A reread of the material but not in this edition before. There are some decent notes but i don't really care much for annotations.

The Horror at Redhook [3/5]
This is considered one of Lovecraft's most racist stories... yeah the mixed race stuff is distinctly icky, but it is interesting that the bad guy is basically a fat version of Lovecraft himself. With the foreign helpers not some random people but one particular tribe of Kurdish devil worshippers.
Anyway the main issue with this tale much like 'Imprisoned with the Pharaohs' is when it gets all dreamlike and you have the vague giant supernatural things marching about.

The Call of Cthulhu [3/5]
This one never really works for me. Main issue is that its all so past, the main horror is long over and cultists just arn't scary.

The Colour Out of Space [4/5]
I like the fact he's never going to drink the water despite how happy he is that the area is flooded now. I bet someone could do a good sequel to this where it turns out putting the main drinking supply resevoir in this area was a really bad idea :P .

The Dunwich Horror [5/5]
One section is very Ninth Gate and the outbreak of the horror is very Tremors :D . They even do a bit where in a line, a shed gets knocked down, then a fence, then the house gets hit, all by a creature which is out of your view.

The Whisperer in Darkness [4/5]
I was trying to figure out what this reminded me of... Invasion of the Bodysnatchers?, Wicker Man? but no it feels most like the early bits of Lord of the Rings where they're trying to escape the Shire and get past Bree. The weird enemies, their human collaborators, the messages going wrong, the farmer and his guard dogs of course.
The one stumbling block is that Lovecraft still focuses too much on the horror of the alien but the real horror in this is the familiar. This is the threat the natives feel when the big mining corporation starts moving into the area. It reminded me a bit of This Island Earth.

At the Mountains of Madness [4/5]
This one suffers a little from being to detailed. You could consider it one of Lovecrafts least racist in that he is able to sympathise with a completely alien culture... on the other hand the aliens he finds sympathy with are masters, whose slaves rose up against them... so it could also be considered one of Lovecrafts most racist stories, perspective is a wonderful thing ;) .

Dreams in the Witch House [3/5]
Too drawn out for the kind of horror its trying to generate. A protagonist called Gilman who is being driven insane by weird aspects of their room.. clearly a nod to Charlotte Perkins Gilmans 'The Yellow Wallpaper'. Also the way the other tenants try to help is liberally borrowed from Harkers train journey in Dracula.
I read this at the same time as Flatland, very appropriate company. Kaziahs method for escaping death is very similar to Alberts (Deaths assistant) in Discworld. Also i wonder if this had any influence on the chest burster scene from Alien :lol.

The Shadow Over Innsmouth [4/5]
A lot of different horror tropes in this one and done pretty well. It could be a little tighter however. I'm detecting hints of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Fly, The Wicker Man, the Truman Show :P .

The Shadow Out of Time [5/5]
This could have been a bit more emotional given what the protagonist has been through and lost but it does make up for that quite a bit near the end.
I do like how not evil the bad guys are, it could have been a lot worse for the protagonist if the aliens weren't just trying to do a job. They're not vicious, its not personal, they just have stuff to do. It also couldn't have been very pleasant for them either, theres a touch of '12 Monkeys' about it. ( )

Annotations!