David A. Riley's Blog, page 27
July 15, 2022
My Retro Review of The House of Cthulhu by Brian Lumley
This review was specially written for the Phantasmagoria Brian Lumley Special. THE HOUSE OF CTHULHU and Other Tales of The Primal Land
by Brian Lumley, illustrated by Jim Pitts
Weirdbook Press 1984 Hardcover 95 pages
This is a large format book measuring 8 ¾ inches by 11 ¼ inches, so although only 95 pages long it’s still quite a good read as each page is roughly the equivalent of 4 in a normal sized book.
Lavishly illustrated throughout by award-winning artist Jim Pitts, this large format hardcover (8 ¾ inches by 11 ¼ inches) contains eleven stories by Brian Lumley plus an Introduction by one of the fictitious characters in it, explaining how the ancient manuscript from a previously unknown civilisation from before the Age of the Dinosaurs was found and translated.
All the tales are set in the fictitious continent of , the only landmass on the face of the Earth in those distant days, during a time when sorcery still prevailed.
It’s a well imagined world, complete with a detailed map. It is also, of course, as the book’s title reveals, part of Lumley’s vision of the Cthulhu Mythos. Although I prefer Lovecraft’s original concept than this Derlethian derivation, it works well enough in the kind of swords and sorcery fantasy setting within which these tales take place. Indeed, the title story itself is a remarkable work, including a disturbing and utterly disgusting curse picked up by anyone foolish enough to venture into Cthulhu’s house on R’lyeh, complete with a singularly nasty climax.
One of the things that struck me about these tales is how good Lumley is at depicting interesting and credible sorcerers. The first story, The Sorcerer’s Book is a wonderful tale of a battle for supremacy between a group of them, and, as with many of these stories, has a suitably fitting twist at the end.
How Kank Thad Returned to Bhur-Esh, by contrast has as its main protagonist an exceptionally vicious barbarian. Kank Thad is no Conan. Though strong and violent, he takes unrepentant pleasure in killing his opponents. Which is why, when he is finally apprehended, tried and sentenced, it’s to climb the Ghost Cliffs of Shildakor. All but vertical and mountainously tall, no one has ever succeeded in reaching the summit and freedom before falling to their deaths. But Kank Thad is confident he can manage what no one else could, for “back home as a youth he had used to climb the sea-cliffs for gull eggs with the best of them…” So skilled is he at climbing, even partway up he manages to exact his revenge on some of those who sentenced him, until he finally discovers the cliffs didn’t receive their name without reason… There are more supernatural menaces in Tharquest and the Lamia Orbiquita, a tale that gets continually darker, while Mylakhrion the Immortal is another yarn of sorcerous treachery, brief but enjoyable in its twists and turns.
Tarra Khash is a regular character in a number of Lumley’s stories, a “bronze-skinned” barbarian “in leather breach-clout and sandals with jewelled ceremonial sword in its long curved sheath strapped to his broad, well-muscled back”. Two volumes of Tarra Khash tales were published by W. Paul Ganley - The Compleat Khash: Volume 1 Never a Backwards Glance and The Compleat Khash: Volume 2 Sorcery in Shad, both illustrated by Jim Pitts.
In Isles of the Suhm-Yi Khash sets sail to a stretch of islands in pursuit of a gang of vicious pirates who have wronged him. This coincides with the annihilation of the Suhm-yi, a strange race of Moon worshippers, by a random cloud of deadly gas. By chance a couple of them survive – though they are fated to be captured by the pirates looking for a hidden treasure whose whereabouts they are convinced the couple know. Combine this with a slumbering god, Gleeth the Blind, and this is quite some tale!
Lords of the Morass is a grisly story of two prospectors who discover the source of a vast hoard of gold. But the people who have access to it worship a monstrous sluglike “gods” that live in the swamp within which the gold can be found. These are possibly the most obnoxious creatures to be found in this book. Despite the horror of these things, though, our prospectors are determined to make themselves rich.
The barbarian Tarra Khash returns in Curse of the Golden Guardians. All but dead after crossing the Nameless Desert he chances across a mysterious old man cooking his breakfast by a large lake in a hollow. Though the two seem destined to become friends, there is something not right about the old man’s explanation of why he is here, nor why he so generously offers Tarra Khash to become his partner in stealing a golden idol. Tarra Khash suspects there is more to the stranger than meets the eye.
Cryptically Yours is in the format of a series of letters between two sorcerers worried about the inexplicable deaths of so many of their confrere. As the letters progress some significant changes take place between them with some typically Lumleyish twists and turns.
The penultimate tale, The Wine of the Wizard starts off in the “present” day. Theired Gustau has concocted a special wine to a recipe found in an ancient manuscript. Unbeknown to him, his nephew, Erik, decides to taste some of it and is immediately overcome by what he thinks is a hallucination – until he realises his mind has been sent back into the body of a young man on the long-lost continent of Theem’hdra where he becomes fascinated in sharing this other person’s life.
The final tale is The Sorcerer’s Dream – which is ultimately a nightmare about the sorcerer Teh Atht, concerned about the alleged immortality of Cthulhu.
All in all, The House of Cthulhuis an entertaining mix of sword and sorcery, outright sorcery and Lumley’s brand of Mythos fiction, tied together in the same primordial setting. Jim Pitts’s illustrations, some of them full page, augment them brilliantly.
June 25, 2022
Lovecraftiana Omnibus edition 2020-2021
Lovecraftiana magazine is publishing an omnibus edition of its four issues from 2020 to 2021 in hard cover, paperback and kindle e-book.I am delighted that this will include three of my Lovecraftian stories: Lurkers, The Shadow by the Altar and Boat Trip.
June 14, 2022
Savage Realms Monthly May 2022
My copy of
Savage Realms Monthly
for May 2022, with my story The Carpetmaker of Arana, arrived in the post today.
Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 4 now published as a paperback and kindle e-book
I am pleased to announce that the latest volume in our popular Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy series is now available as a paperback and kindle e-book. with even more stories and more pages than before.Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 4 contains eleven tales:
In the Iron Woods by Dev Agarwal
My People Were Fair and Wore Stars in Their Hair by Andrew Darlington
At Sea by Geoff Hart
The Flesh of Man by Frank Sawielijew
City at the Mouth of Chaos by Adrian Cole
In the Belly of the Beast by Edward Ahern
The Tracks of the Pi Nereske by Wendy Nikel
Slaves of the Monolith by Paul D. Batteiger
The Green Wood by David Dubrow
Demonic by Phil Emery
The Whips of Malmac by H. R. Laurence
Here are a few pages from the book, including the Introduction:
June 9, 2022
My story The Carpetmaker of Arana has just been published in Savage Realms Monthly #12
I am very pleased that my fantasy tale The Carpetmaker of Arana has just been published in
Savage Realms Monthly #12
, which is available as a paperback and a kindle e-book. This is my second fantasy tale to be published this year. The Storyteller of Koss appeared in Summer of Sci-fi & Fantasy in May.
May 28, 2022
ChillerCon May 27th 2022
Jim Pitts and I had a great time yesterday attending Chillercon at the Royal Hotel in Scarborough, where we met up with some old and new friends.
Trevor Kennedy held a launch and mass signing for the latest Phantasmagoria Special devoted to Brian Lumley.
Jim Pitts, Steve Dilks and David A. Riley
May 24, 2022
Still on a roll: another fantasy story completed
I am pleased to find I am on something like a roll at the moment, having just completed yet another swords and sorcery story, this one entitled Welgar the Cursed, which involves my recurring hero Welgar, who appears in Ossani the Healer and the Beautiful Homunculus and The Dark Priestdom. There is also a brief appearance at the beginning of Nadrine, the Storyteller of Koss.
"It is almost impossible for a man whose face and body have the horrifying aspect of something that belongs inside a tomb to be regarded as a hero."
May 18, 2022
My fantasy story The Carpetmaker of Arana has just been accepted for the next issue of Savage Realms Monthly
I am delighted to announce that I just heard back from Savage Realms Monthly and my fantasy story The Carpetmaker of Arana has been accepted for the next issue.
More details soon.
May 17, 2022
My copy of Summer of Sci-fi & Fantasy arrived today
My copy of Summer of Sci-fi & Fantasy arrived today, which includes my swords and sorcery fantasy tale The Storyteller of Koss.
Another Swords and Sorcery story finished: The Dark Priestdom
I seem to be on a bit of a roll with new stories at the moment. I have just completed and proofread a 10,200 word swords and sorcery story called The Dark Priestdom, which as two of its main characters has protagonists I have previously used but never in the same story before.
My swords and sorcery stories so far are:
Baal the Necromancer (published in 2021 in Mythic #17)
The God in the Keep (published in 2021 in Swords and Sorcery Magazine #118)
A Grim God's Revenge (published in 2017 in Mythic #4)
Ossani the Healer and the Beautiful Homunculus
Creatures of the Black Tunnel
The Storyteller of Koss (published in 2022 in Summer of Sci-Fi and Fantasy)
The Carpetmaker of Arana
The Dark Priestdom
