Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion

This is our discussion of the Classic fantasy novel...

A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny
(1993)

So, Jim, what's the plan? A chapter a day, or just read right through?

This is a Zelazny I haven't read before. (Sadly, the current paperback I got from Amazon doesn't have the original cover. Instead, this, from Farrago publishing...


(Also, the Kindle edition doesn't seem to be available anymore. Between this and the Amber discussions, I'm beginning to associate Zelazny with dead trees. :)

I prefer to read this one chapter per day & I'll post the notes the following day. Today's assignment is for everyone to read from the beginning to the end of the first chapter.

It's SHORT! Too short. Don't read on. Contemplate what you have read. There's a lot more there than you'll see at first &, in these days of instant gratification, it will do you good to wonder what tomorrow will bring.

It's confusing! If you've never read this book before, it takes a while to figure out what is going on. If you have read it before, there is plenty more to see.

Zelazny has filled this book with allusions. He's known for that. He wanted to be a poet, but it didn't pay well, so he wrote SFF instead. In this book, he pulled out all the stops & it makes the book a lunatic scavenger hunt for clues that he's pulled from old horror movies, mythology, classics, fairy tales, history, & more.

The title of the book is a line from "ULALUME" by Edgar Allan Poe (1847).
Read online here: http://www.online-literature.com/poe/...
More about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulalume

I've read the book with several groups over the years & have created notes for each day. While I'll post them, I'm not smart or observant enough to have come up with them on my own. The only credit I deserve is compiling the notes.

I've also created a topic for discussing the front cover separately here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Until tomorrow...

Christopher S. Kovacs is a Zelazny expert. He's one of the main editors of the Collected Works of Roger Zelazny by NESFA, so it's always good to read his thoughts on a book & he wrote a great article on this one.

Warning! It contains spoilers, but you can safely read up to the poem & it does introduce the book well.

https://lovecraftzine.com/magazine/is...

I couldn't get the link to Ulalume to work, but here's another link for anyone who wants to read the Poe poem from which this story took its title: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem...

By the way Professor Jim, I have completed today's assignment and look forward to reading more tomorrow. I'm assuming the dog's owner Jack is Jack the Ripper, but then again it says something about that on the back cover blurb.

It took a while for the poem link to work for me today, Randy. I almost went looking for another when it popped up. Thanks for posting an alternate. I probably should have.

Chris' article states that it is Jack the Ripper's dog, too. I think that's a spoiler as I enjoyed figuring it out on my own way back when I first read it. If you don't know it, the dog's eye view makes the historically evil Jack seem like a pretty good guy who just does bad things so worse won't happen. Of course, that's the whole point of it. Dogs always see their masters in their best light.

The Dedication
Even this part of the book is important since it helps us guess who the players are & what is going on as the book progresses.

Mary Shelley – Dr. Frankenstein & his monster

Edgar Allan Poe – for the book's title found in his poem "Ulalume"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulalume

Bram Stoker – The Count Dracula

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – the Great Detective, Sherlock Holmes & his familiar, Watson

H.P. Lovecraft - "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath", the "Book of the Dead" & the Alhazred Icon.

Ray Bradbury – (from Chris Kovacs )lots and lots of stories about October and Halloween and spooky themes. He's also written about vampires.

Robert Bloch – (from Chris Kovacs (editor of the Complete RZ Works) NIGHT OF THE RIPPER and the short story "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper" were inspirations for Zelazny to write the short story "Is There a Demon Lover in the House?" and the act of writing that story inspired him to consider Jack the Ripper as a good guy, in turn leading to an inspiration for A NIGHT IN THE LONESOME OCTOBER. Zelazny also did an audiobook reading of some Bloch stories before OCTOBER came out, and it included "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper."
Bloch also did a trilogy of short Jack the Ripper stories with Harlan Ellison in the first “Partners in Wonder”.

Albert Payson Terhune - wrote a lot of dog poems that Zelazny was fond of.

& the makers of a lot of old movies – The Wolfman, 1941, Larry Talbot played by Lon Chaney Jr.. Others?
(from Chris Kovacs ) acknowledges so many without being specific and probably includes (but is not limited to) Bela Lugosi's Dracula, all the Frankenstein movies, the werewolf movies, Basil Rathbone's Sherlock Holmes, etc., etc. Zelazny loved B movies so there are probably many unnameable and forgettable films receiving a nod there. Zelazny's use of the character of Larry Talbot is a specific nod to one movie, but the setting and many of the characters were inspired by a lifetime of watching those movies.

Prologue:

The story is being told by Snuff (another word for sniff, but also means to extinguish – a fitting name), a watchdog who is currently living outside of London with his master, Jack, who is under a curse, has a wand & a knife with old writing on it. Snuff likes Soho, dark & misty, where he & Jack take long walks at night. Jack works then in secrecy to keep worse things from happening. Snuff watches over him as he works & howls a warning if anyone disturbs them. Sounds ominous – Jack with a big knife who does bad things at night in Soho... Jack the Ripper?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_the...

Jack the Ripper operated in Whitechapel in 1888. That is east of Soho, I believe, but he was known for killing prostitutes & the Soho district was well known for its sex shops throughout most of the 20th century, so has that reputation in most people’s minds now.

They are the keepers of several curses. Snuff says he was summoned by Jack & given his job, so he’s not an ordinary dog. The various ‘things’ are all scared of him, too.
- Thing in the Circle
- Thing in the Wardrobe
- Thing in the Steamer Trunk
- Things in the Mirror

Jack is digging in a cemetery, but is not the first there. The competition was there ‘last month’. Last month was when? Snuff is glad they left without getting what they wanted because that means he & Jack are probably still ahead of them in the competition. Competing for what? The ‘big bit of business’ that’s coming soon? Seems likely, but what is it? Jack needs a lot of ingredients for it, whatever it is.

1Oct:

Snuff checks on the various curses. Circle & Wardrobe talk to him, Steamer Trunk just growls & the Things in the Mirrors gibber & slither. All quiet down when Snuff gets after them. I wonder what they are?

Jim wrote: "The Dedication
Even this part of the book is important since it helps us guess who the players are & what is going on as the book progresses. ..."

When I saw the dedication I realized I'd made a mistake buying this. Probably why I never read it before.

Jim wrote: "Prologue:..."

Jack the Ripper seemed a likely guess. The digging is strange, since that's more associated with the movie version of Dr. Frankenstein.

I noticed Snuff was "summoned" by Jack, not "originally" a dog. Probably why he intimidates other dogs. The associated Gahan Wilson cartoon suggests he doesn't especially look like a dog, either.

"The Thing in the..." sounds like bad Lovecraft/Howard/pulp horror in general.

Jim wrote: "1 Oct:..."

Despite the prologue calling it the "Things in the Mirror", it appears the proper plural constructions would be The Things in the Mirrors, since there seem to be multiple mirrors.

I do hope the Thing in the Wardrobe is Aslan.

Maybe the Things in the Mirrors are from Lewis Carroll

Interesting idea on Lewis Carroll. I'll have to watch for that. As many times as I've read this with groups, it never fails to amaze me how people keep finding things that aren't in my notes. It's one of the reasons the book never grows old.

What was it about the dedication that turned you off?

Jim wrote: "What was it about the dedication that turned you off?"

I would assume the horror references are what he didn't like.

By the way, October would be a great month of the year to allow for horror books to be our monthly read as an exception to the rule.

I read chapter 2 today. There's Graymalk, a cat, and also a reference to several other characters we haven't met yet. Any thoughts on who any of these folks are?

Graymalk
Crazy Jill (lives on the other side of the hill - is this a Jack and Jill reference?)
Nightwind the owl
Morris and McCab
Rastov the monk
Quicklime the snake

Randy wrote: "By the way, October would be a great month of the year to allow for horror books to be our monthly read as an exception to the rule...."

Remind me next August.

Oct 2
Randy wrote: "I read chapter 2 today. There's Graymalk, a cat, and also a reference to several other characters we haven't met yet. Any thoughts on who any of these folks are? ..."

Grimalkin is a popular name for cats in "witchy" stories. It's apparently a very old word for cat, and was the witches' familiar in Hamlet MacBeth.

I seemed to have missed the dedication, usually I actually read those things, need to check if my copy even has it.

G33z3r wrote: "Jim wrote: "Prologue:..." I noticed Snuff was "summoned" by..."

I noticed that too and thought it was a bit of an odd choice of words.

Was it supposed to be a secret that Jack is Jack the Ripper? I somehow knew that before starting the book, maybe it was on the back cover blurb. Although one definitely doesn't associate him with digging a graveyard for "ingredients". Elder Gods got mentioned in my blurb too, so I was expecting something Lovecraftian to show up at some point, perhaps they are the "Things" or they are the thing that big event is centered on.

G33z3r wrote: "Graymalkin is a popular name for cats in "witchy" stories. It's apparently a very old word for cat, and was the witches' familiar in Hamlet"

Graymalkin even shows up in Dresden, as feline minion(s) of Mab. Butcher didn't necessarily follow folklore accurately but there could be a faerie connection there too.

Randy wrote: "Rastov the monk"

I'm guessing that's the monk-like guy on the cover who I hazarded a guess as being Rasputin, the Russian name still points that way.

Haven't actually read Oct 2 yet, can't wait to get to it.

G33z3r wrote: Grimalkin..."

Macbeth

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimalkin

Interesting list of bullet points in that wiki, just the random trivia like Nostradamus owning a cat name Grimalkin or the Beware the Cat novel, which given we're all book fans here is of interest - "It is notable as the first horror fiction text longer than a short story and has also been claimed by some academics as the first novel ever published in English of any kind."

Now I want to read that book, assuming someone re-wrote it in modern English (which apparently someone did and published in a book called Tales of Lovecraftian Cats...) Lovecraft himself had a story about cats though I don't recall if there was a Graymalkin in it.

2Oct: Jack & Snuff get a mandrake root from the ‘place of a killing by someone else’. IOW, they do kill people. Again, we’re told that Jack has a long list of ingredients. Snuff meets Graymalk, the cat of Crazy Jill who lives on the other side of the hill. They agree that ‘it’, the competition (?) has begun & they’re in it. How does Snuff know her name & she his?

A grimalkin (also called a greymalkin) is an old or evil-looking female cat. The term stems from "grey" (the color) plus "malkin", an archaic term for a cat, derived from a hypocoristic form of the female name Maud.
[1] Scottish legend makes reference to the grimalkin as a faery cat that dwells in the highlands. The term/name may first come from Beware the Cat (published 1570) by William Baldwin.
[2] The novel is a story of talking cats, and part of it relates the story of the Grimalkin's death. According to its editors, the story, and thus the name, originates with Baldwin in terms of being the earliest example known in print. It is also spelled Grimmalkin or Grimolochin. During the early modern period, the name grimalkin – and cats in general – became associated with the devil and witchcraft. Women tried as witches in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries were often accused of having a familiar, frequently a grimalkin.

Their talk introduces us to several other competitors:
- The owl, Nightwind, consort of Morris and MacCab.
- The Mad Monk, Rastov, with a black snake named Quicklime coiled in his stomach.
- Nightwind is a solid name for an owl, nothing special though, unless I'm missing something. Night Winds (1978) was the name of one of the Kane novels by Karl Wagner which contains a short story of the same name. It is somewhat Lovecraftian, so there are interesting points of congruence to the story as a whole. I think that's a stretch, though.

It’s interesting the way Snuff is so quick to pay his debt, which Gray puts him in when she tells him of the feather coated with mummy dust that Nightwind left to bring he & Jack bad luck. She even says she’ll take care of it for him. So he tells her of the scales that Quicklime rubbed off on their porch corner post.

Quicklime or burnt lime is a caustic agent that becomes less so the longer it is exposed to air where it bonds with C02 & turns into calcium carbide. Putting it back into the furnace, reheating it, changes is back though, I think. It's associated with death as it was used to kill the odor of bodies in graves.

Rastov, the Mad Monk: The name is suggestive of another who was sometimes called the Mad Monk, Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasputin

If the Mad Monk, Rastov, is indeed Rasputin, that puts the timing sometime before his death in 1916 &, since he's an adult, no earlier than the late 1880's, although this is fantasy & a fictional figure, so no guarantees, but along with the possibility of Jack the Ripper.

One of the many theories about Raputin's death was that a tape worm in his stomach kept him from succumbing to the poison they gave him. Snuff describes Quicklime as a black snake that lives in the belly of the Mad Monk, so that does have certain parallels, although I thought tapeworms were white.

The first attempt on Rasputin's life was a knifing by a prostitute that left him with his entrails hanging out, but he lived through it. In the final attempt, they tried to poison, shoot, beat, & drown him, but he almost pulled a Houdini by coming out of the freezing river.

Rostov is an ecclesiastical town in Russia, but I can't find any specifics on the name's meaning, and I don't find references to the word as a personal name. Wikipedia says Ivan the Terrible "favored" the monastery at Rostov, for whatever that's worth.

I've posted today's notes. Keep in mind that I'm just copying what I have to cover all bases. I'm also pretending the various blurbs & articles about the book contain no spoilers.

Andrea wrote: "I'm guessing that's the monk-like guy on the cover who I hazarded a guess as being Rasputin, the Russian name still points that way."

I don't know much Russian history and I know Rasputin only by his name. I may need to check out his Wikipedia entry.

Little ditty
'Bout Jack and Jill
He lives in Soho
She lives over the hill

In today's entry it seems like Dracula has entered the story, or at least that's who I assume "The Count" is.

Also, Snuff talks of being watched by an unknown person/entity near the end of the chapter but we don't yet know who was watching him.

There were a few odd choice of words in this section too.

Like the "The broom beside the entrance was still warm" this gave me an odd image of the way a car's engine will remain warm, and thus implies that Jill and Graymalkin were riding around on it.

And now, whatever is going on is being refered to as "the Game", which given the connection to Sherlock Holmes (he's unmistakably on the cover even though he hasn't shown up yet) made me think the "game's afoot".

I'm now very interested and also disturbed about "the ingredients" and what those may turn out to be.

Thanks for the research into Rasputin, I actually tried to see if there was a connection between him and snakes (umm, you don't know want to know what websites comes up when you search for that) but didn't find anything. I thought it was particularly weird to say the snake lived inside of him so I had to see if there was some basis for that.

Oct 3

I'm getting the idea that all the competitors in this "game" have a familiar. (Interestingly, Snuff, at least, seems to regularly trade intel with rival familiars.)

Andrea wrote: "There were a few odd choice of words in this section too...."

I thought it interesting at the very start that when Snuff reports Jack was "discovered" while out collecting ingredients and chase, Snuff nipped an apparently pursuing "the other" on the leg to discourage further following. The odd term "other" cannily avoids revealing not just who the pursuer was, but even if it was human (though presumably it rules out Quicklime, who has no legs to nip.)

3Oct: Jack took his big knife out to get more ingredients & was pursued at the end. Snuff bit the leg of the pursuer (we don't know even the sex) to slow them down & Jack got away.

I'm always tickled how Snuff knew that Crazy Jill had been out & returned - her broom was still warm. That means she’s likely a witch. Who else travels around on a broom?.

Graymalkin is the name of the familiar of the witches in MacBeth - the Weird Sisters; Darkness, Chaos, & Conflict.

Needle is introduced, although we don't know what it is, just that it works for The Count, has such a high pitched voice that Snuff has trouble hearing it, & can fly. There's only one 'The Count' that I know of & he would have a familiar that fit the above description, probably a bat. Given the dedication to Bram Stoker & old movies, I think Count Dracula is pretty much a given.

Needle tells Snuff that the Count joined the Game 2 nights before & that Jill is still abreast of them, a way of wording that is used when folks are opposed in competition. I go the impression that Jack & Snuff had been at it longer, though. I'm not really sure when they were in the graveyard, but their competition had been 'last month' & that was mentioned in the prologue, before the 1Oct entry.

It's interesting how they share information. They trade that Morris, MacCab & Jill have found their ingredients, but don't ask directly about their own success. I guess that they have time to check on the others means they did OK.

They don't know how many players are in the Game, but now we know what the competition is – The Game. The players are either Openers or Closers, but we’re not sure which team who is on & it doesn’t seem as if they’re real sure themselves. What are they trying to open or close? Good or Bad?

Jim wrote: "3Oct:. Snuff bit the leg of the pursuer (we don't know even the sex) to slow them down..."

We don't even know the species.

G33z3r wrote: "we don't know what it is, just that it works for The Count, has such a high pitched voice that Snuff has trouble hearing it, & can fly.."

The associated Gahan Wilson illustration is a bat.

Andrea wrote: "...connection to Sherlock Holmes (he's unmistakably on the cover even though he hasn't shown up yet)..."

He's also on the inside of the back cover, or at least he is on my copy. In that illustration Zelazny is portrayed as Holmes and Gahan Wilson (the illustrator) is portrayed as Watson.

G33z3r wrote: "Jim wrote: "3Oct:. Snuff bit the leg of the pursuer (we don't know even the sex) to slow them down..."

We don't even know the species."

The October 4 entry says: "The dour detective and his rotund companion were about, the latter limping from his adventure of the other night." Holmes and Watson?

Also Snuff finds a paw-print near the house. Maybe connected to whoever was watching Snuff at the end of Oct 3?

Jim wrote: "Needle is introduced, although we don't know what it is, just that it works for The Count, has such a high pitched voice that Snuff has trouble hearing it, & can fly. There's only one 'The Count' that I know of & he would have a familiar that fit the above description, probably a bat. Given the dedication to Bram Stoker & old movies, I think Count Dracula is pretty much a given."

I think the fact the book has an accompanying illustration of a bat is an even bigger giveaway, though without the picture and given only the cover it could have possibly been that white bird since the owl is already accounted for, but that would be a stretch, not really any birds around with a voice so high pitched a dog would have trouble hearing it.

Randy wrote: "Also Snuff finds a paw-print near the house. Maybe connected to whoever was watching Snuff at the end of Oct 3?"

That would be interesting because that eliminates any of the birds/bats/snakes we've come across so far. By Oct 4th we know of a squirrel and a cat that have paws (and the cover implies a rat will eventually show itself).

And like G33z3r, it also seems to me that all the human participants all have an animal familiar to help the out, which is interesting, wonder if that's a requirement to be part of the "Game". And so far Snuff only interacts with the familiars, not the humans, which makes sense as he probably can only speak "animal" but not English, though he can understand his master's commands.

Oct 4

Randy wrote: "The October 4 entry says: "The dour detective and his rotund companion were about, the latter limping from his adventure of the other night." Holmes and Watson? ..."

Elementary? :) Also, strongly implies Watson was "the other" who was pursuing Jack & Snuff the night before and got bit on the leg.

Andrea wrote: "By Oct 4th we know of a squirrel and a cat that have paws (and the cover implies a rat will eventually show itself)...."

However, as Snuff says the paw print is larger than his own, I'd argue that rules out cat, squirrel, & rat.

The man with the squirrel, Cheeter, harvesting mistletoe with a silver sickle sounds druidic, but I don't have a guess at his identity.

4Oct: The Thing in the Circle is still trying to tempt Snuff. Must be a demon since it wants him to break the circle that binds it. Collies are red heads? Snuff certainly is an SOB.

A large paw print near the house & a howl that says, "Lost". Not only does Snuff not know who howled, but he wasn't sure it was a dog & it put his hackles up. What could it be?

Cheeter, the squirrel, is with an old man using a scythe to harvest mistletoe. Who does this? Cheeter admits they're in the Game & it's a last minute thing. They're fairly new to the Game, but not new enough to admit which side they're on, so apparently that should be kept secret. Confusing – 2 teams, but no one knows who is allied with whom.

“The dour detective and his rotund companion were about, the latter limping from his adventure of the other night.” So Snuff bit the leg of one of their pursuers the night before. Who would pursue them? Along with the description & the dedication to Sir Arthur, I'd guess this is The Detective, Sherlock Holmes & Watson. They too came about it the late 1800's, so that fits with the other two characters, Jack the Ripper & Rasputin (aka Rastov).

Wikipedia says, "Holmes, who first appeared in publication in 1887, was featured in four novels and 56 short stories. The first story, A Study in Scarlet, appeared in Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887 and the second, The Sign of the Four, in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1890. The character grew tremendously in popularity with the beginning of the first series of short stories in Strand Magazine in 1891; further series of short stories and two novels published in serial form appeared between then and 1927. The stories cover a period from around 1880 up to 1914." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherlock...

The timeline isn't quite our world, though. From https://lovecraftzine.com/magazine/is...

The novel takes place during the Victorian era at the time of a full moon over London on Halloween, which places it in 1887 (per David Harper’s guide to full moons). Halloween 1887 fits the timeline of Sherlock Holmes and Jack the Ripper, although 1888 is when the notorious murders attributed to Jack occurred in the Whitechapel district of London. A portrait of Queen Victoria’s son Prince Albert hangs on a wall; he succeeded her as Edward VII in 1901.

Oct 5 - looks like Frankenstein has joined the game. I'm still not sure who is the quiet druid who's harvesting mistletoe with a scythe

Also, there's mention of someone ripped apart as though by a giant dog (funny...I'm also reading The Hound of the Baskervilles right now) and another paw print near Snuff's house

Randy wrote: "Oct 5 - looks like Frankenstein has joined the game. I'm still not sure who is the quiet druid who's harvesting mistletoe with a scythe

Also, there's mention of someone ripped apart as though by ..."

Frankenstein, Igor (I'm assuming that's the hunchbacked little man who seems to be acting as the doctor's familiar), and we know from the cover his monster will be involved too.

Hound of the Baskervilles, interesting idea. It would have big feet since Snuff (at least on the cover) is not a small dog. Dracula would also take the form of a large dog/wolf such as when he first arrived when the Demeter was shipwrecked. That might explain why there are no other large animals on the book cover we're actually looking for a man. Oh wait...I know who the paw print belongs to!! But it's a hint I shouldn't have yet, it's from one of the publisher blurbs on the back...

No guesses for the druid other than Merlin but he doesn't seem to fit the theme even if he matches the description.

5Oct: This day starts early, rather than late. Graymalk & Snuff meet up with Nightwind & they list the players – adding some details we didn’t know – plus add another. They all seem to get along well. Still no idea who is on which side. Snuff is pretty slick & manages to get information out of Nightwind, but he doesn't mention Needle or the Count to either.

There has been a killing in town, as if a big, vicious dog killed the man. Graymalk thought it was Snuff, but he says not. At the end of the chapter, Snuff finds another big paw print near his house, too. Graymalk says there must be ‘more of these’ [killings] & notes that it will make people more wary before the big event – the goal they’re preparing for. She & Snuff seem to think that’s a shame. I guess because it will make their lives more difficult.

Jack the Ripper & Snuff (dog) – a notorious serial killer & his dog. While the real Springheeled Jack operated in Whitechapel in 1888, this one is operating in Soho. The former was a notorious sex district of the 19th century, the latter the same in the 20th century, so I think the discrepancy is allowable since both are in London.

(Crazy) Jill & Graymalk (cat) – A witch & her familiar. Graymalkin is the name of the familiar in MacBeth (1057). She does have a broom.

Morris & MacCab with Nightwind (owl) – who are they? Wikipedia says they’re Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, a very influential occultist who started the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. He lived from 1854 to 1918, so the timing fits, as does the magic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacGrego...

Personally, I think Zelazny added a big dose of Burke & Hare, the infamous West Port Murders. They operated decades earlier, around 1828, though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Por...
They’re known for supplying bodies to a doctor for research. The money was good & digging them up was hard, so they just started killing off travelers who stayed at the rooming house they lived in. Robert Louis Stevenson wrote “The Body Snatcher” based on this pair.

Rastov (the Mad Monk) & Quicklime (snake) – Rasputin & his tapeworm, is my guess.

Owen & Cheeter (squirrel) - we find out today that Owen is a druid according to Snuff because of the way he harvested mistletoe. A druid named Owen? Owen Glendower (his name in Shakespeare’s Henry IV part 1) was a real person, the last prince of Wales who tried to keep it free in about 1400. Shakespeare turned the historical figure into a druid & hero, sort of along the lines of Merlin, who can “call spirits from the vasty deep”.
http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/...

The Good Doctor is introduced. He has a small hunchbacked assistant (Shades of Marty Feldman!) who raids cemeteries for parts & lives in a mansion that has lots of lightening rods & the odor of death around. He also laughs manically. With the dedication to Shelley & old movies, I have to conclude that this is Victor Frankenstein & Igor making the Monster. I wonder which is familiar, Igor or the Monster? Could he have more than one, just as Nightwind has 2 masters?

The Count & Needle - are known only to Snuff at this point. Probably Count Dracula.

It was nice to get all our characters in order. I notice the dour detective & his rotund companion weren't considered as players, even though we've seen them twice.

Snuff is trying to find where everyone lives & draw lines between these places. Why? It seems to take a lot of concentration, so it must mean something.

Jim wrote: "5 Oct: Morris & MacCab with Nightwind (owl) – who are they? Wikipedia says they’re Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, a very influential occultist who started the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.... Personally, I think Zelazny added a big dose of Burke & Hare, the infamous West Port Murders. They operated decades earlier, around 1828, though.,,,"

I'm going with Leopold & Loeb, because of alliteration. :)

Andrea wrote: "Frankenstein, Igor (I'm assuming that's the hunchbacked little man who seems to be acting as the doctor's familiar), and we know from the cover his monster will be involved too...."

The text suggests that Zelazny is using "Movie Dr. Frankenstein" rather than Shelley's (her place in the dedication notwithstanding) as Shelley didn't have an Igor, grave robbing, or lightning. OTOH, the book's cover suggests the Shelley version, intelligent & conversational.

Jim wrote: "5 Oct: Owen & Cheeter (squirrel) - we find out today that Owen is a druid... A druid named Owen? Owen Glendower (his name in Shakespeare’s Henry IV part 1) was a real person,..."

Seems very much obscure compared to the (in)famous other players.

G33z3r wrote: "Andrea wrote: "Frankenstein, Igor (I'm assuming that's the hunchbacked little man who seems to be acting as the doctor's familiar), and we know from the cover his monster will be involved too...."
..."

My thoughts too, which surprised me a little since Zelazny was supposed to be well versed in the originals, but maybe certain things got so pervasive that people think the original is wrong, the lightning and Igor for example :)

Jim wrote: "It was nice to get all our characters in order. I notice the dour detective & his rotund companion weren't considered as players, even though we've seen them twice."

That occurred to me too. I could see the detective as just investigating all these weird going ons rather than being a player per-se. Also doesn't appear to have a familiar unless Watson fills that role... :)

G33z3r wrote: "Seems very much obscure compared to the (in)famous other players."

Morris & MacCab would be equally obscure if they really map to a single occultist I've never heard of. The bodysnatcher pair, though I didn't recognize their names, I'm at least familiar with. If Owen can be a real person in 1400, then he could equally be the older but more well known Merlin so I'm sticking with that for now :)

I'm not currently reading this book, but I'm so intrigued by the comments that I'm very tempted to join in (but unlikely to be able to get my hands on a copy until mid oct). My only question, is this book scary/horror or more leaning towards the weird end of the scale? I've enjoyed the other Zelazny reads Lord of Light and the Princes of Amber series, do you think I'd enjoy this one?

It's not scary so far, sure we have some "Things" being kept in mirrors and wardrobes, and most of the characters appear to be graverobbing or even murdering to gather "ingredients" but most of that is mentioned in an offhand way from Snuff the dog's POV. As he's not very concerned about those things, you don't get a scary vibe from it. The intent is to be more a mystery than a horror. Currently it's less scary than the works it is inspired by.

At least that's what I feel from the first 29 pages. It's definitely interesting to read a book about 5 pages at a time.

I'll agree that it's not a scary book even though a lot of grim things happen.

I don't think of any character of Shakespeare's as particularly obscure. He put a lot of Merlin into the original Owen, too.

I think Zelazny used what suited him. Conflating Mathers with Burke & Hare while naming them Morris & McCab seems reasonable to me. MacFarlane was the name of the body snatcher in RL Stevenson's story.

Andrea, I'm glad you're enjoying the chapter a day. I read the book cover to cover the first time, but enjoy this method far more since I really get/feel the story better.

Jim wrote: "Andrea, I'm glad you're enjoying the chapter a day. I read the book cover to cover the first time, but enjoy this method far more since I really get/feel the story better. "

You also find yourself re-reading parts since each chapter is short so you have time to go back and visit earlier chapters.

G33z3r wrote: "The text suggests that Zelazny is using "Movie Dr. Frankenstein" rather than Shelley's (her place in the dedication notwithstanding) as Shelley didn't have an Igor, grave robbing, or lightning. OTOH, the book's cover suggests the Shelley version, intelligent & conversational."

And if he was singing "Putting on the Ritz" we'd know it was the Young Frankenstein version.

Oct 6 - we know there is something that will happen at the center of the pattern created by drawing lines between the locations of all of the participant's houses, but it looks like all players may not be accounted for, and we also don't know Drac's location.

6Oct: The slitherers, aka Things in the Mirror, cracked their mirror, but Snuff set up a racket until Jack fetched his mundane (?) wand & transferred them to another mirror.

(What’s a ‘mundane’ wand? Can a magic wand be mundane?) Apparently the old one was a Yellow Emperor mirror. That might be a reference to the "The King in Yellow", or Hastur, which is not really of the Cthulhu Mythos (at least not originally), since it is Robert W. Chambers who wrote this book (in 1895). Lovecraft, however, was very inspired by Chambers work, as were other writers of that circle, and the King in Yellow has since been used by some writers writing in the Cthulhu genre. (Available for free on Gutenberg.org here: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8492)

Snuff is apparently seeking where the main event will take place by drawing a pattern between all the players. It’s not a simple intersection because apparently most can’t do it. The site that he & Nightwind have figured out so far doesn’t seem to be correct, but that could be because they don’t know where the Count is or if there are other players.

Hmmm… When & how did Snuff & Nightwind take talking about the Count for granted? I went back & read yesterday's entry again, but saw no mention of him as one of the players in their conversation. Did I miss something? Perhaps it just shows them both being cagey to a point & now they realize the other knows? They are both back at the same spot & would only show up there if they calculated using the same players & sites.

I love Nightwind’s comment about Graymalk, "Never trust a cat, anyway. All they're good for is stringing tennis racquets." Also the Thing in the Circle giving Snuff the ‘paw’.

Jim wrote: "6 Oct: Apparently the old one was a Yellow Emperor mirror. ..."

Huh. That's an interesting interpretation the sentence, "Jack.... transferred them all to another mirror, just like the Yellow Emperor." I thought the sentence a bit ambiguous, and was going to ask here, but I was thinking two other interpretations:

1. Jack transferred them the same way the Yellow Emperor did. I.e., someone called The Yellow Emperor had performed a similar transfer of the selfsame slitherers, perhaps, or of something else. The Yellow Emperor would them be a predecessor to Jack, and perhaps involved in the current game, or not. As in, "he called for a suicide squeeze, just like Dave Roberts."

2. Jack transferred them the same way Jack had transferred the Yellow Emperor. I.e., the Yellow Emperor is (or once was) one of the Things in the Mirrors. As in, Sammy Watkins ran a wheel route, just like Tyreek Hill."

It had not occurred to me that Yellow Emperor was a type of mirror. As in an "Aaron Rodgers jersey", I suppose.

I have no idea about the identity of Yellow Emperor. (I know little of Lovecraft or the Cthulhu Mythos.) I was vaguely aware of a Chinese demigod from antiquity, but checking Wikipedia didn't suggest any special relationship with mirrors or slitherers.