Nethescurial

by Thomas Ligotti

Genres: Horror, Lovecraftian, Audiobook, Short Stories

Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 1991

About the author

Thomas Ligotti is a contemporary American horror author and reclusive literary cult figure. His writings, while unique in style, have been noted as major continuations of several literary genres—most prominently Lovecraftian horror—and have overall been described as works of "philosophical horror", often written as philosophical novels with a "darker" undertone which is similar to gothic fiction. The Washington Post called him "the best kept secret in contemporary horror fiction"; another critic declared "It's a skilled writer indeed who can suggest a horror so shocking that one is grateful it was kept offstage."

Reviews

[Tim Pendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nethescurial appears to be Ligotti's most obvious homage to Lovecraft almost to the point of pastiche in terms of structure and mood although it is clearly very much a Ligotti production.

It is as if Ligotti decided to see how he could take as many Lovecraftian tropes about ancient cultic lore and the dark occult, refine them to their basics and come up with a definitive layered narrative oozing unease rather than outright horror.

Ligotti is at his best not in trying to present something visceral, disgusting or terrible but in presenting something that unnerves us with the sense that the world is not as it seems - something closer to Sartre's 'nausea' than to most horror fare.

In this story he possibly over-reaches himself. The attempt to create unease through an adroit use of formulae that we recognise is skilled and will please those with a post-modern and ironic sensibility but it is perhaps all a little too clever and neatly structured.

There is unease here certainly but also a hysteria towards the end that implies a literary concoction rather than an honest attempt to create an emotion or a sense of things not being as they should. Highly skilled, always part of the Ligotti canon, but a story to be admired rather than loved.

[Per · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://www.ligotti.net/tlo/nethescuri...

[Cidolfus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Audio reading here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7B_Q...

Easier to read than some of Ligotti's other works. Brilliantly written, captures how POV characters in Lovecraft et al. start sane and lose their sanity by the end.

The audiobook linked above is amazing, especially the end.