to say which of his works was their favorite. Every author picked a different piece as his or her favorite, which probably says more about how prolific Lovecraft was than his versatility in appealing to different people with different works, but it was also the most interesting part of the book for me.

My advice with this book would be to gift it to the Lovecraft-lover in your circle of friends (I promise you, there is one) and let them decide if it's any good. If you are the Lovecraft-lover, well, don't let me influence you. As I said at the beginning, I am not, and so perhaps it will be more to your taste than it was to mine, though if you're going into expecting to hear about Dunwich horrors and all, you may be disappointed: the editor advised the contributors to steer away from borrowing directly from the Cthulu mythos.(less)

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May 12, 2011 Brendanmoody rated it 5 of 5 stars

Once upon a time I wrote part of a dreadful H.P. Lovecraft pastiche. I mention this not because you care about the many pieces of fiction I've abandoned over the years, but to offer another small piece of evidence for the truth Ellen Datlow mentions in her introduction to this eminently enjoyable anthology: unimaginative Lovecraft imitations are everywhere. People treat his stories like a mathematical formula: strained antiquated prose plus unspeakable tentacled evil equals masterwork of horror....more Once upon a time I wrote part of a dreadful H.P. Lovecraft pastiche. I mention this not because you care about the many pieces of fiction I've abandoned over the years, but to offer another small piece of evidence for the truth Ellen Datlow mentions in her introduction to this eminently enjoyable anthology: unimaginative Lovecraft imitations are everywhere. People treat his stories like a mathematical formula: strained antiquated prose plus unspeakable tentacled evil equals masterwork of horror. Well, no. Lovecraft, like another much-imitated writer born in the 1890s, J.R.R. Tolkien, wrote as he did because of who he was and how he thought. You can't re-evoke that, and the results when you try bring to mind Twain's immortal if outdated comment on a woman swearing: "She knows the words but not the music."

In Lovecraft Unbound, Ellen Datlow brings together stories that are inspired by Lovecraft without slavishly imitating him. The drawback for some readers will be that some stories seem too loosely inspired, not "Lovecraftian" enough. I admit that I thought this about one or two of the stories in this anthology, but I don't see much value in pursuing the point: Lovecraft is so influential a writer that almost any modern horror tale could be said to be influenced by him, and in any case what matters is that the stories are good. And in this volume, they are. A few struck me as underdeveloped, but even those had such strong style that it's hard to complain.

I've now read "The Crevasse," the collection's first story, twice: once in this volume and once in The Best Horror of the Year: Volume Two, also edited by Datlow. On first reading I was disappointed by the story. It seemed to me too interested in subtle effects at the cost of narrative substance. It was like reading the first twenty pages of a fine novella and then having it abruptly stop. On second reading, I was better able to appreciate the intensely evocative prose Dale Bailey and Nathan Ballingrud bring to it. For a story in which very little happens, it's remarkably atmospheric, and confronts Lovecraft's deepest themes, and some of his narrative motifs, in a new way. It's still a story I respect more than enjoy, but I respect it a heck of a lot.

"The Office of Doom" is the best kind of comic horror: it's funny without skimping on the chills factor. This brief story by Richard Bowes has surprising scope and real charm. Anna Tambour's "Sincerely, Petrified" takes a while to get going and sometimes seems to indulge in quirkiness for its own sake, but by the end it's evolved into an excellent, creepy take on the power of the imagination. Brian Evenson's "The Din of Celestial Birds" is another one that lacked the edge I was hoping for, but it's a more than competent story of a man's strange transformation. "The Tenderness of Jackals" has a protagonist who's Evil But Not Really Because He's World-Weary, which is not the sort of thing that sits well with me, but Amanda Downum writes this about as well as it can be written. "Sight Unseen" by Joel Lane starts well then ends a bit abruptly, but what climax there is creepy.

In "Cold Water Survival," Holly Phillips masters the sense of encroaching terror that pervades Lovecraft's best stories. A group of adventurers have colonized a giant chunk of ice in the Antarctic, but is there something alive down there? You know the answer, and watching the characters discover it is good scary fun. At times the stylized descriptions of action on the narrator's video camera are a little distracting, but this is a minor quirk in a great story.

"Come Lurk with Me and Be My Love" is a funny and oddly sweet comic romance about a guy in love with a strange girl. She's in this weird cult, but that won't be too much of a problem, or will it? This story has only touches of horror, but they're very well-executed, and the love story has real charm. I look forward to reading more of William Browning Spencer's work in the future.

For some reason I've been resistant to checking out Caitlin R. Kiernan's fiction, despite her high reputation among readers of dark fiction. The loss has been mine. "Houses Under the Sea" is a brilliant story, using motifs and structure reminiscent of Lovecraft but bringing a distinctive modern narrative voice in as well. Another of HPL's great talents was his ability to arrange seemingly unrelated facts to devastating gradual effect, and Kiernan has a similar gift. I've already purchased one of her novels, and look forward to seeing what other tricks she has up her sleeve.

Michael Cisco's "Machines of Concrete Light and Dark" is a little too abstract and dream-like for my taste; its style is unsettling in a way that's not only atmospheric, but just a touch annoying. Still, it's a fine creepy story that reflects Lovecraft's theme of broken-down psychic borders. Marc Laidlaw's "Leng" is a likable epistolary piece. It doesn't bring quite as much innovation as some other entries here, but that just means the joys of its elegant traditional structure are easier to savor, and it does have a couple twists to offer. "In the Black Mill" by Michael Chabon was one of the stories I was most excited about when I picked up the anthology, and it didn't disappoint. It too is closer to the bounds of "typical" Lovecraft than some, and Chabon writes in a less extreme versions of Lovecraft's typical manner, which he handles perfectly. I'm at a loss to describe quite why I'm so fond of this tale, except that Chabon is as always a master stylist.

Lavie Tidhar's "One Day, Soon" is an unsettling tale that lingers in the mind. It deals with a topic that I don't often enjoy seeing in imaginative fiction (he said vaguely, to avoid spoilers), but does so with a understatement that increases its horror. In "Commencement," Joyce Carol Oates satirizes the pomposity of the typical college graduation ceremony by describing a school where that ritual has a disturbing twist. It's not hard to see where things are going, but as always with Oates, the pleasure is in her hypnotic style and the portrait of the thought processes of her all-too-human characters. "Vernon, Driving" by Simon Kurt Unsworth is an intense, deeply-felt story of suffering, and an excellent read. Another writer could have used these elements in a weak story that felt dismissive of Lovecraft, but Unsworth's handling is just right. When looking at the table of contents to remind myself which stories were in this book, I had to think a minute about which one Michael Shea's "The Recruiter" was. It had already slipped my mind. Now that I remember it, I can't find much to say. It's a good story, with some interesting stylistic touches, I suppose, but I really don't feel much about it one way or the author.

I do love an epistolary horror story. Gemma Files's "Marya Nox" is presented as an interview with an exorcist priest, who recounts a strange experience he had in Southeastern Europe, in one of those churches that had incorporated an older pagan tradition, which seeps through in a disturbing way... The value of this format is that it removes the reader from the horror in a manner that paradoxically makes everything creepier. In "Boojum," Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear offer a fun dark science fiction story that's also an homage, not just to Lovecraft, but to Kipling and Lewis Carroll, and perhaps others that I missed. It's also about how attached one can get to an animal companion, even when that companion is, er, a trifle unusual.

Laird Barron's "Catch Hell" offers his usual distinctive, atmospheric prose, but its tale of a troubled magic and the extreme lengths to which the couple will go to help themselves is also a little longer than it might be, and the setting doesn't mesh with the characters fully. It's still a worthwhile read, of course. And the collection closes with Nick Mamatas' "That of Which We Speak When We Speak of the Unspeakable," a story that might be baffling to readers who aren't familiar with its non-Lovecraftian literary antecedents, though the author's note will help them cover this unfortunate gap in their reading. For those who know what's up, this delightful and sad story is the ultimate reminder that Lovecraft's themes aren't limited to creaky retreads of his basic forms, but can be-- and should be-- re-imagined over and over again. Lovecraft Unbound shows some of the finest modern writers of dark fiction doing just that.(less)

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Feb 16, 2011 Nesa Sivagnanam rated it 5 of 5 stars

Edited by Ellen Datlow, whose collections generally more than fulfill their promise, here are 22 stories inspired by Lovecraft. Datlow sought stories inspired - thematically and possibly - by plot points in Lovecraft's mythos. She wanted variety: in tone, setting, point of view, time. Datlow had a preference for stories that made no use of the words 'eldritch' or 'ichor', and no mention of Cthulhu or his minions. And especially no tentacles. Having said that some tentacles did slip through but t...more

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Jan 24, 2010 Res rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: sff

I'm neither a Lovecraft fan nor a horror fan, so possibly my opinion on this book is not of much value to anybody. However, I'm going to give it anyway.

There are twenty stories in this book. I abandoned fourteen for being either boring (you have to get my attention with human desires; life-or-death adventures on the ice don't cut it), amateurish (starting way too early, thunking into the dreaded past perfect for a nice long slog through the backstory, awkwardly lurching from emotion to emotion),...more I'm neither a Lovecraft fan nor a horror fan, so possibly my opinion on this book is not of much value to anybody. However, I'm going to give it anyway.

There are twenty stories in this book. I abandoned fourteen for being either boring (you have to get my attention with human desires; life-or-death adventures on the ice don't cut it), amateurish (starting way too early, thunking into the dreaded past perfect for a nice long slog through the backstory, awkwardly lurching from emotion to emotion), or both.

Marc Laidlaw's "Leng" was interesting enough for me to finish it, but it did a thing I've seen in other horror stories: the horror started small, got big, got bigger, and then ... got so big that it was just funny.

Michael Chabon's "In the Black Mill" was workmanlike but cold.

Joyce Carol Oates' "Commencement" was a clever idea -- a graduation ceremony that starts giving hints of being something darker -- and she gets points for writing with some real style, unuusual in this book, but the story was as long as an actual graduation ceremony.

In Gemma Files' "Marya Nox," I felt that the form fought with the content -- the opening paragraph left me confused and expecting something much bigger than what I got, and I didn't really see any reason to tell the story in the form of a transcript and not in the form of a regular story. Once I got into it, I enjoyed the story it told.

Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear's "Mongoose" was the whole reason I requested the book at the library -- another story in the "Boojum" universe. I was charmed at cheshires, creatures from another dimension that could phase in and out at will, keeping a space station free of vermin called toves so that they won't attract something worse. Tone was smaller (less epic/apocalyptic) and more hopeful than you normally find inspired by Lovecraft. I consider that a plus.

Nick Mamatas' "That Of Which We Speak When We Speak Of the Unspeakable" reminds me of some Saturday Night Live sketches: the execution is nothing to get excited about, but the mere idea -- a Lovecraftian parody of Raymond Carver, in which people sit around drinking and airing their egos while shoggoths ooze up to where they're hiding -- is hilarious enough that I'll remember it long after I've forgotten what actually happened in the story. (Obviously I'm not a Carver fan either.)(less)

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Feb 16, 2011 Lea rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: acquired-2011, read-2011, reviews

Not being a big Lovecraft fan, I can't really say why I picked this up -- but I was pleasantly surprised with it. The quality of the writing is consistently good, with the stories being inspired by Lovecraft, rather than imitations of his work.

My favourite story was Mongoose, by Sarah Monette & Elizabeth Bear -- it was suspenseful, but had a lovely charm to it, with engaging characters.

Sadly, the weakest for me was In The Black Mill, by Michael Chabon. I really expected to love this one, but...more

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Apr 11, 2013 Kylie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: cosmic-horror, horror-and-paranormal, short-story-collections, books-about-books, my-library

Usually when I tackle a short story collections there will be at least one or two duds from my point of view, but while there were a few here that I didn't like as much as others they were all rather inventive and there wasn't a one that I felt like saying "Why did they include THAT in here?" over.

My without-a-doubt favourite is Mongoose. It's pretty much straight-out sci-fi with a Lovecraft bent, I can honestly say I was sad when it finished. Looking up Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette's work I...more

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Mar 29, 2013 Nancy Oakes added it

Shelves: horror

I am rating this one at 3.5, the highest rating I've given an Ellen Datlow collection so far. Having just finished four other books she's edited, I have to say that this one has a wider range of good stories than the previous four volumes of The Best Horror of the Year do individually. It's still a mixed bag though, with some stories much better than the rest, some following under the category of "good and I'd probably look for more by their authors," and some that just didn't do it for me. In s...more

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May 22, 2010 Steve rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, horror

I thought about rating this one 4 stars, because of a number of really fine stories. However, there are at least a 100 pages wasted on pretty lame material. I think when you get to a 100, the sin for an anthology becomes unforgivable. I have notes for the individual stories, but I left them elsewhere. Maybe I'll put them up later. In the mean time, the good stuff:

The Crevasse, by Dale Bailey and Nathan Ballingrud
Cold Water Survival, by Holly Phillips
Houses under the Sea, by Caitlan Kiernan (Best...more

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Jun 17, 2012 Marsha Altman rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, sci-fi-fantasy

I thought these short stories would be a little more Lovecraft mythos themed, but the editor says they tried to stay away from Cthulu and tentacles, which I suppose is fair. A lot of stories are terrific anyway, though most of them seem to be in the second half of the book, which is a good buy because of its length alone. I recommend "Leng" by Laidlaw, "In the Black Mill" by Chabon, "Commencement" by Joyce Carol Oates, and "Mongoose" by Monette and Bear.

From the other Lovecraft spinoff mythos I'...more

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Feb 09, 2010 Lori rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: everybody

I love shorts stories in general but this batch was really good. These are all Lovecraft inspired stories by different authors, there are some seriously creepy, fatalistic tales in here. I really loved Mongoose in particular, loved the Alice references. I definitely reccommend this book. I think this is a good book to read if you find Lovecraft himself difficult, I think this gives you a good idea of the feel of his writing without bogging you down in heavy, musty descriptions, strange tongue-tw...more

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Dec 21, 2009 Crowinator rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2009-reads, horror-and-psychological-thrillers, other-monsters, paranormal, short-stories, memorably-scary-or-disturbing, everything-is-turning-out-so-dark, adult

I love the horror genre, especially in short story form, to which I think it’s ideally suited, but I’m not as well read in the classics as I’d like. I haven’t read any Lovecraft stories until recently: when I checked out this book, I checked out a book of Lovecraft stories to read first, so I could experience what I’d heard about his writing style and his themes firsthand. I read (more like skimmed, to be honest) five stories before giving up entirely. I hate to admit it, but even though I find...more

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Sep 21, 2012 Stoffe rated it 2 of 5 stars

A compilation of novels is difficult enough to keep interesting, but to try to compile authors where Lovecraft is the common inspiration is near impossible. The aim of Datlow is not to create a collection of stories based on Lovecraft's body of work, but more inspired by the same. This does create a very unbalanced collection. Some of the author's are clearly better than others and it seems as if they have all decided to use the same blueprint when they tackled the task.

Most of the short stories...more

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Mar 06, 2011 F.R. rated it 3 of 5 stars

I was disappointed with this collection, but then that was partly my fault as my expectations were askew. If I'm honest I didn’t read the introduction until I’d read all of the tales. (It sounds perverse, but I never read introductions until I’ve finished reading the rest of the book. Primarily because, if you have a piece of classic fiction you’ve never encountered before, the introduction is often quite happy to ruin the entire plot). And the thing is, the introduction does make it entirely cl...more

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Oct 04, 2010 Mouldy Squid rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: horror

Another excellent anthology of horror from legendary editor Ellen Datlow. Here she has collected 20 tales influenced by Howard Phillips Lovecraft, best known for his "Cthulhu Mythos" stories from the first three decades of the 20th Century. This anthology is just what I like to see from new Lovecraftian fiction, that is, these stories are new.

Lovecraft is one of those authors who are famous, not just for their own work, but for pastiche. Too often Lovecraftian fiction is but pale imitation of th...more

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Jul 13, 2012 Sesana rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: horror, fantasy, short-stories

This is not a collection of Mythos stories, or even stories necessarily set in Lovecraft's world. It seems the idea was to collect stories inspired by the tone in much of Lovecraft's work. Bleak hopelessness, psychological strain, that sort of thing. Oh, there are indeed things recognizable as Old Ones, but none of the familiar ones. So if you're a fan of Lovecraft, you're likely to enjoy the style the authors were aiming for, but feel somewhat mislead with what you get. Be forewarned.

Anthologie...more

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Nov 21, 2010 Lord Humungus rated it 4 of 5 stars

Datlow, with the possible exception of Gardener Dozois, is probably one of the best SF/Horror editors ever so I was pretty much assured this comp was going to have some solid gold in it. I was not disappointed.

This is one of the best, if not the best, Lovecraft collection I've ever read (barring those by HPL himself), featuring a variety of styles and approaches. By being flexible in her selection of 'Lovecraftian' material, she was able to include some excellent gems that might have otherwise b...more

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May 11, 2013 Tarl rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: lovecraftian

I am fairly wary when it comes to Lovecraftian stories by other authors. Either they are really good, or really bad. And usually they are really bad.
I have to say though that Lovecraft Unbound was an enjoyable read. The editor set out to have authors write stories that were Lovecraftian in their ideas, not in their monsters/characters/etc. Sure, some of them still have a tentacle or two, but for the most part, we are left with a very unique feeling after each story, one that we encounter when we...more

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Jun 22, 2011 Gevera Bert rated it 4 of 5 stars

My new favorite story "Mongoose" is in this anthology, so I thought I'd read the whole thing. Disappointingly, the theme is Lovecraft without tentacles or reference to anything Lovecraft. I like tentacles, and the world "eldritch," and Deep Ones, and all the other disallowed items. (A few did sneak in, but not as many as I'd like.) The stories are solid but to me they were horror stories, not Cthulhu Mythos for the most part.

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Mar 20, 2013 Larry McCloskey rated it 4 of 5 stars

With "Lovecraft Unbound", Datlow seeks to assemble authors to channel Lovecraft without regurgitating a bunch of Cthulhu-mythos characters. Across twenty short stories, there are only a handful of direct Lovecraft references and for the most part, the collection is the stronger for the works that pay homage to Lovecraft without ripping him off.

As with any anthology, some stories ("The Crevasse", Marya Nox") are better than others ("Machines of Concrete Light and Dark", "Catch Hell"); others ("Ho...more

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Sep 28, 2012 Dan Henk rated it 5 of 5 stars

I think Lovecraft often gets a bad rap. People read that he influenced the modern greats, everyone form authors like Stephen King and Clive Barker, to movie makers like John Carpenter and Wes Craven, and then dive into his books expecting the same fare. He wrote for a different era. His mind-bending, first person surrealistic approach to a creeping, nameless horror stunned and fascinated huge segments of early century America. The America that read, that is, which wasn't nearly what it is today....more

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Apr 19, 2012 Kristin rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: spooky, short-stories, paranormal

The stories in this book are overall very much in his style. I think I would like these stories, and indeed Lovecraft's own works, more if there were more explanation to them. I really enjoyed most of them, but as I said, there were times that I wished that there was more detail. Part of the mystery in the stories is the unknown, but instead of being spooked, sometimes I was just plain confused....several times I went back and reread passages just to be sure I didn't miss anything. Overall thoug...more

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Nov 09, 2010 Suna marked it as to-read

Shelves: tentacles-will-kill-us-all

These kind of books are always a bit scary: Sometimes the contributors who take the basic ideas of a well-loved author for an anthology can get it so completely wrong.
But I've heard so many good things about this, plus Ellen Datlow was also the editor of the very impressive Alien Sex, that I am going to give it a go.

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Sep 21, 2012 Marissa Wilk rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: lovecraft

Some fantastic stuff in here, some not-so-good. I really liked that is isn't full of the usual Lovecraft pastiches -- the book is very deliberately NOT a collection of those. My favorite is probably "Mongoose," which was an absolute blast, full of references not just to HPL but many others, notably Lewis Carroll.

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Jul 24, 2012 Michael rated it 1 of 5 stars

A really disappointing book - most of the tales trail off without any real ending. I realize that they were going for a post-modern, "hip" take on Cthulhu Mythos - Cthulhu stories that never directly invoke Lovecraftian mainstays, but it results (mostly)in a naval-gazing, magical-realism-with-a-little-gore-added-in muddle.

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Feb 21, 2011 Elias St.septum rated it 4 of 5 stars

A wonderful collection of new Mythos tales, the greatest strength of which is it's foregoing of tentacles and ichor in favor of the broader Lovecraftian themes of cosmic dread and deep time. Worth reading just for Kaitlyn Kiernan's "Houses Under The Sea", but theres a remarkable variety of fine stories here.

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New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird
by Paula Guran (Editor)
Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, Vol 2
by H.P. Lovecraft

About Ellen Datlow

Ellen Datlow has been an award-winning editor of short science fiction, fantasy, and horror for over twentyfive years.

She is editor of the Best Horror of the Year and has edited or co-edited a large number of award-winning original anthologies. Her most recent are Supernatural Noir, Naked City, Blood and Other Cravings, The Beastly Bride, Teeth, Trolls Eye View, and After (the last three with Ter...more

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Books by Ellen Datlow

The Faery Reel: Tales from the Twilight Realm

Naked City: Tales of Urban Fantasy (Riverside Series; The Dresden Files, #10.9)

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“Terrible and ancient and scarred with the endless cold of space, the terrible and ancient things glistened with frozen moisture and colors played across the surface of the skin, colors that were never meant to be seen on earth.” — 3 people liked it

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Lovecraft Unbound

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