Ravenous Dusk, by Cody Goodfellow

0970400012
Perilous Press, 2002
580 pp
trade paper ed.

"The world is insane, and there aren't enough bombs or bullets to fix it." 

Having just finished Radiant Dawn, I couldn't just stay hanging on that precipice of a cliffhanger -- there was just too much at stake to leave it for another time.  And whereas in Radiant Dawn I noted Goodfellow's few nods to Lovecraft,  here the Lovecraftian scene explodes -- in and around the government conspiracies, the clandestine organizations within other clandestine organizations, and  military action  (including a legendary, truly badass  group of soldiers called Spike Team Texas whose very name freaks the most hardened of regular army people), lie those who've been waiting "sleeping, since before the earth as men knew it came to be." For these beings, humans are of no consequence in the larger scheme of things; they're simply accidents of evolution and mutation who took over in the absence of the Old Ones.   Everything human beings have inscribed upon their world down through the millenia turns out to have been  illusory -- the truth is something so frightening it has led many who've glimpsed only shadows of it  to madness.  Here, in both Radiant Dawn and Ravenous Dusk, that madness takes several forms, but   Lovecraft would be so happy with Cody Goodfellow if he could only read these books.

As in Radiant Dawn, Ravenous Dusk continues the story of the three main characters, who have emerged transformed from events in Radiant Dawn -- Stella Orozco, FBI Special Agent Cundieffe, and Ezekiel Zane Storch.  This time around, however, the action is stepped up  -- the conspiracies multiply, all hell breaks loose all around the globe, the secret war escalates,  and the very future of humanity hangs in the balance, based on events chronicled by Lovecraft in his  At the Mountains of Madness.   The past eons have finally caught up to  our current world, and how the three characters fit in to all of the ensuing insanity is at the heart of this novel. 

Like its predecessor, Ravenous Dusk is a mix of sci-fi, horror, political conspiracy thriller, and military action; here it's all packed together in a Lovecraftian frame.   There are some awesome moments in this book -- for example,  in the installation at Mount Weather, Virginia, where Cundieffe reckons that

"some genius back in the Fifities must have reasoned that men, pushed to the brink of a nuclear exchange, would be kept from losing their heads at a critical reminder of all that was quaint and corny small-town America"

and where a group awaiting the worst makes plans to become the leader of the coming New World Order;  there's also a white-supremacy cult in the mountains of Idaho who new neighbors just happen to be the relocated and reinvented Radiant Dawn hospice center.  While much of the action in the story is way over the top, it's still so much fun that setting the book aside is impossible.   And considering what's going on in this book, the ending is a surprise,  but at the same time it totally fits.

Really, the only negative thing I have to say is that at some points the book is sometimes  overly wordy, depending on a lot of conversation or discoveries to fill in the multiple backstories of events and people in the novel.  I'd also say that it might be a good thing to have even some familiarity with Lovecraft's work; if nothing else, at least At the Mountains of Madness; if you run into a word like "shoggoth," for example, you'd at least be familiar with the term; otherwise, if you're not already a Lovecraft reader, you might be a bit lost.  But together, Radiant Dawn and Ravenous Dusk comprise something very different than the usual post-Lovecraft Mythos fare I've read, and Goodfellow's imagination has run crazy wild in a good way.   Personally, I don't get why people settle for the twee stuff like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies or Twilight when there are worlds upon worlds of coolness to be found in books like Goodfellow's; now I'm wondering who else I've missed that taps into this kind of bizarro but incredibly awesome wavelength.

*Black Wings of Cthulhu: Twenty-one Tales of Lovecraftian Horror, ed. S.T. Joshi

9780857687821
Titan Books, 2012
505 pp
(trade paper ed.)

“The one test of the really weird is simply this — whether or not there be excited in the reader a profound sense of dread, and of contact with unknown spheres and powers; a subtle attitude of awed listening, as if for the beating of black wings or the scratching of outside shapes and entities on the known universe’s utmost rim.” -- Howard Phillips Lovecraft

There is no doubt about it: HP Lovecraft's original Cthulhu story has captured the imaginations of readers and writers all over the world for decades.  There's an entire Cthulhu Mythos spawned from Lovecraft's bizarre imagination, and it has served as an influence on several modern authors, making its re-imagined way into several anthologies of eldritch tales.  Black Wings of Cthulhu  is such a collection, and while the stories are not limited to the dreaming god himself, he makes an appearance or two. For the most part, the cosmic horror Lovecraft was able to convey so well is maintained, as is his focus on the utter helplessness of human beings in the face of forces much larger than themselves. Another common thread throughout this book is that of humankind's inability to fully comprehend the immensity of the forces that lay hidden in unknown dimensions -- as one of Donald Burleson's characters notes in his contribution:

"It is possible for consciousness beyond the common grasp to reach across unthinkable gulfs of time and space and fasten upon the unwary dreamer."

The problem with reviewing an entire anthology is that each story is its own entity, and what may hold true for one entry doesn't necessarily equate throughout the entire book; reviewing individual stories is a lengthy process and would probably bore many readers out of their respective skulls.  There are a few entries that were more gory or graphic rather than cerebral; I prefer the latter and like to feel that creeping and "profound sense of dread" when I read horror rather than have it all spelled out for me by the author.

Some of the stories  in this book are by authors I've been following a long time:  Caitlin Kiernan, Donald Burleson, Joseph S. Pulver, Laird Barron, W.H. Pugmire, Ramsey Campbell, and Michael Cisco.  Many of these people have already shared their Lovecraft-inspired fiction in other anthologies or in their own books.  Once inside the collection, there are three entries inspired by HPL's own "Pickman's Model," which he wrote in the late 1920s; there are some which feature HPL as a character; a story by Philip Haldeman (whose book Shadow Coast gave me a good case of the willies)  that conjures up Bloch's Mysteries of the Worm, and even HPL's mom gets her own space in a story by Jason Van Hollander.  Locations change as well -- from New England to the American Southwest to the Isle of Wight  and other places.  Campbell "annotates" a collection of letters belonging to Lovecraft, where HPL is insultingly called "Pulpcraft," and members of the original Lovecraft circle are similarly blasted by a bizarre "fan."

Out of the entire collection, my  least favorite stories were  by Michael Cisco, entitled "Violence, Child of Trust," and "Lesser Demons," by Norman Partridge. While both held true to the whole "cosmic horror" ideal and were well written, they were just a bit too graphic for my personal taste -- hearts being ripped out, bodies being noisily eaten at a graveyard , for instance.  I also didn't care that much for Nicholas Royle's "Rotterdam," which just didn't do it for me.  As noted earlier, I tend toward more cerebral horror where what actually happens and why  is really left to the reader's imagination after the author constructs his or her story.

Although the Lovecraftian vision is at the heart of each story throughout this novel, you don't need to be a gung-ho Lovecraft fan to enjoy these stories -- if you're into the cosmically weird and horrifying, you'll get a lot out of these compelling tales as well. 

"Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn!"

The contents of the book are (with my favorites asterisked):

Caitlin Kiernan: “Pickman’s Other Model (1929)”  *

Donald R. Burleson: “Desert Dreams”

Joseph S. Pulver, Sr.: “Engravings”

Michael Shea: “Copping Squid”

Sam Gifford “Passing Spirits”

Laird Barron: “The Broadsword” *

William Browning Spencer: “Usurped”

David J. Schow: “Denker’s Book”

W.H. Pugmire: “Inhabitants of Wraithwood” *

Millie L. Burleson: “The Dome”

Nicholas Royle “Rotterdam”

Jonathan Thomas “Tempting Providence”

Darrell Schweitzer “Howling in the Dark”

Brian Stableford: “The Truth about Pickman” *

Philip Haldeman: “Tunnels” by Philip Haldeman *

Ramsey Campbell: “The Correspondence of Cameron Thaddeus Nash”

Michael Cisco: “Violence, Child of Trust”

Norman Partridge “Lesser Demons”

Adam Niswander: “An Eldritch Matter” by Adam Niswander

Michael Marshall Smith “Substitution”

Jason Van Hollander: “Susie”