H.P. Lovecraft, The Complete Omnibus Collection, Volume II: 1927-1935

by H.P. Lovecraft, Finn J.D. John

This is Volume Two of a two-volume omnibus set comprising the complete fictional works of Howard Phillips Lovcecraft. Every story written for publication under his own name is included in this set, from 1917 through 1935. (Poems, ghost-written material and stories written in collaboration with other writers are not included.)

Highlights of this volume •    The Color out of Space•    The Case of Charles Dexter Ward•    The Dunwitch Horror•    The Whisperer in Darkness•    At the Mountains of Madness•    The Shadow over Innsmouth•    The Dreams in the Witch House•    The Thing on the Doorstep•    The Shadow out of Time•    The Haunter of the Dark

Genres: Horror, Audiobook, Fiction, Classics, Science Fiction

610 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 2, 2016

About the author

Howard Phillips Lovecraft, of Providence, Rhode Island, was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction.

Lovecraft's major inspiration and invention was cosmic horror: life is incomprehensible to human minds and the universe is fundamentally alien. Those who genuinely reason, like his protagonists, gamble with sanity. Lovecraft has developed a cult following for his Cthulhu Mythos, a series of loosely interconnected fictions featuring a pantheon of human-nullifying entities, as well as the Necronomicon, a fictional grimoire of magical rites and forbidden lore. His works were deeply pessimistic and cynical, challenging the values of the Enlightenment, Romanticism and Christianity. Lovecraft's protagonists usually achieve the mirror-opposite of traditional gnosis and mysticism by momentarily glimpsing the horror of ultimate reality.

Although Lovecraft's readership was limited during his life, his reputation has grown over the decades. He is now commonly regarded as one of the most influential horror writers of the 20th Century, exerting widespread and indirect influence, and frequently compared to Edgar Allan Poe.
See also Howard Phillips Lovecraft.

— Wikipedia

Reviews

[Fred Nanson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had read a few stories from Lovecraft a long time ago and didn’t like them very much. I tried again earlier this year with At the Mountains of Madness and I absolutely loved it.

So when I found this well edited audiobook of all the stories from the Cthulhu Mythos, I didn’t hesitate despite the 35 hours of listening time.

In the end even though I found a lot of the texts quite dated or not to my liking (the poetry in particular) the whole œuvre with its complex mythology is simply incredible.

Also the narration by Finn J.D. John is excellent with a good variety of voices and an impressive capacity to pronounce the Old Gods names and languages.

Now I can reread Providence by Alan Moore with probably a better understanding of all the references.

List of all the stories in this volume with my rating:
Cool Air - 7/10
The Call of Cthulhu - 8/10
Pickman’s Model - 7/10
The Strange High House in the Mist - 4/10
The Silver Key - 6/10
The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath - 7/10 (good but waaay too long)
The Case of Charles Dexter Ward - 7/10 (again great ideas but way too many details)
The Colour out of Space - 7/10
The Descendant - incomplete so not rated
The Very Old Folk - 5/10
Ibid - 6/10
The Dunwich Horror - 7/10
The Outpost - poetry goes over my head
The Ancient Track - same
Fungi from Yuggoth - same
The Whisperer in Darkness - 7/10
At the Mountains of Madness - 9/10
The Shadow over Innsmouth - 7/10
The Dreams in the Witch House - 5/10
The Thing on the Doorstep - 6/10
The Wicked Clergyman - incomplete so not rated
The Book - same
The Shadow out of Time - 7/10
The Haunter of the Dark - 7/10
To Clark Ashton Smith, Esq., upon His Phantastick Tales, Verses, Pictures, and Sculptures - poetry

[Gary K Bibliophile · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading this on and off for four years I’m finally finished. 😀 ( I started before I was a GR member even). I’ve been chipping away at it mixing in a story here and there between other books. As a collection of many stories some were really good and some not so good… I almost gave up after The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath - haha. Many stories I had to cringe at Lovecraft’s not so hidden racism… very disturbing- but not totally surprising as many of the stories are 100 years old. I will try to put together a proper review as best I can a bit later - with notes on the more memorable stories.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of HP Lovecraft's greatest work collected in this second of two volumes. During his later years his writing became much better. Although he still used way too much narrative at the expense of dialog and has a penchant for run on sentences that could easily be a paragraph in their own right the stories are uniquely Lovecraftian in their origins. Highly recommend the read if you enjoy weird tales, psycho thrillers or early year scifi.

[Ryan Ross · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love being able to read a story or two from this book for a change in pace and then put it down for a while and not worry too much about forgetting what is happening. Not all the stories are equally compelling but they all serve to build the mythos of the Old Ones and our insignificance by comparison.
The more I read, the more I learned about the mythos behind all the stories and how they connect together. I found it to be really engaging the more I immersed myself in his stories.

[Brent · Rating 5 out of 5]

While volume one has some great stories in it the bulk of Mr. Lovcraft's best stories are in this volume.

Great annotations and commentary as well.

[Jordan Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you only read one collection of Lovecraft's work, this is a pretty good one to choose! I found the narrator (the author/editor Finn) to lull me into zoning out a lot, unfortunately, but these stories are all fantastic. As with the first book, there's also a ton of biographical information to help contextualize the stories within Lovecraft's life. Although it's hard to pick a favorite story, these are all way up there: Cool Air, The Mountains of Madness, The Strange High House in the Mists (LOVE Nodens!), The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath (LOVE cats!), The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Dunwich Horror, The Shadow Out of Time, and the Whisperer in the Darkness. I find The Whiperer in the Darkness, The Mountains of Madness, Cool Air, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, and The Shadow Out of Time to have an especially fun vibe that reminded me of being a teenager and discovering older sci-fi writers like Poul Anderson for the first time. Not that they're sci-fi, exactly, but they along with some others not in this volume like The Electric Executioner definitely pull in some very plausible sci-fi elements. On second thought, I think the powder gun in The Dunwich Horror and the half-fish race in The Shadow Over Innsmouth ping vaguely sci-fi to me too, even though all of the stories in the book are thematically cosmic horror for sure (the way Star Wars is thematically fantasy despite being set in a sci-fi setting).

At any rate, this was my first collection of Lovecraft's work I attempted to read, and the stories were all fantastic. I'm planning on re-reading several of them!

[Carlos · Rating 4 out of 5]

This half of the completed works was more in line with what I was looking for from Lovecraft’s completed works. Either by design or coincidence most of the tales that allude to a larger Lovecraftian mythos are in here. The chronological order also helps nail down the relations between several of these stories as more than once the references come from the exact previous story. This allowed the curious reader to really get a feel for the scope of the mythos, the different beings constantly referred to as well as nailing down the relationship between the beings themselves. All of this led to me to enjoy this half much more than the first. It also allowed me to understand better some of the stories that I found confusing on a previous reading, such as “At the Mountains of Madness”. Definitely would recommend it to all the Lovecraft fans that are driven half-crazy by trying to collate dozens of short stories into a shared fictional universe.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the anthologist says himself, this is THE volume in this collection to check out if you haven't read any Lovecraft before. All of the stories and novellas related to the Cthulhu Mythos are here along with other masterpieces. As much as I've read Lovecraft before, I found it more obvious than ever on this time through the stories just how MUCH influence he has on modern horror in these stories. In particular, it's hard to imagine most of Stephen King without Lovecraft's ideas: the idea of indifferent cosmic malignant beings that our brains can't even comprehend which result in insanity or death after encounters, the idea of a place itself being hostile without needing traditional ghosts, and of course the New England setting.

[Curtis Ghoul · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's widely known at this point that H.P. Lovecraft was deeply troubled and much of his writing is steeped in his own problematic fears of people from other races. Nonetheless, the reach of influence from his creative work is stunning and powerful. This complete omnibus is truly impressive, and does not skirt around Lovecraft's flaws. I love many of the stories (though a couple of them are just too prejudiced to be enjoyable), and the asides about what was going on in the author's life at the time of writing them are fascinating.

[Warren Hall · Rating 5 out of 5]

This volume contains most of his best and well known works.

The pieces are also much longer than previous volume in this series.

Can't say much that hasn't already been said about H.P's work, other than to say that his style of writing and subject matter is out of this world.

It is as gripping and terrifying as it has always been.

A must ready for any horror or cosmic horror fans.

[Joel · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great way to experience Lovecraft's work. Having everything annotated and organised chronologically provides insights beyond what are, for the most part, excellent weird tales. The free ebook that comes with this audiobook edition is a great inclusion, too.

[R.K. King · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like the first omnibus of the collection of HP Lovecraft, I enjoyed this second omnibus quite a lot. I appreciate the production's effort in organizing the works by year, which gives the listener a chapter-style look into Lovecraft's career and works, plus offering little snippets of his life at the time of each. My favourites, At The Mountains Of Madness and Shadow Over Innsmouth, are both in this collection which I thoroughly enjoyed. I highly recommend for any fans of Lovecraft and/or the Cthulhu Mythos.

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[Rob · Rating 5 out of 5]

great annotations