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Titan Books are re-releasing this series of books, originally from 1994 by Fedogan and Bremer. The first,Shadows over Innsmouth, would make a terrific Halloween read, if you were looking for something this year.

The book starts big. After an introduction by Stephen, we’re off and running with the inspiration for this collection, one of HP Lovecraft’s longest tales (about 64 000 words), The Shadow over Innsmouth. If you haven’t read it before, it’s an impressive read, showing all the strengths (and weaknesses) of Lovecraft’s writing.

At times it can be a little overwrought, a little repetitive and over-dramatic, and yet, with its details of creepy Innsmouth, New England, its weird religions and slimy otherworldly inhabitants, its florid language and relentless sense of unease (not to mention the oft-derided tone of racism), it must be said that even after 75-plus years since its original publication, there’s no denying that the tale still has a certain power, even when there are places where it appears that ol� Howard Phillips has merely stumbled across his typewriter keys. The bar is set quite high.

It’s certainly no mean feat, but there’s a broad and rich collection of authors chosen to attempt the task, such as Ramsey Campbell, Neil Gaiman, Kim Newman, Brian Lumley, Basil Copper, Michael Marshall Smith and others.

You might think that a book with seventeen stories all about the same place in New England might be a little limiting. And it may be, although Lovecraft’s detailed setup means that even after 60-odd thousand words there’s a lot of places that the rest of these tales could then go, from the rich historical background of the town and surrounding New England area to the present day weariness that seems to be part of the culture, the undoubtedly creepy back-story of Innsmouth’s inhabitants and their attempts to keep strangers out or alternatively catch unwary visitors.

Some of the tales here take the Cthulhu mythos further: to England (Brian Mooney’s The Tomb of Priscus Brian Lumley’s Dagon’s Bell and Michael Marshall Smith’s To See the Sea), to Ireland (Peter Tremayne’s Daoine Domhain), to Romania (Nicholas Royle’s The Homecoming) and even internationally, over the internet (David Langford’s Deepnet).

The story following Lovecraft’s tale must be a tough choice, because it must stand perhaps the closest comparison to the original.

Thankfully, Basil Copper’s lengthy story, Beyond the Reef, doesn’t let us down. It is a pleasantly surprising read, similar in tone to HPL’s tales and a great follow on to the original, but set twenty or so years later. I loved the strange goings on at Lovecraft’s mythical University, Miskatonic U. Sadly Basil died this year. I wish I had read more of his work before his death.

After that, the other fifteen tales go past in some speed, but no major loss of quality. Particularly liked were Kim Newman’s A Quarter to Three (mainly for its horribly bad pun at the end), Ramsey Campbell’s The Church in High Street and Dagon’s Bell by Brian Lumley. All of these writers are as good as I expected, with Campbell and Lumley being well known for their own versions of Lovecraft’s tales. Neil Gaiman’s Only the End of the World Again is an interesting tale combining Deep Ones and lycanthropy.

Of the lesser-known authors, Jack Yeovil’s* The Big Fish is an abrupt change of gear from many of the stories in the collection, written from the perspective of 1942 as a weary and cynical Chandler-esque story (with added Cthulhu). Not to be taken too seriously, and good fun to read. David Sutton’s Innsmouth Gold is also good, and a bit more serious, but leaves matters rather unresolved at the end. In Daoine Domhain Peter Tremayne broadens the Mythos by transporting most of the tale to Ireland to show the mythical origins of the Cthulhu story. Michael Marshall Smith’s To See the Sea tells of a Wicker Man-type event on the English coast, Peter Mooney’s The Tomb of Priscus gives the Cthulhu background a historical and archaeological feel, Brian Stableford’s The Innsmouth Heritage a scientific dimension.

Not all are quite as good, though none are really bad. Guy N Smith’s Return to Innsmouth does well to recap the original Lovecraft story before giving it its own minor twist. If I had not read the original one hundred pages or so previously, I think I would have enjoyed this one more, but in the end my abiding impression was that it mainly summarised Lovecraft’s original tale. DF Lewis’s tale (Down to the Boots) was rather short and thus left little impression.

Nevertheless, the writing on the whole in this collection is pretty strong. There’s enough here to keep the reader happy with more ‘hits� than ‘misses� overall. What I also liked was that this is also a collection that pays attention to the extra little details, clearly ‘a book� rather than an e-book product. The book is profusely illustrated throughout by some admirably ghoulish Cthulhulian drawings from artists Dave Carson, Martin McKenna and Jim Pitts, to whom the book is dedicated. These set off the text grandly.

Finally, to round the collection off, there’s some biographical notes in the Afterword about each of the contributors, updated from the 1994 version. Jack Yeovil’s (aka Kim Newman) biography is quite an imaginative entertainment in itself.

So: fancy giving Lovecraft a try but never got round to it? Or how about having read Lovecraft but wanting to read more contemporary writers� varied takes on the Lovecraft canon? This book caters to you both. It’s a terrific collection, and worthy of Halloween reading. (Had I not read it already�!)

Well done to Titan for re-releasing this one.

There’s a companion volume, Weird Shadows over Innsmouth, which I’m now going to track down, also due October.
Iä-R’lyeh! Cthulhu fhtagn! Iä! Iä!