High Seas Cthulhu: Swashbuckling Adventure Meets the Mythos

by William Jones (Editor), Lee Clark Zumpe (Contributor)

Set during a time when tall ships roamed the oceans and creatures lurked in the dark depths, this collection of tales ranges from the reign of pirates to the Age of Napoleon to the present.

Genres: Horror, Anthologies, Cthulhu Mythos, Lovecraftian, Short Stories, Fantasy

336 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2007

About the author

William Jones has received Bram Stoker Award nominations, International Horror Guild Award and Origins Award nominations for his works. He is the editor of several anthologies, including The Anthology of Dark Wisdom: The Best of Dark Fiction, Frontier Cthulhu: Ancient Horrors in the New World, High Seas Cthulhu, and the Horrors Beyond Series. His book, The Strange Cases of Rudolph Pearson was selected by Editor Ellen Datlow as a "seminal" work for readers of Lovecraftian horror. He has also written a number of role-playing game supplements, and his writings have been translated into several languages. He was worked as an engineer and a professor of English literature. He writes full time now, and lives in Michigan.

--from the author's website

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Reviews

[Christopher Sutch · Rating 3 out of 5]

Of the later Cthulhu Mythos anthologies (third generation? fourth?), this is by far the best. The number of incompetent amateur authors is kept at a minimum, the style and quality of the works are pretty consistent throughout, and there are some truly good (and one great) Mythos stories. Highlights include the stories by professional writers Alan Dean Foster and John Shirley; John Shire's "The Tip of the Iceberg;" Stephen Mark Rainey's "Signals;" and "Ice" by Heather Hatch. The one outstanding contribution is "The Stars, in Their Dreaming" by Gerard Houarner, an instant classic in the Lovecraftian Mythos. Still, for my money, Lovecraft's immediate contemporaries and the next generation of writers taking their cue from the master are the best writers of this sort of fiction.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some great Mythos tales in this book. But, at times it misses the mark. And some of the stories miss the mark in a big way. Meaning, some of them hit the right mark...on the completely wrong target.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent anthology of ocean-going Lovecraftiana!

[Brandon Watkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid collection. More hits than misses.

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a fairly interesting mix of stories here, some quite good, and a few that really didn't work for me. The latter are mostly those that ignore what are, to me, fairly important aspects of Mythos stories. Two major examples of this are Passage to Oblivion and The Star of Istanbul. The former introduces a vaguely explained semi-immortal group working for the good of humanity, which felt far too inconsistent with the idea of humanity's general insignificance and lack of hope in the Mythos. The latter story is told in part from the point of view of a Deep One and gets far too close to giving Cthulhu understandable goals, along with including a technological artifact that is too understood by the humans involved.

On the other hand, there were some excellent stories here. Some of the best include Signals and Ice, which deal with things that are terrifying and mysterious and most importantly, never properly explained or identified. It's fun to read stories with recognizable aspects of the Cthulhu Mythos, but it's also nice to have stuff that surprises you just as the original stories were meant to. Dark Blue and High Seas are excellent stories dealing with the Deep Ones, and a number of good tales involve deadly encounters with a single Shoggoth. I had expected to largely encounter Age of Sail stories here, due to the title and cover, but there's actually a fair variety of stuff dealing with the modern day as well as sailing ships and pirates. All in all, I generally enjoyed these stories a fair bit, and there were at least one or two that were genuinely disturbing and scary. I'll have to look for more stuff by this publisher at some point.

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

For lovers of HP Lovecraft and the tales of mythos I would definitely recommend this book. A collection of 20 stories all from different authors including well-known authors such as Alan Dean Foster and John Shirley to relative unknowns, who going on their contributions to this book will not be in that category for long. All the stories are set in, around and under large bodies of water and vary from historical pirate tales to modern day explorers. Each one captures the essence of HP Lovecraft's writing, but each author still manages to put their own spin on the tale. I found all the stories enjoyable but a couple stand out for me. 'The Star of Istanbul' is an interesting take on the mythos with the story being written, mainly, from the point of view of a Deep One. 'Clown Fish' by Matthew Baugh tells the tale of what happens when a crew of a ship take on board a woman, a survivor from a wreck with devastating consequence. All in all a very enjoyable collection of stories put together by William Jones who puts his own spin on a modern tale of underwater archaeological finds, research stations and creatures from the deep.


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[Brett · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a blast, a different take on the Cthulhu Mythos, but somewhat appropriate. I'll have to post more of an actual review when finished reading.