Delta Green: Denied to the Enemy

Delta Green Fiction

by Dennis Detwiller

Thule, the Nazi Atlantis, legendary home of Aryan superbeings that ruled prehistory. Thule was supposed to be a Nazi myth, but when a defector from the SS occult sciences division, the Karotechia, brings proof of Thule's reality, Delta Green's course is clear: the alien city and its technological and occult secrets must be denied to the enemy at all costs. But the true masters of Thule are fighting their own war. A traitor from the past endangers their eons-old plan to shape the future. The survival of mankind depends on the fate of Thule; but to destroy Thule or save it? Which choice will save mankind? Written by Dennis Detwiller with cover Art by Samuel Araya.

Genres: Horror, Lovecraftian, Fiction, Role Playing Games, Cthulhu Mythos, Weird Fiction, Science Fiction

259 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2003

Reviews

[Robin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting book, but it has some issues. As a game tie-in it's not very friendly to newcomers, the main plot isn't as exciting as an early subplot, and it over-promises for such a slender volume. That being said, I enjoyed what Detwiller tried to accomplish, and both the beginning and ending were quite strong.

This book is for established fans only. This book is billed as "A Cthulhu Mythos Novel of World War II", and familiarity with the work of H.P. Lovecraft (particularly his Mythos stories "Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family" and "The Shadow Out of Time") are effectively required to comprehend this story. Some knowledge of the Delta Green campaign setting for the Lovecraft-inspired Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game is also advisable if you want to get the most enjoyment out of the story.

After a cryptic prologue about an aged military officer contemplating suicide, the story gets very interesting, very quick. We're introduced to a member of the Ahnenerbe, a (historical) Nazi organization dedicated to occult study. It soon becomes clear that he's been left disaffected and not a little mentally unstable by his studies, and that he's just biding his time until he can defect to the Allies and throw a monkey wrench in the Axis's literal scorched earth strategy. The narrative takes him to a coastal town in occupied France, where he becomes an unwilling bystander to the Ahnenerbe's efforts to broker an alliance with the Deep Ones, mutant fish-men introduced in Lovecraft's "The Shadow Over Innsmouth". The close encounters with the Deep Ones are very creepy and obliquely written, Detwiller does an excellent job portraying the characters' sanity leach away through close proximity with the unknowable. Here we had unhinged (yet sympathetic) people committing atrocities to curry favor with disturbing allies; this was the peak of the book for me, it's a shame it came so early.

Unfortunately, the Deep Ones section of the book comes to an abrupt end as the books' true protagonists arrive on the scene: Delta Green, a subdivision of the OSS tasked to deal with supernatural threats. The story to follow is still fun--particularly if you enjoy Delta Green--but after such an atmospheric build-up it felt like a vaguely disappointing bait-and-switch. The story's true antagonists are somewhat undefined, and the primary plot twist towards the end seemed poorly foreshadowed, with baffling motivations.

In the end, the story ends up being a *Call of Cthulhu story set during World War II*, rather than a "Cthulhu Mythos novel of World War II". There are two slight distinctions here. One is that readers hoping for an grand reveal of the occult side of World War II will be disappointed; this book is nowhere near that epic in scope. The second distinction is that--perhaps unsurprisingly, given the origins of the Delta Green property--"Denied to the Enemy" leans more towards the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game's interpretation of the Cthulhu Mythos than Lovecraft. I counted about five different creature types appearing over the course of the story, while most literary Mythos authors tend to limit themselves to one or two. While monster-spotting is sort of fun for RPG fans, some of the cameos were a little gratuitous, like attempts at fan service. (Don't have the Tcho-Tchos show up if you're not going to do anything with them!)

If you're already a Delta Green fan, by all means give this book a shot. But if you're not, this book won't turn you into one.

[Zachary Jacobi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm pretty torn on this book. On one hand, I feel like I know a lot more of the history of Delta Green and of the Mythos its set in. This book made me rethink two of the missions my Delta Green agents have been sent on, so props for that.

I was less of a fan of the relentlessly grim tone. There's only so many times I can be told that the universe is vast and uncaring before I begin to instinctively skip over it.

There were also a few copy-editing mistakes and typos, which occasionally caused me some confusion.

[Emma · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting addition to the Delta Green variant of the Cthulhu mythos. Story moved along nicely, but was confused in places, and there was some jarring historical inaccuracies (a pound *coin* in 1942 and paying for two pints?)

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well-written book, but also a slow one, I think because it spends so much effort stitching together different Lovecraft stories.

[Mike Nusbaum · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very enjoyable world spanning Delta Green adventure.

Mr. Detwiller is a very good writer and I found the weaving of Lovecraft's original stories ("The Shadow Out of Time" and "Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family") with new connective tissues very enjoyable. He seamlessly fuses the two stories and ties them into the horrifying experiments of the Nazi Karotechia during WWII and the early history of Delta Green.

Here Delta Green is entering a new phase of simply fighting monsters like the Deep Ones and moving into the horrifying knowledge of reality altering beings like the Great Race of Yith. Delta Green is out of it's depth and losing agents to forces they don't understand and can never truly stop.

I would highly recommend this to Delta Green fans looking for a novel involving some famous characters from the background lore, mind bending conspiracies and a fun adventure. Fans of Lovecraft and Call of Cthulhu will probably enjoy this as well.

As a side note Mr. Detwiller writes what I feel are the best responses to sanity blasting reality that I've ever seen in a novel. It seems like he's done his research into real world responses to trauma and I find it incredibly realistic. Rather than just write "his mind reeled with madness" he puts you into their mind and how it's trying to both process what's happening and suppress it at the same time. I truly enjoyed it.

Also worth noting is that my epub copy had a few typos. After I finished I realized I also had a revised edition in my collection but I can't say if that suffers from the same issue. These minor typos aren't frequent and didn't slow me down or confuse me, but others may have a different response.

[Damian Herde · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is my first encounter with the world of Delta Green, the militaristic gaming offshoot of the Call of Cthulhu game, based on the writings of HP Lovecraft. Given that, I had low expectations, which were met. The writing style was choppy, and the structure was frustrating at times, with setups that did not pay off, or nonsensical character reasoning.

The book draws on Lovecraft’s stories ‘The Shadow Over Innsmouth’, ‘The Shadow Out of Time’, ‘Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family’, ‘The Call of Cthulhu’, with a cameo from Derleth’s Tcho-Tcho cannibals.

The overarching story involves a hunt for the lost, ancient city of the white apes of ‘Arthur Jermyn’ because the nazis learnt something about the site from Yithian books they had unearthed. The Yithians become invested in the hunt also, but no spoilers. Despite this, we start with a great premise of nazi research into allying with the Deep Ones to gain ocean supremacy, but this story is immediately dropped.

Apart from those disappointing missed opportunities in the story, a side quest into Australia dropped my ratings of the story. The author makes an appalling attempt to write an accent of First Nations people of Western Australia, which, as an Australian, I was so shocked by it I had to read some out loud to people to share my pain. Americans have never successfully done an Australian accent, and this was so much worse.

Worse than that, it features a gratuitous use of the Magical Negro trope (magical black character who devotes himself to selflessly helping whites), and derogatory language to describe First Nations people.

This will be the only book of Detwiller’s or Delta Green that I touch.

[Leo McBride · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a big fan of the work of HP Lovecraft - an author whose writing might not always have been the finest, but man, the ideas, those wonderful ideas. His Cthulhu Mythos has of course been much venerated - not least through the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game that gobbled up so many of my nights.
Delta Green is an offshoot of the mythos in both gaming and written form - and Detwiller's books are a determined look at the Delta Green organisation, a secret group set up to deal with the truth of the mythos. After all, if the authorities knew that Old Ones and their kind were indeed a threat to the world, they'd have to do something about that, right? Delta Green is the solution. And sometimes the problem.
Detwiller charts a tale through the years of World War II, as rival factions make use of ancient tomes and dangerous artifacts in pursuit of their goals.
I'll be honest - I've enjoyed Detwiller's stories before, but this one is a bit disjointed. It feels like a number of short stories shunted together, rather than a piece as a whole. I still quite liked it - because I'm a Cthulhu Mythos junkie, but it's probably not the greatest place to start. If your copy of Lovecraft's complete collection has as many dog-eared pages as Cthulhu has tentacles, and you've already dabbled with Delta Green stories, then dive on in, it's certainly one for the completist. If you're newer to the material, you might want to read some of those other works first.

[Johann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Tale

This story follows the actions of the organization known as Delta Green from America and Pieces from Britain as they take on the Nazis and alien races.
You become quite attached to the characters within this story as they fight against the Nazi regime.
Throw in a third party and you wonder will anyone survive.
Great book!!!

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

My first Delta Green novel after reading a series of anthologies. I found the first third un-put-downable: a compact, compelling blend of occult science-fiction and pulp espionage. But after such a promising start, the narrative fractures over the final two-thirds, introducing too many sub-plots and characters that take too long to reassemble.

[Matthew Jeffrey · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF at 71%

An awkward story that lurches from scene to scene. Doesn't really get going until a third of the way in (that first third should have been a prologue). In my next life I'll give this a miss.

[Ernest Rowland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really like this, probably would give 5 stars, but there was an odd lack of conflict with or presence of the Nazi's in the second half of the story, given the way the story began.

[doowopapocalypse · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maybe a tad overlong, but a fun read.

[Dan Groth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good Delta Green story. A World War II tale. A very good entry in a great shared universe. I am enjoying this series more with every read.

[Gerard Van Der Waal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Man, this is a hard book to get my head around and review. I liked it the best of all three Delta Green books I have read (Strange Authorities by Tines and Tales from Failed Anatomies by Detwiller). In the afterword, Detwiller proclaims his love for the works of H.P. Lovecraft that this novel builds on 'The Shadow out of Time' and 'Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family' and encourages anyone who hasn't read these stories to read them because of the importance to the story of Denied to the Enemy. So, that is exactly what I did.

I found that everything about Arthur Jermyn and his family is explained satisfactorily in this novel by Detwiller himself (and I found it not one of Lovecraft's best stories and a good example of his recurring theme: "Yes, Howard the evidence points to interracial relations by someone's ancestors. You made your point twenty pages ago... People aren't appalled by that anymore and generally weren't about fifty years before you were born.").

Now, the shadow is a whole different can of worms. It proved I wasn't as well-versed in the mythos as I thought because this story introduces the alien species of the 'Great Race' also known as the time-traveling and body hijacking Yith. I found this story very interesting, if a little long-winded and you really need to read this story before you read Denied the Enemy. Or you could listen to an episode of the Modern Mythos podcast, which explains it all pretty well and amusingly: https://modernmythos.libsyn.com/moder...

One more thing I want to say before I end this horrible, positive review is that I really enjoyed the fractured nature of the story of Denied the Enemy. It starts with a protagonist in Nazi Germany and changes well into a quarter of the book. It then alternated between two different Delta Green agents who are in different parts of the world dealing with different sides of this huge story.

I can't explain what the book is about. It's just too... ...too much, man.

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well-written effort that drops the reader straight into the Delta Green setting's early era. Lovecraftian horror meets the banality of evil in World War II. Detwiller's taut writing conveys the full lurking evils beyond the ken of man as he takes us from one theater of the war to the next as DG and PISCES agents struggle to thwart the machinations of the Nazis... and greater forces. Multiple entities, locations, and stories by HPL are invoked. From the degenerate rapacious Deep Ones to the inscrutably transcendental Great Race to still others hinted in cameos, this book has it all. However, ultimately it feels a bit like a shaggy dog story meets WWII travelogue, as the main plot does not pick up until the midpoint (though what follows previously, the viewpoint from a disloyal yet complicit SS officer, is chillingly compelling). All of the characters are more or less bluff military men, steadfast in the cause of duty, which makes them rather generic. Still, Lovecraft's stories are not really about the protagonist figures, but rather the eldritch situations they are captured in, and the book does show them effectively. As a personal preference, I felt the book became less horror and more cosmic thriller, even space fantasy, towards the end, almost reminiscent of Darwinia by Robert Charles Wilson. I thought the portrayal of the Yithians was rather shallow and bare. Such is the difficulty in writing about an inscrutable- yet not altogether malevolent. Ultimately, Delta Green: Denied to the Enemy is a solid entry into the dark world of DG, but not an excellent one.

[Jesse · Rating 4 out of 5]

First and foremost, take it from a guy who has read more than his share of shared-world fiction (usually but not always, novels set in RPG worlds), this is the best one I've ever read! This is good enough to stand with the non-shared world fiction books.

And awesome expansion on the ideas of the Cthulhu mythos world and Lovecraftian themes. We've got WWII action, occult nazis, aliens, ancient hidden cities, secret government organizations, horror, action, adventure, its all here. Good characters that feel real and deal with some very crazy situations in there own uniquely gibbering ways. Complex plot that (for me) seamlessly weaves multiple mytho's devices into one synergistically amazing book. I hate to be mysterious about details but I really think anyone reading this should go and read this and I don't want to ruin any surprises for you. They are half the fun.

[Louis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book because I like games set in the Cthulhu Mythos but have never gotten into Delta Green, and I thought this would be a good introduction.

I likes this up to the last chapter. The principal characters were faced with an unknown, you sensed their increasing awareness that there was more to the story than they knew as the story went on. And as the last in the chains of principal characters reached the climax of the story, they did so with the realization that this was much bigger than they had imagined. But to me I lost it in the very end. The characters have their moments of heroic sacrifice and after that comes the horror in the realization of what they found. But (and maybe it is because I read this over the course of a month) the epilogue seemed to be forced in wrapping up the final fates of the various characters)

[Ken Ringwald · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this a lot, but it's not my favorite Delta Green book. It sets out at a heroic task - to integrate two of the lesser regarded H.P. Lovecraft stories and find the potential for cosmic horror in them, but at the end of the day that does make for a weaker foundation.

Th historical research and mythos weirdness are both excellent, especially at the start and at the end. I was surprised by the first narrator in the book and enjoyed his section immensely; while the rest was very solid it was hard to top that introduction.

Overall, I recommend it if you know/like Delta Green. If you are not familiar with it already and fairly familiar with H.P. Lovecraft, I think it could be more difficult to follow. But you're also not really the target audience at that point.

[Kevin Trainor · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the first of Dennis Detwiller's Delta Green novels, and can be a little hard to follow since things jump around quite a bit between characters and in time sequence. It's basically an account of two Delta Green operations during WW2 against the Nazis' SS-Ahnenerbe/Karotechia, which unfortunately involve some bureaucratic infighting with the British PISCES agency. Good read, but not great; definitely of interest if you enjoy Charles Stross' Laundry series, although the average Delta Green operative makes Bob Howard and his wife look like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, living in the best of all possible worlds.

[Gar · Rating 3 out of 5]

First off, this entire book will make zero sense to anyone not familiar with the HP Lovecraft source material, and also--to a somewhat lesser extent--with the Delta Green tabletop rpg setting based on it. But you have to figure the only people reading this already meet both qualifications, so there you go.

Overall, this was kind of a mess that needed a stronger editing hand. But it was short and quick, so it didn't overstay its welcome.

[Stig · Rating 3 out of 5]

Delta Green is a covert US government agency which fights occult threats. In this novel the agency and its British counterpart come up against various Lovecraftian horrors. A fun concept, but the story is all over the place - Deep Ones, white apes, Thule etc. - and the story seems to lack a clear focus. I thought that the best part was the beginning where the Nazis try to form an alliance with the Deep Ones. Nevertheless, a well-written book and a good read.

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a novel that meshes real aspects of the SS’s occult branch, the Ahnenerbe Society, with the Cthulhu Mythos of pulp fictioner H.P. Lovecraft. It is very well done and will be of interest to readers who are familiar with these things. (The book also gives some nice background on the OSS, the proto CIA.)

[Damon Dorsey · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first part of the novel is some of the best Lovecraft-inspired fiction I've read. It has an intriguing point of view character and a healthy dose of creeping dread. Overall the novel dragged a bit for me after part one, but still a lot of great ideas here and well worth the read for anyone with an interest in Delta Green or mythos fiction in general.

[Tallburt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad little read and a melange of a few Lovecraftian threads. Spoilt by some glaring historical inaccuracies such as the British using Pound coins during WW2. Seeing as you could wallpaper a small room with a fiver of this period, a Pound coin would have been about a metric ton of copper-nickel alloy.

[John R. Dailey Jr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A GRAND TALE OF THE OTHER IT IS....

Hello, this story is really good and really well written. Throw in some Nazis and Lovecraftian horror and you have a recipe for wonder. Damn fine stuff. Thanks.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the footsteps of a legend

Derailleur took his first steps into the hall of legends with this great story of lovecraftian horror meets WW 2 military action. I look forward to reading his other works.

[Max Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

Takes a long time to get into due to the abundance of separate narrative lines but once you understand what is going on, it's awesome (speaking as a H.P.Lovecraft fan here).

[Justin · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://librarianaut.com/2012/04/24/bo...

[Pete731 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very enjoyable little piece of Cthulhu mythos. I you like Cthulhu mythos, you'll like this. If you don't, you probably won't.

[Simon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Terrific start, then it all sort of falls down a bit.