Finally, at long long last! Finally, I've finished reading the Necronomicon, written by the mad Arab Alhaz...I mean, The Complete Works of H. P. Lovecraft! I did intend to do it slowly, savoring each story before moving on to the next, so it's no surprise how long it took. But still... finally!

First off, enormous kudos to ChthulhuChick for creating this! Your formatting is great, the whole thing read like a dream on the Nook Simple Touch and the Kobo Aura. The rest of my review and rating applies only to the fictions themselves; your contribution would net a solid 5 stars if there was a separate rating for that.

Now, on to the eldritch. I honestly have to say I'm disappointed. I wonder if other people have experienced this. So much of Lovecraft is embedded within our culture now, so many people claim him as inspiration. How could I possibly not have high expectations once I got around to the genuine article? Much like every single one of Lovecraft's characters, I now have to wonder whether it's better to know the nameless truth, or live in decadent ignorance. Like your typical noisome antiquarian, I had to go and spoil my adoration for HPL by digging up the singularly loathsome original manuscripts. They proved to be disproportionate to the cyclopean gibbering they lead to, and not as unutterably abnormal as I had hoped. If it isn't blasphemous to say so, these antediluvian writings are all basically the same: some accursed, demoniac, fungoid lurker from the Stygian, non-euclidean depths drives a furtive mortal to ululating madness. Squamous.

Not to say that many of them weren't great, of course! The ones I enjoyed the most were often not what I expected going in. My favorites include: Dagon, The Terrible Old Man, The Nameless City, The Moon-Bog, The Rats in the Walls, Pickman's Model, The Colour Out of Space, and The Thing on the Doorstep. Very surprisingly (to me at least), The Picture in the House was by far my favorite, despite it lacking much of the supernatural bent I look for in horror.

I feel somehow compelled to give this at least 4 stars, although in my heart of hearts I know the stories merit a 3 on average, at best. I guess the old racist shoggoth deserves that much for introducing some fantastic new concepts into modern horror. Either that, or it's Nyarlathotep pulling inexorably upon my mind. Ia! Ia Shub-Niggurath! Ph'nglui Mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!