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<blockquote data-quote="Desdichado" data-source="post: 5016079" data-attributes="member: 2205">I don't know what being in the Library of America is supposed to prove.&nbsp; Maybe you could clarify.I'm talking about his writing craft.&nbsp; He's not that great at it.&nbsp; In fact, he's quite poor at it.&nbsp; He over-uses words like &quot;blasphemous&quot; and &quot;nameless&quot; and &quot;Cyclopean&quot; and &quot;eldritch.&quot;&nbsp; He thinks the addition of more exclamation points makes his writing more exciting (it doesn't.)&nbsp; He &quot;cheats&quot; by never describing anything; &quot;it can't be described&quot; or the narrator faints, or something.&nbsp; The promised payoff isn't delivered in most of his stories.And his most notorious example is the narrator who literally stopped to write his story while the freakin' monster was breaking into his house.&nbsp; While it was a laudable attempt to bring the plot &quot;into the moment&quot; (something that Lovecraft was poor at in general; he had a removed, slightly lecturely writing style), it was really quite silly at the same time.How much craft issues bother you is, of course, subjective and subject to personal interpretation.&nbsp; But a lot of those flaws certainly are objective ones.Also: although it is probably an atypical recommendation, I think the best place to start with Lovecraft, especially for a fantasy and D&amp;D fan, is &quot;The DreamQuest of Unknown Kadath.&quot;&nbsp; While it's not a typical Lovecraft story, in many ways, it does the cosmic horror better than the iconic Lovecraft stories.&nbsp; And the fact that it's also a sword &amp; sorcery story at the same time is just a bonus.&nbsp; Other than that, I've always been partial to &quot;The Shadow Over Innsmouth&quot;, &quot;The Colour Out of Space&quot;, &quot;Rats in the Walls&quot;, &quot;Dreams of the Witch-House&quot;, &quot;At the Mountains of Madness,&quot; and &quot;The Dunwich Horror.&quot;The latter illustrates some of the problems with Lovecraft in general, though.&nbsp; I mean the one villian that Lovecraft spends so much time building up gets killed by a dog?&nbsp; Whiskey Tango Foxtrot.&nbsp; Luckily he had a backup or the story would have been dead on arrival.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Desdichado, post: 5016079, member: 2205"] I don't know what being in the Library of America is supposed to prove. Maybe you could clarify. I'm talking about his writing [I]craft[/I]. He's not that great at it. In fact, he's quite poor at it. He over-uses words like "blasphemous" and "nameless" and "Cyclopean" and "eldritch." He thinks the addition of more exclamation points makes his writing more exciting (it doesn't.) He "cheats" by never describing anything; "it can't be described" or the narrator faints, or something. The promised payoff isn't delivered in most of his stories. And his most notorious example is the narrator who literally stopped to write his story[I] while the freakin' monster was breaking into his house[/I]. While it was a laudable attempt to bring the plot "into the moment" (something that Lovecraft was poor at in general; he had a removed, slightly lecturely writing style), it was really quite silly at the same time. How much craft issues bother you is, of course, subjective and subject to personal interpretation. But a lot of those flaws certainly are objective ones. Also: although it is probably an atypical recommendation, I think the best place to start with Lovecraft, especially for a fantasy and D&D fan, is "The DreamQuest of Unknown Kadath." While it's not a typical Lovecraft story, in many ways, it does the cosmic horror better than the iconic Lovecraft stories. And the fact that it's also a sword & sorcery story at the same time is just a bonus. Other than that, I've always been partial to "The Shadow Over Innsmouth", "The Colour Out of Space", "Rats in the Walls", "Dreams of the Witch-House", "At the Mountains of Madness," and "The Dunwich Horror." The latter illustrates some of the problems with Lovecraft in general, though. I mean the one villian that Lovecraft spends so much time building up gets killed by a dog? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Luckily he had a backup or the story would have been dead on arrival. [/QUOTE]

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