Final Thoughts

[Beth]

Please share your thoughts here after finishing At the Mountains of Madness.

[Sandra]

Although I didn't think this particular book was the greatest, I too, came to appreciate Lovecraft and the precise and scientific descriptions he tended to use in his writing. I am interested in the whole "Cthulhu Mythos" and have already recently read The Call of Cthulhu. I'm kind of confused about the whole Mythos thing maybe someone here can enlighten me. I'm not sure of the titles of the stories that contain the Mythos stories. i take it, he wrote multiple stories about the ELder ones? I had a great book called Necronomicon from the library that supposedly had all Lovecrafts short stories but alas it was due back and I couldn't renew as someone else had a "hold" on it. Someone in this group, perhaps? LOL.

[Monica]

Here's what I thought:
I am torn on my reception of this story. Part of me really liked it while the other part was nearly bored to tears. The story started out strong; it was suspenseful and terrifying. I had really high hopes for a solid story up to the point when the narrator and his friend go underground. I appreciate and greatly admire Lovecraft's creation and the great detail he put into it, but his pages-long descriptions of the rock formations (only appropriate since the narrator is a geologist) quickly lost me as a casual reader. Nonetheless, the idea behind the story is thought-provoking and the monsters really are the stuff of nightmares.

[Beth]

Monica wrote: "Here's what I thought:
I am torn on my reception of this story. Part of me really liked it while the other part was nearly bored to tears. The story started out strong; it was suspenseful and terri..."

Monica, I am right there with you. My thoughts exactly.

[Robin]

I was glad to see this as an October pick. Tentacled monstrosities seem just perfect for the season. I enjoyed the beginning, the set-up and narrative voice were spot-on. Although I did get exasperated at the relentless ladling on of descriptive gloom - " grotesque penguins" I ask you!?! About halfway through I began skimming and was content to make do with the gist of the subsequent narrative. Ultimately I enjoyed Lovecraft's brilliant imagination, his monstrous esthetics, but I did not have the stamina to stick with the tedium of the story. It is good to have dipped into the original classic, but it leaves me hungry for a talented re-telling to feed my modern taste with more whizz bang! Any suggestions for a good read along those lines?

[Colleen]

@Robin, I totally get what you're saying about the book. I finished to finish, but not sure it added much to my read list excerpt that it's now checked off. Unfortunately, I don't have any suggestions for you, but hopefully others will so I can add on to my tbr list!

[Beth]

Robin, My husband is more familiar with Lovecraft inspired stories than I am so I asked for suggestions. He recommended a series of books entitled The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross. Another idea is Declare by Tim Powers. And not knowing your threshold for lurid details, you might enjoy some of Clive Barker's stories. He definitely has been inspired by Lovecraft however some might find his style a bit gratuitous. Let us know what you find!

[Jessica]

This was my first Lovecraft experience and I enjoyed it. The imagery and nightmare world he created is really intriguing.

[[deleted user]]

There is a clever passage from The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt that references Lovecraft. After the awful bombing disaster, the protagonist goes to live with a Manhattan family, whose son he was "best friends" with earlier in life. He describes the friend like this:

"Andy had never been overly talkative, even in childhood, except in occasional pressured bursts (much of our friendship had consisted of wordlessly passing comic books back and forth). Years of harassment at school had rendered him even more close-tongued and uncommunicative - less apt to employ Lovecraftian vocabulary words, more prone to entomb himself in advanced-placement math and science...."

Given the challenge of immersing myself into Lovecraft's world ... trying to accept it on his own terms, and then reaping the benefits of the experience - this passage had additional significance for me. :-)

[Colleen]

I love when that happens - those connections.

[[deleted user]]

Colleen wrote: "I love when that happens - those connections."

I do, too! It's like finding that somebody has bought your jacket that you donated to a thrift shop, and is getting good mileage out of it. :-)