The Book of Cthulhu

Tales Inspired by H. P. Lovecraft

The Cthulhu Mythos is one of the 20th century's most singularly recognizable literary creations. Initially created by H. P. Lovecraft and a group of his amorphous contemporaries (the so-called "Lovecraft Circle"), The Cthulhu Mythos story cycle has taken on a convoluted, cyclopean life of its own. Some of the most prodigious writers of the 20th century, and some of the most astounding writers of the 21st century have planted their seeds in this fertile soil. The Book of Cthulhu harvests the weirdest and most corpulent crop of these modern mythos tales. From weird fiction masters to enigmatic rising stars, The Book of Cthulhu demonstrates how mythos fiction has been a major cultural meme throughout the 20th century, and how this type of story is still salient, and terribly powerful today.

©2011 Ross E. Lockhart (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Lots of Monster Fun

Incredible anthology of short (and somewhat longer) stories that mostly are great listens, some really make your skin crawl

a mix of good ones and bad ones

some are really good, some are bad, and others are terrible. overall not bad though.

Not for Everyone

Fans of Lovecraft will be for the most part pleased. Expect canon typical gore/ violence/sanity bending/sexism and racism. The last two, for those familiar with the original stories, are actually very mild and underplayed.

The performances were Good to Excellent with only one chapter being ultimately unsatisfactory ( it dragged. I skipped it).

Heavy rotation

Long time HPL reader, I bought this book as an attempt at a distraction from my day to day life. What I discovered has blown me away like I never suspected. These stories are as true to the mythos as any others I'd ever read, or even derivative works within the "universe". The difference, for me, is that several of these stories are of such high quality that I rank them among the best I've ever read and a few are 'insta-classic' with me. And so I believe that one thing that sets this compilation apart (out of many), is the level of professional effort brought to the writing and editing of this volume. Which is something I have frequently found absent with so many other works along the same skein. Here, within this audiobook, the authors rarely seemed compelled to force HPL's works or materials into the body of their stories. They pretty much came off as a natural evolution and expansion of the existing infrastructure. Or untold tales in some cases. So I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in HPL but also good storytelling and strong narrative.

great mix

Great mix of stories for someone trying to get a feel for the Cthulu mythos.