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At the Mountains of Madness & Other Weird Tales
Multi-eyed protoplasmic entities, flesh-eating ghouls, animate corpses, time-traveling body snatchers, and, yes, huge albino penguins. These are some of the bizarre creatures that populate the universe created by American horror author H. P. Lovecraft. Lovecraft has influenced many of today’s most famous writers and artists, including master of contemporary horror fiction Stephen King, Academy Award-nominated director Guillermo Del Toro, and artist and Alien set-designer H. R. Giger.
This collection includes three selections from the Cthulhu Mythos: the novella At the Mountains of Madness, which is often considered Lovecraft’s masterpiece; “The Thing on the Doorstep”; and “The Shadow Out of Time.” While including all the chilling “cyclopean vistas,” monstrous abominations and appalling transformations that readers have come to expect from Lovecraft, this also showcases his fantasy writing in stories such as “The Cats of Ulthar,” “The Silver Key,” and notably The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.
This collection includes three selections from the Cthulhu Mythos: the novella At the Mountains of Madness, which is often considered Lovecraft’s masterpiece; “The Thing on the Doorstep”; and “The Shadow Out of Time.” While including all the chilling “cyclopean vistas,” monstrous abominations and appalling transformations that readers have come to expect from Lovecraft, this also showcases his fantasy writing in stories such as “The Cats of Ulthar,” “The Silver Key,” and notably The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.
336 pages, Paperback
Published July 17, 2009
28 people are currently reading
184 people want to read
About the author
H.P. Lovecraft
6,040 books19.2k followersHoward 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
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
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
April 5, 2020
This was my introduction to Lovecraft. I appreciated the selection of works here, in the order they were presented. I would recommend it if you're interested in reading his works and uncertain where to begin.
January 1, 2013
This book's saving grace was the last three stories (At the Mountains of Madness, The Thing on the Doorstep, The Shadow Out of Time). The fantasy portion was just, in a word, awful. The writing was so dense with his own made-up jargon that it was almost impossible to find any flow while reading it. The main character was so underdeveloped that his existence almost seemed incidental. This is the kind of fantasy writing I hate, because it feels like I'm reading a dry science textbook about a topic I find really boring.
In comparison, the last three stories were an example of decently-written horror. I was on the edge of my seat for parts of them, and I had a deep interest in the perils these characters faced. There wasn't as much jargon, and it was interesting to catch all the ways the disparate stories connected together. The writing was much, much better, at least in comparison to the first three stories. I rather liked At the Mountains of Madness. It was pretty tightly-written suspense. There were points where it got bogged down with description, which made the flow really awkward. Overall, not that bad. The second story, The Thing on the Doorstep, pretty much slapped me in the face with misogyny (Only a man is really human?!), and that made it pretty tedious. The third story, The Shadow Out of Time, was quite good. It wasn't quite as good with the suspense like At the Mountains of Madness, but it was obviously linked to that story, so it was building on already-established information for that universe in my mind.
I have to admit my surprise at finding that an author that is considered widely influential on most modern horror authors to be a pretty mediocre writer. He had a vivid imagination, but seems to have utterly failed at finding the correct phrasing to properly express it. The number of times I read a description of something where it was described as being (paraphrasing) "so shocking as to be indescribable" is practically obscene. It's not particularly accessible, and it's not particularly well-written. No wonder it kept being rejected by publishers.
2 stars because it took me a month and a half to get through the first 148 pages.
In comparison, the last three stories were an example of decently-written horror. I was on the edge of my seat for parts of them, and I had a deep interest in the perils these characters faced. There wasn't as much jargon, and it was interesting to catch all the ways the disparate stories connected together. The writing was much, much better, at least in comparison to the first three stories. I rather liked At the Mountains of Madness. It was pretty tightly-written suspense. There were points where it got bogged down with description, which made the flow really awkward. Overall, not that bad. The second story, The Thing on the Doorstep, pretty much slapped me in the face with misogyny (Only a man is really human?!), and that made it pretty tedious. The third story, The Shadow Out of Time, was quite good. It wasn't quite as good with the suspense like At the Mountains of Madness, but it was obviously linked to that story, so it was building on already-established information for that universe in my mind.
I have to admit my surprise at finding that an author that is considered widely influential on most modern horror authors to be a pretty mediocre writer. He had a vivid imagination, but seems to have utterly failed at finding the correct phrasing to properly express it. The number of times I read a description of something where it was described as being (paraphrasing) "so shocking as to be indescribable" is practically obscene. It's not particularly accessible, and it's not particularly well-written. No wonder it kept being rejected by publishers.
2 stars because it took me a month and a half to get through the first 148 pages.
May 11, 2017
I've now read two collections of Lovecraft, and I feel very accomplished. Overall I enjoyed most of the stories. Lovecraft definitely had a vivid imagination which has influenced some of my favorite pop culture items. Without Lovecraft, would Alien exist? Would John Carpenter's The Thing have been possible? Event Horizon? Hellboy? I'm sure that's just the surface.
HOWEVER!
HPL's prose left quite a bit to be desired. Some stories were a total chore to get through-- some things were just way too long, and the constant use of the same phrases over and over and over and over got very annoying. Also, if something can't be described, and you're a writer, maybe try harder? Yeesh. And of course, HPL's icky and bizarre racism crops up and removed me from the flow frequently (primarily the first collection, "The Call of Cthulhu" than this one, not that this didn't have it's own problems).
I'm glad I finally read Lovecraft, it gives me a greater appreciation for sci-if horror, even if it is heavily flawed.
HOWEVER!
HPL's prose left quite a bit to be desired. Some stories were a total chore to get through-- some things were just way too long, and the constant use of the same phrases over and over and over and over got very annoying. Also, if something can't be described, and you're a writer, maybe try harder? Yeesh. And of course, HPL's icky and bizarre racism crops up and removed me from the flow frequently (primarily the first collection, "The Call of Cthulhu" than this one, not that this didn't have it's own problems).
I'm glad I finally read Lovecraft, it gives me a greater appreciation for sci-if horror, even if it is heavily flawed.
November 9, 2013
I wanted to love this book, but that just didn't happen. It was boring. Everything is dry and lifeless. There are no characters, just blank spaces moving around and reacting.
The reader is kept distant from all the action. They feel more like summaries than actual stories. Instead of listening to a conversation the main character just tells you what was said, or what everyone decided to do. Here's an example from At the Mountains of Madness:
This sort of droll recounting happens all the time in most of the stories, especially the longer ones. Eventually I just started skimming because I didn't care about anyone. It's all tell, no show.
The reader is kept distant from all the action. They feel more like summaries than actual stories. Instead of listening to a conversation the main character just tells you what was said, or what everyone decided to do. Here's an example from At the Mountains of Madness:
"From then on for another half-hour Lake kept up a running fire of comment, and expressed his intention of climbing some of the peaks on foot. I replied that I would join him as soon as he could send a plane, and that Pabodie and I would work out the best gasoline plan - just where and how to concentrate our supply in view of the expedition's altered character."
This sort of droll recounting happens all the time in most of the stories, especially the longer ones. Eventually I just started skimming because I didn't care about anyone. It's all tell, no show.
June 18, 2023
This is the second ever collection of Lovecraft's works that I ever bought. There's not a ton to say about the stories. It's some of his best work, plain and simple. This one does hold a special place for me as it introduced me to At the Mountains of Madness, which is one of my two favorite stories of Lovecraft's, and to some of the fiction from Lovecraft's Dream Cycle, which is weird and fascinating in its own way. I also have to comment on the cover. I don't usually do that a ton in my reviews but Lovecraft book covers tend to be really eye-catching and bizarre. This one is no exception. Definitely not the most literally colorful cover I've seen on a Lovecraft book, but it's a piece by Zdzislaw Beksinski, who has recently gained some notice not only for his dark art but the even darker events that often inspired it. It really fits the material (it always brings to mind Lovecraft's iconic "blind idiot flute players/pipers" for me) and its a striking piece unto itself. Great stories, great book.
November 12, 2023
Great imagination, poor storytelling. This read exactly like a scientific paper and it gave me identical emotions: boredom and fatigue. I'm not sure why this book was written, I don't even know the narrator's name, let alone experienced any character development.
An endless telling instead of showing, an overwhelming repetition of descriptions or "this thing cannot be described by mere words".
Ultimately I am still curious how this scientist was able to disclose this lush narrative about the ancestors' history within a few hours of just staring at statues that made surprising sense to a human mind 100m years later.
An endless telling instead of showing, an overwhelming repetition of descriptions or "this thing cannot be described by mere words".
Ultimately I am still curious how this scientist was able to disclose this lush narrative about the ancestors' history within a few hours of just staring at statues that made surprising sense to a human mind 100m years later.
October 2, 2020
Great collection of stories from H.P. Lovecraft. The Dream Cycle can be seen echoed and imitated in books and movies today and this is why even though these were written so long ago they still hold up. While it is difficult for me to come to terms with liking the author because of his personal views, which often do inform certain of his stories, the stories themselves resonate and make you contemplate humanity’s relationship and existence in the cosmos.
March 10, 2022
Being a huge fan of Lovecraft, I've read all of these stories before. However, I never tire of rereading them and enjoyed the selection of this collection. I felt this collection did a great job of collecting short stories and novellas having to do with Lovecraft's dream cycle, as well as his mythos stories. All in all this is a great place for any future Lovecraft fan to start and contains my favorite novella ever written; At The Mountains of Madness
May 8, 2020
Only reason I'm not giving this one 5 is because of the "Dream Quest of Unknown Kaddath" I almost skipped it because it was such a descriptive slog to get through, ironically it's what I like about Lovecraft, but that story just damn near made me want to skip it. I think this collection of stories is a pretty good introduction into his work, out of the more obscure tales, I really enjoyed Pickman's Model.
September 11, 2017
I had a difficult relationship with this book. It took me ages to read it. It's only 320 pages longs. If I had set my mind to it I could have read it in a matter of days. Instead it took me months. When I put it down, I didn't really have a desire to pick it back up again. My issue wasn't with the writing. Lovecraft's writing is phenomenal. Perhaps the prose is a bit florid, but that wasn't my problem. It took me a while to figure it out, but I was finally able to put my finger on it. This book is overflowing with pretentious white boy nonsense. I understand Lovecraft was writing in the 20s and 30s. Which is why the rare fleshed out female character is desperate for the superior powers of a male brain. And all the vague racism in the form of "dark strangers" and "simpleminded black fellows." Just because it's a product of its time doesn't make it any less off-putting. Also, Lovecraft is so evidently full of himself. There is an entire story in here where his self-insert decides every aspect of life on earth is cheap and unfulfilling and the people who buy into, well, real life, are clearly shallow and idiotic. OK. That being said, when Lovecraft finally gets past all the exposition, and weird bigotry, and grating self-inserts, everything gets good and it gets good fast. The horror elements awesome. He was a pioneer of the genre after all. I can see myself having loved this book if I was reading it at a different period in my life. Perhaps before I got over my elitism and at the height of my depression, I would have thought Lovecraft was the bee's knees. The core ideas are enticing and enthralling. However, all the trimmings and trappings those ideas are wrapped up in are just as unsavory as some of the monstrous creatures Lovecraft describes. At least in my opinion. If you can plow past all the extravagant elements, then you'll probably really enjoy yourself.
January 31, 2024
HPL's magnum opus (says the guy who's only read like eight of his stories). The guys who did the miniseries based on Dan Simmons' novel The Terror need to tackle this one.
June 26, 2014
Having read this collection and a couple of other miscellaneous works nobody can say that I didn't give Lovecraft a fair shot, but his stories are just so agonizingly dull and repetitive that I can't imagine what people see in them. His characters are generally indistinguishable, he never says in five words what could be needlessly expanded to fifty, and most of the alleged "horror" seems to stem directly from his own phobias (which some readers may relate to, but I found baffling). The writer's worst offense is the flogging of words like "grotesque," "horrifying," "terrible," and the like to describe things without ever specifying in what manner those terms apply, the characters giving the cheap excuse of whatever it is they are dealing with being simply too awful to put into words.
August 14, 2019
Dark fantasy and dreams merge into a mysterious world of unknown within the mind. This collection explores the idea of the Abyss from within, spearheaded by the titular story, "At the Mountains of Madness:" a landscape so barren and desolate nothing could survive, and yet something DOES lurk here. A great something. Something unimaginable, cyclopian, and terrible. Below the surface of the ice a kingdom so old, so archaic that the very foundations of science and humanity are disturbed. As an allegory for psychology, this tale strikes a particularly cold iron into the heart of the intellect. This is Freud taken to his ultimate end. Below the surface of the mind might lay horrors so ancient we dare say we don't know who we are anymore.
March 19, 2018
I was disappointed with the titular story. The mountains of madness is supposed to be lovecrafts masterpiece but I found it tedious and not scary at all.
However I loved “the thing on the doorstep”, “the music of Erich Zann,” “the Cats of ulthar,” and the final story “the shadow out of time” which is very similar to the mountains of madness, but more suspenseful.
My biggest issue with Lovecraft is his tendency to say how something was “indescribable” seriously he does it about a dozen times in the book. Just use your words lovecraft
However I loved “the thing on the doorstep”, “the music of Erich Zann,” “the Cats of ulthar,” and the final story “the shadow out of time” which is very similar to the mountains of madness, but more suspenseful.
My biggest issue with Lovecraft is his tendency to say how something was “indescribable” seriously he does it about a dozen times in the book. Just use your words lovecraft
July 18, 2011
I was really looking forward to read this book and it was a huge let down! I couldn't get into it. I found it really really hard to read and to stay interested in it. The story seems good but Lovecraft did not do a good job. I feel like he jumped around to much and really didn't describe what was going on. His description of the monsters was not that great and neither was the description of the Artic city.
July 3, 2019
The Barnes and Noble edition of this series is absolutely horrendous.
The font is bafflingly small, there are no annotations (if you have an opportunity to read the annotations of S.T.Joshi or Leslie Klinger, please do!). There are several other editions which have about 50 pages of additional information which will help the reader further appreciate Lovecraft's work!
The font is bafflingly small, there are no annotations (if you have an opportunity to read the annotations of S.T.Joshi or Leslie Klinger, please do!). There are several other editions which have about 50 pages of additional information which will help the reader further appreciate Lovecraft's work!
November 12, 2010
Incredible surreal stories. Haven't been inspired to think this way in years. Nightmarish, disturbing tales, journeys into dark parts of the earth, ancestral civilizations. A must read for any fan of Poe, fantasy, surrealism.
June 3, 2016
Conclusions I have drawn from this book:
a) H.P. Lovecraft was the king of the Info Dump.
b) and he sure loved those adverbs.
c) No one had ever introduced him to the concept of "show, don't tell".
Also, all the stories from the Cthulu Mythos felt like the same story over and over again.
a) H.P. Lovecraft was the king of the Info Dump.
b) and he sure loved those adverbs.
c) No one had ever introduced him to the concept of "show, don't tell".
Also, all the stories from the Cthulu Mythos felt like the same story over and over again.
May 2, 2010
I like Lovecraft's mixture of science and fantasy. Some of his stories have a philosophical tone to them, exploring the place of humanity in the universe. One of my favorite writers.
December 9, 2012
Some of his stories/novellas are just amazing while some are trying to read. He is good at creating some creepy imagery.
January 15, 2019
It was definitely a challenging read. The last three stories are what made up for this book.
October 21, 2019
Highlights: The Music of Erich Zann, Pickman's Model, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kaddath, The Thing on the Doorstep, and of course At the Mountains of Madness.
September 7, 2022
Cosmically horrific. Old writing and tedious at times, but the ideas are iconic very much for a reason.
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews