J. Blackmore

This was a great quick read and I found it refreshing to read something like this between longer and more complicated books. I enjoyed all the short stories quite a lot and it was great that you could read one story, take a little break or just go through the whole book without stopping (like I did, because it was so good). There were a couple of stories that confused me a little bit but they were good none the less and I will be looking forward to reading similar books to this.

*ARC received from publisher through Netgalley… (more)

This is a collection of eight short stories edited by J. Blackmore and published by Circlet Press, which marries erotica to H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. No doubt Lovecraft would look on in horror at any form of overt sexuality being connected to his work and there is little doubt that his strange vistas of cosmic horror don't obviously lend themselves to erotica, but there was always more than a hint of a sublimated sexuality (albeit one horrified by the notion of sex) buried in Lovecraft's work. You wouldn't have to be the greatest psychologist to be able to conclude on Lovecraft's sexual hang-ups in all his talk of terrifying wet, slimy orifices and rampant tentacles. This collection therefore takes that strange sublimated sexuality as a launch pad into strange new areas and a more overt approach. All the stories in the collection are very good and I particularly enjoyed "Ink" by Bernie Mojzes, "Koenigsberg’s Model" by Peter Tupper and "The Artist’s Retreat” from Annabeth Longa. "Ink" sees a private detective meeting the Eldritch Horror in a dingy bar as part of his investigation into a missing girl. He discovers that Eldritch may be offering strange sexual services and finds himself participating in an orgy with otherworldly tentacled horror. In "Koenigsberg’s Model” a student at Miskatonic University, undertaking a thesis on pornography, discovers the sketchbook of a legendary comic book artist (a thinly disguised Jack Kirby) and is sucked into a strange otherworldly relationship with the bookstore owner. “The Artist’s Retreat" sees the narrator of the story getting a strange card from her artist friend, which persuades her to go up country to visit her old pal. Arriving at her friend's retreat she becomes enamoured of her new work and suddenly finds herself becoming subject to strange, kinky sexual urges. The other stories in the collection are: “A Reflection of Kindness” by Kennan Feng; “The Dreams in the Laundromat” by Elizabeth Reeve; "Sheik" by Angela Caperton; The Flower of Innsmouth" by Monique Poirier and “When the Stars Come” by Alex Picchetti. All the stories are good and there isn't a failure amongst them. They are all are very much of the Mythos and display a strong understanding of Lovecraft and his works. The language throughout is also very good, full of atmosphere and redolent of Lovecraft's approach. Most of the stories carry clever little touches and have quite an unsettling quality; even the erotic elements have a more horrific than sexual feel. "Whispers in Darkness" is a great wee collection – it is effective, ambitious, unsettling and horrific in equal measure, as well as being compellingly Lovecraftian in its delivery.… (more)