Necronomicon

By: H. P. Lovecraft

Narrated by: Richard Powers, Bronson Pinchot, Stephen R. Thorne, Keith Szarabajka, Adam Verner, Tom Weiner, Patrick Cullen

Length: 21 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

The only audio edition of Necronomicon authorized by the H. P. Lovecraft Estate

Originally written for the pulp magazines of the 1920s and ’30s, H. P. Lovecraft’s astonishing tales blend elements of horror, science fiction, and cosmic terror that are as powerful today as they were when first published. This tome brings together all of Lovecraft’s harrowing stories, including the complete Cthulhu Mythos cycle, just the way they were when first released. It will introduce a whole new generation of readers to Lovecraft’s fiction, as well as attract those fans who want all his work in a single, definitive volume.

Stories include:

“Dagon”
“Herbert West – Reanimator”
“The Lurking Fear”
“The Rats in the Walls”
“The Whisperer in the Darkness”
“Cool Air”
“In the Vault”
“The Call of Cthulu”
“The Color Out of Space”
“The Horror at Red Hook”
“The Music of Erich Zann”
“The Shadow Out of Time”
“The Dunwich Horror”
“The Haunter of the Dark”
“The Outsider”
“The Shunned House”
“The Unnameable”
“The Thing on the Doorstep”
“Under the Pyramids”

©2014 H. P. Lovecraft (P)2014 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Dim the lights, listen closely, feel the fear

I have been putting this off for ages now, but I am glad I finally got to listen. This is a collection of H. P. Lovecraft's greatest tales, and relentlessly barrages you with fear of the unknown, taking you beyond sanity, logic, humanity and the thin veil of our mundane lives into the infinite terror of the beyond.

I listened to parts of this book past midnight. I recommend you do the same. If you do, keep the shades open and the windows closed. Who knows when your mind will start playing tricks on you.

found it boring

I guess this just wasn't for me. expected horror got vague unexplained weirdness. most stories were essentially "I'm a smart guy. the following events are true. village idiots are the only ones who believe. unexplainable things that I will make no attempt to describe happened for 1-60 minutes. My friend died. trust me I'm scared" I listened all the way through but I struggled. Good narrators though.

Oldschool cosmic horror at its finest!

I loved the variety of performers! You can never get bored with a single narrator when each short story brings on a new one! I have seen many adaptations of HP Lovecraft source material (Re-Animator, From Beyond, Dagon, and even the venerable Dunwich Horror) and its very interesting to see the changes that were made from the original stories (that are roughly a century old at this point). Of course the age of the stories adds a bit of a complication for modern audiences. Let me address the elephant in the room. The N word. In one of the stories (Rats in the Walls) the protagonist has a cat named "N****r man". I am glad they left the text unaltered, because as a snapshot of a particular time it gives one a unvarnished view of the era in which the piece was written. Its a piece of history. It is what it is. Also kudos to the narrator of that story who when reading the name chose to not place emphasis on the first or last part of the name, but simply said it evenly as if one were saying Superman or Spider-man. It made it sound more ludicrous than offensive (which is probably the best you're going to do with that particular turn of phrase). And though there was nothing too scary by the standards of modern horror, it was still fascinating to see the roots of many modern horror tropes expressed in these tales.

Hard To Stay With

Is there anything you would change about this book?

The subject.

What do you think your next listen will be?

I like science fiction but not this kind.

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

no

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

no

Any additional comments?

Well written but subject is not my cup of tea.

A 'Best of' for Lovecraft

Two warnings need to be given:
1) The title is misleading. Only a few of these stories even mention the Necronomicon.
2) This is a 'Best of Lovecraft' collection. It is not complete by any means, not even a complete set of Necronomicon mythos stories.

Having given those two warnings, this is a very good collection of Lovecraft's best work, read by a number of very good readers. Myself, I appreciate his work and concepts, but don't always enjoy his actual stories. Even so, I did enjoy pretty much this entire collection.

If, somehow, you are entirely unfamiliar with H. P. Lovecraft, a short description is that, in the first half of the 20th century, Lovecraft wrote stories about mankind's encounters with things that are beyond his comprehension (and how it almost never ends happily for humans in such meetings).

Superb!

I wish it contained the entire Cthulhu Mythos but I still enjoyed these works of cyclopian horror none the less.

love it

I absolutely loved this and have listened to it twice now. All the narrators are amazing, all the stories phenomenal, all of is just glorious.

Love the narration

A vast amount of short stories impressively narrated by a great team of actors. I fully recommend this to those who enjoy short horror stories and cosmic horror.

A great collection of stories but....

What did you love best about Necronomicon?

These are classic tales that have influenced many horror, science-fiction, and fantasy writers. I am a big fan of Stephen King who often alludes to Lovecraft. If Stephen King likes an author then you should probably give him/her a read.

Who was your favorite character and why?

I found a lot of the characters to be somewhat flat and in a lot of ways interchangeable. They may have had different backgrounds but in many ways they all seemed the same.

What does the narrators bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

As mentioned in other reviews, many of the stories are in the first person. The narrators paced the story well and helped make each story quite immersive.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

I really liked the ending of "The Whisperer in the Darkness". Yes, a modern reader wouldn't have been surprised by it at all and found it predictable but I can only imagine how a reader in 1931 would have reacted.

Any additional comments?

As many others have pointed out, the chapter breakdowns are numerical. That's where the "But" comes from in the title of this review. I am not sure if there is a way of updating this so that the chapters at least show the names of their associated stories. I often find with anthologies that I come back to certain stories and it would be great if I could just queue up the story that I want.

This book consumed my first Audible credit and it was great to have a compilation like this to listen to while recovering from eye surgery. (It sucks loving books and not being able to see!)

It would be nice to be able to compare to other similar compilations (i.e. ones with named chapters rather than numbered) but I think I would still recommend it.

Dreadfully Well Done

Where to start with such an iconic literary piece? That is, in and of itself, part of what drives the fascination with the world that Lovecraft has peeled back for us in this title. While listening, we are taken to a point near the end of the tale to have a glimpse of the end, before tracing back to the beginning and following the events as they play out. And while the mystery of what happens to the narrator is never left to question, the driving interest is in to what horrid fate awaits those who ask questions of ancient and malign powers that surround the world of the occult.

The performers themselves lend incredible depth to the rendition of the stories, though some performing well above the quality of others. As a listener, I find a slight shame that I am not easily able to tell who read which piece, though I'm certain a quick internet search could possibly unveil that. Particularly, the reader of "The Rats in the Wall" struck me as exceedingly compelling in his rendition.

There are times when, unfortunately, the story tends towards predictable and dry. Especially for the longer pieces, when I was able to predict what plot twists were likely to occur, only to have to wait 2 chapters to confirm what I already knew. This is probably an issue of my own doing, however: I was quite familiar with the lore of Lovecraft before listening to this collection, so I was already apprised of what was likely to transpire.

In the end, though, I consider this to be a great listen. Well performed, well written, and a great read I'm sure (only downside to listening to an audio book is not being able to get intimate with the specific words and phrases used).