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Neurosis posted:I thought More Dark was all in good fun. My image of the story has been shattered; the Ligotti stuff made me giggle. Why? I read the review with the "sour tone" and my image of the story wasn't exactly shattered by somebody saying "there's more to it, I don't understand why he wrote it". I like Ligotti and the caricature was still hilarious and not that mean-spirited.
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Nov 19, 2013 15:24
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I can't imagine Barron's version of Thomas Ligotti is any less flattering than the one the man himself gives in interviews. It's hard to caricature a caricature.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:54
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Since somebody mentioned webcomics on the last page, and I can't remember if it's been mentioned yet, it's worth bringing up Broodhollow. It's from the guy who did Starslip Crisis, so its art is pretty cartoony-- but to Straub's credit, he does a pretty good job of using that to his advantage. He paces pretty well between simple light-heartedness and pretty creepy Lovecraftian moments.
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Nov 20, 2013 07:47
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Anyone have an opinion on Jeremy Robert Johnson? I saw him recommended to me on Amazon and the reviews for his We Live Inside You look pretty good but I know to not trust internet reviews very far.
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Nov 25, 2013 13:22
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I've only had time to read a few stories in Johnson's book but they've been pretty  . Check it out if you like sci-fi/horror or body horror!
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Nov 27, 2013 08:17
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Thread kind of dead so going to recommend two great books i read recently in this genre both by same author. Dead Sea - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008YA4RR0/ref=oh_d__o02_details_o02__i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 The Hive - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008GWT2NK/ref=oh_d__o00_details_o00__i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1 (Kind of continues a future version of at the mountain of madness by HPL)
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Dec 25, 2013 09:47
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I really like some of Tim Curran's stuff (The Underdwelling was amazing,and the one about the weird flesh-monster in prison was great). But The Hive was honestly a total car-crash, he revealed way too much too early, made it clear the monsters were super-invulnerable so there was zero tension at any point and he just killed off all the characters you expected him to and left the rest alive. Really really didn't get on with it at all.
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Dec 27, 2013 15:10
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So, what cosmic horror is best at being cosmic? Y'know, giving a sense of scope and grandeur, conveying a universe that is alien, uncaring, and utterly inimical to human life.
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Feb 4, 2014 01:26
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Darth Walrus posted:So, what cosmic horror is best at being cosmic? Y'know, giving a sense of scope and grandeur, conveying a universe that is alien, uncaring, and utterly inimical to human life. A Colder War by Charles Stross, and its even free to read online!
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Feb 4, 2014 01:33
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Darth Walrus posted:So, what cosmic horror is best at being cosmic? Y'know, giving a sense of scope and grandeur, conveying a universe that is alien, uncaring, and utterly inimical to human life. There are the classic answers, Ligotti, Kiernan, and Barron, but here's a new entry: Whom the Gods Would Destroy by Brian Hodge.
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Feb 4, 2014 02:33
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Ornamented Death posted:There are the classic answers, Ligotti, Kiernan, and Barron, but here's a new entry: Whom the Gods Would Destroy by Brian Hodge. You've mentioned (Caitlin) Kiernan before, but looking through her Amazon listings, her books have some godawful covers that make them seem like your standard supernatural romance fiction a la Anita Blake. Don't judge books by their covers blah blah but the only one from the description that even seems like cosmic horror would be her short story collection "The Ape's Wife and Other Stories." Unless there are multiple Caitlin Kiernan's, which would be unfortunate.
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Feb 4, 2014 03:59
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I am specifically referring to her short story collections, of which there are several. I keep forgetting they aren't widely available, though  .Regarding her novels, I've only read one but my understanding is that the covers have fallen victim to the success of Laurell Hamilton, but the actual stories are nothing like that. I know for a fact this is the case with The Red Tree as it's 100% cosmic horror, albeit perhaps a little more low-key than most folks in this thread would like.
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Feb 4, 2014 05:25
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I really struggle with 'You can't judge a book by its cover' when it comes to genre fiction.
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Feb 4, 2014 05:26
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TOOT BOOT posted:I really struggle with 'You can't judge a book by its cover' when it comes to genre fiction. If I wasn't already familiar with Kiernan through her short fiction, I'd probably assume the worst, too.
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Feb 4, 2014 05:29
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Ornamented Death posted:I am specifically referring to her short story collections, of which there are several. I keep forgetting they aren't widely available, though I started reading The Red Tree, but it moved really loving slowly. I got 28% of the way through before giving up, according to my Kindle, and still nothing interesting had happened. When does it pick up?
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Feb 4, 2014 05:53
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Neurosis posted:I started reading The Red Tree, but it moved really loving slowly. I got 28% of the way through before giving up, according to my Kindle, and still nothing interesting had happened. When does it pick up? It starts getting weird when the main character (been years since I read it, so I can't remember her name) first walks around the tree, and gets progressively weirder after that, culminating in a really hosed up trip through the basement that includes a lot of stuff that goes unexplained (not a terribly specific spoiler, but tagged just in case). However, like I said, it's a low-key story and if the general weird atmosphere didn't do it for you, chances are the few "action" scenes won't, either.
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Feb 4, 2014 06:02
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While searching through some cosmic horror on Amazon, I came upon this upcoming new book from Thomas Ligotti: http://www.amazon.com/Spectral-Link-Thomas-Ligotti/dp/1596066504 Unfortunately it is only 96 pages. I feel bad wanting more from the man given that he apparently has to subject himself to some gross misery to write, but uh, yeah I want more. Also goddamn, that blurb.
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Feb 4, 2014 06:03
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GrandpaPants posted:While searching through some cosmic horror on Amazon, I came upon this upcoming new book from Thomas Ligotti: http://www.amazon.com/Spectral-Link-Thomas-Ligotti/dp/1596066504 Link if you want a signed/numbered copy, though frankly I think their price is ridiculous considering what they've ostensibly valued Ligotti's signature at in the past.
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Feb 4, 2014 06:06
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Ornamented Death posted:It starts getting weird when the main character (been years since I read it, so I can't remember her name) first walks around the tree, and gets progressively weirder after that, culminating in a really hosed up trip through the basement that includes a lot of stuff that goes unexplained (not a terribly specific spoiler, but tagged just in case). However, like I said, it's a low-key story and if the general weird atmosphere didn't do it for you, chances are the few "action" scenes won't, either. All I recall was her agonising over her previous relationships for many pages. I'll check out her short fiction instead, I think. Also will check out Whom the Gods Would Destroy since that seems a bit more overtly Lovecraftian. It's very hard to scratch that Lovecraftian itch. Most of those who ape is style manage to make it cheesy and unreadable. Barron's the only one who's really worked for me as coming close on a reasonably reliable basis (A Colder War is obviously the high point, otherwise). Ligotti works, too, but his writing style is more removed from cosmic horror than Barron's. Neurosis fucked around with this message at 06:46 on Feb 4, 2014 |
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Feb 4, 2014 06:43
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Neurosis posted:Ligotti works, too, but his writing style is more removed from cosmic horror than Barron's. I had the exact opposite take, actually, though. Ligotti's work seems to really invoke the idea that the universe is indifferently inimical to human life and values, that reason and emotion are not merely hopeless, but meaningless. Barron, on the other hand, seems to focus more on a universe that's filled with utterly alien things, but these things, at least when they interact with our world, tend to end up being portrayed as malicious or ravenous, which aren't monster motivations restricted to cosmic horror, to say the least. I think this distinction exists in style, as well: Barron tends to build, through tone and description, a recognizably normal world that quickly becomes invaded by menace and strangeness, whereas Ligotti's worlds are intrinsically oppressive and rotten, regardless of setting, with his style tending to highlight disgust rather than menace. tl;dr: In Barron, the horror is the awful things the indifferent universe produces; in Ligotti, the horror is the indifferent universe itself. Which is closer to how I think of "cosmic horror."
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Feb 4, 2014 09:29
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The reason I really enjoy Ligotti more than most other writers of this genre's ilk is because instead of evoking the idea of "cosmic" intelligences beyond our comprehension, his take on it is a lot more personal & close. It's as if the idea that our worst horrors happened upon Earth casually while exploring & consuming other parts of the universe isn't the actual origin; rather, it's been here since before mankind and almost needs humanity in order to thrive.
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Feb 4, 2014 09:47
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C2C - 2.0 posted:The reason I really enjoy Ligotti more than most other writers of this genre's ilk is because instead of evoking the idea of "cosmic" intelligences beyond our comprehension, his take on it is a lot more personal & close. It's as if the idea that our worst horrors happened upon Earth casually while exploring & consuming other parts of the universe isn't the actual origin; rather, it's been here since before mankind and almost needs humanity in order to thrive. The "close and personal" sentiment is spot on IMO. Someone in this thread mentioned a crucial difference in protagonists: Barron's, as most other writers', protagonists usually try to fight whatever menaces them before they inevitably succumb, while Ligotti's are almost always resigned, passive observers of whatever happens to them. This is pretty obviously a result of what the guy keeps loudly insisting is his normal mode of existence, namely lying in bed staring at the ceiling and feeling helpless, but it does serve to make his stories even darker. You really get the sense that whatever oppressive entities are out there are also seeping into the narrator's mind and invading his self, and for me that's an even bigger headfuck. Of course, the flipside of this is that every story is narrated less by a character and more by a sentient embodiment of "hey everyone Thomas Ligotti feels bad a whole lot", but anyone who reads cosmic horror for the living, breathing, three-dimensional characters is in for one hell of a disappointment anyway.
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Feb 4, 2014 13:20
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Ornamented Death posted:There are the classic answers, Ligotti, Kiernan, and Barron, but here's a new entry: Whom the Gods Would Destroy by Brian Hodge. Read Whom the Gods Would Destroy. It's good. Very solid prose, hit the right notes. A short read, but that's not a bad thing. Anything else by Hodge in this vein? Re: Ligotti... The above posters are right in that Barron makes his cosmic horrors much more malevolent and overtly evil than is traditional in cosmic horror, while Ligotti's universe seems more passive and indifferent. Nonetheless something about the entities Barron writes of feel more comparable to the Outer Gods and Great Old Ones that were in Lovecraft's bestiary. The grounding in the real world also resonates more. Some of Lovecraft's protagonists did try to fight back, as well, some with success, although none were the cigarette smoking whisky drinking alpha males seen in Barron's works. For whatever reason, the oppressive and bizarre worlds Ligotti writes of I enjoy a lot as interesting ideas, but it's Barron's work that has made my skin crawl.
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Feb 5, 2014 08:26
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Neurosis posted:Re: Ligotti... The above posters are right in that Barron makes his cosmic horrors much more malevolent and overtly evil than is traditional in cosmic horror, while Ligotti's universe seems more passive and indifferent. Nonetheless something about the entities Barron writes of feel more comparable to the Outer Gods and Great Old Ones that were in Lovecraft's bestiary. The grounding in the real world also resonates more. Some of Lovecraft's protagonists did try to fight back, as well, some with success, although none were the cigarette smoking whisky drinking alpha males seen in Barron's works. For whatever reason, the oppressive and bizarre worlds Ligotti writes of I enjoy a lot as interesting ideas, but it's Barron's work that has made my skin crawl. See, I'm the exact opposite: with the more traditional Lovecraftian horror, I'm still somewhat excited as a reader because the "unknown" of those stories are still monsters after a fashion; hell, I've always had a crush on Nyarlathotep because even though the mythos that exists is great, deep, and quite haunting, it's still something that I can picture within the framework of the horror genre itself. The idea(!) of the Old Ones et. al. and their interaction with humans is truly terrifying, yet the physical depictions still allow me to think of them in a more conventional light. With Ligotti, the physical description of the horrors (if there's even any in whatever particular story you're reading) is afforded much less importance or description versus the inevitable outcome of brushing up against these "things". I dunno', I guess I'd describe Barron and other writers of his ilk as people who present horror on a grandiose scale. Ligotti, on the other hand, feels very close, very uncomfortable, and very unnerving. Funny thing is that some of Clive Barker's earlier works actually hit this same note for me also.
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Feb 5, 2014 09:09
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Neurosis posted:Read Whom the Gods Would Destroy. It's good. Very solid prose, hit the right notes. A short read, but that's not a bad thing. Anything else by Hodge in this vein? Not cosmic horror, no. However, he's been writing for decades, so there's a fair of his stuff in other types of horror. I'm currently reading Dark Advent, which is similar to The Stand except most of the supernatural stuff is gone, and Hodge doesn't meander with the story. without Purpose Without Pity is probably my favorite story of his; it's another short one, but drat is it good.
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Feb 5, 2014 14:00
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Bit of a tangent, media-wise, but apparently the writer behind HBO's True Detective has mentioned being directly influenced by Thomas Ligotti in a couple of recent interviews. I haven't seen it myself yet, but there were apparently a couple lines in the first episode specifically written to sound Ligotti-esque. I certainly wouldn't mind this leading to a little upswing in popularity for the man, even though he doesn't sound like the sort of person who'd be cheered up by news of that.
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Feb 11, 2014 04:44
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BigSkillet posted:Bit of a tangent, media-wise, but apparently the writer behind HBO's True Detective has mentioned being directly influenced by Thomas Ligotti in a couple of recent interviews. I haven't seen it myself yet, but there were apparently a couple lines in the first episode specifically written to sound Ligotti-esque. I didn't know this, but in retrospect it sorta makes sense. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOGoX1B6_2k
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Feb 11, 2014 05:06
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GrandpaPants posted:I didn't know this, but in retrospect it sorta makes sense. They have been alluding to a dark god since the second episode when they find that girls notebook and she wrote about the yellow king. It just keeps getting lumped into Satanism by people who are outside of the church and probably don't know what the gently caress an elder god is.
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Feb 11, 2014 05:11
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BigSkillet posted:Bit of a tangent, media-wise, but apparently the writer behind HBO's True Detective has mentioned being directly influenced by Thomas Ligotti in a couple of recent interviews. I haven't seen it myself yet, but there were apparently a couple lines in the first episode specifically written to sound Ligotti-esque. I hadn't seen that show, thanks. When Rust starts talking in the car about human consciousness being a misstep in evolution it could have been taken from The Conspiracy Against the Human Race.
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Feb 11, 2014 08:18
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Stephen King does cosmic horror pretty well. If you want to read a recent duo of loving disturbing and creepy stories, check out N. and the very Laird-Barron-esque In the Tall Grass (which he co-wrote with his son, Joe Hill). 
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Feb 11, 2014 11:47
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Hope you guys don't mind me asking for something related. I've been looking to get into horror again and I'm not sure what's popular these days. I'm not necessarily into cosmic horror. Got any recommendations?
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Feb 11, 2014 20:21
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Ninja fetus posted:Hope you guys don't mind me asking for something related. I've been looking to get into horror again and I'm not sure what's popular these days. I'm not necessarily into cosmic horror. Got any recommendations? Some Joe Hill maybe? Horns is okay in my book. What kind of horror do you like?
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Feb 11, 2014 20:44
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ravenkult posted:Some Joe Hill maybe? Horns is okay in my book. What kind of horror do you like?
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Feb 11, 2014 20:54
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Ninja fetus posted:Good question. I'm not sure to be honest. I've read Clive Barker's Books of blood and a few Stephen King novels. They were pretty cheesy sometimes although I was entertained for the most part. I guess I'd like my novels to be less cheesy? I'm sorry I can't really put into words what I'm looking for. I'm open to all suggestions and then I'll pick something. Well here's a brief list of various kinds of horror to get you started. The Rising by Brian Keene (zombies) 'Salem's Lot by Stephen King (vampires) Teatro Grottesco by Thomas Ligotti (literary horror and cosmic horror) The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (classic horror) The Weird edited by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer (weird fiction) The Hole by William Meikle (monsters) Cheese levels very from zero to a fair amount.
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Feb 11, 2014 22:19
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Ninja fetus posted:Hope you guys don't mind me asking for something related. I've been looking to get into horror again and I'm not sure what's popular these days. I'm not necessarily into cosmic horror. Got any recommendations? Brian Evenson is probably one of the best writers writing horror at the moment. Get Windeye, its got most of the really good stuff in it.
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Feb 11, 2014 22:27
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If you liked Clive Barker then a few more of his that I like are The Great and Secret Show The Damnation Game Cabal Those three all have Barker's trademark two worlds interacting in horrific ways. Two others that are more "fantastic" but still in his milieu are Weaveworld Imajica (good but very long) In a more cosmic horror vein then Ramsey Campbell is good - Cold Print has some spooky stuff in it.
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Feb 11, 2014 22:30
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Ninja fetus posted:Hope you guys don't mind me asking for something related. I've been looking to get into horror again and I'm not sure what's popular these days. I'm not necessarily into cosmic horror. Got any recommendations?
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Feb 11, 2014 22:33
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Ninja fetus posted:Hope you guys don't mind me asking for something related. I've been looking to get into horror again and I'm not sure what's popular these days. I'm not necessarily into cosmic horror. Got any recommendations? What kind of stuff interests you? serial killers? gore? haunted houses? zombies? vampires? If you like haunted houses I'd go with Richard Matheson's Hell House if you want seventies style creepy weirdness and Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House if you want spooky ambiance. Adam Nevill is a popular UK author who does some good stuff. I really liked The Ritual about a group of friends that get lost in the Scadinavian Wilderness and get hunted down by an unnamed Ancient Horror. Will Elliot wrote this great book called The Pilo Family Circus about this guy who gets pulled into a Circus of the Damned by these crazy clowns who end up turning him into one of them.
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Feb 12, 2014 04:33
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Poutling posted:
I'll vouch for the first half of this. Cut the second part off and you got a really good novella.
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Feb 12, 2014 09:17
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langurmonkey posted:If you liked Clive Barker then a few more of his that I like are I can back up the recommendations for The Great and Secret Show and Weaveworld. I really, really disliked The Damnation Game however.
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