The Horror of It All: Encrusted Gems from the " Crypt of Cthulhu "/ Starmont Studies in Literary Criticism # 31 (inc. Strange Case of Robert Ervin Howard; Solar Pons Meets Cthulhu; Mythos Fiction of Robert Bloch; Clark Ashton Smythos [ Smith ]; etc)

Mercer Island, Washington : Mercer Island, WA: Starmont Books, 1990, 1st Edition, First Printing, 1990. ------------( 1st printing of the First Edition ) --- trade paperback, about 5.25 x 8 inches, a Near Fine unread example, light rubbing mainly to the rear cover, small sticker on front panel, 199 pages plus an illustarted page showing a faux ad for CoolAire air conditioning, ---From the Introduction ---Ph-nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn, In his house at R’lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming. According to H.P. Lovecraft horror awaits humanity in the depths of R’lyeh, where Great Cthulhu lurks in his crypt. What lurks in this volume, a collection from Crypt of Cthulhu magazine, is horror, too, the literary kind. As you grow increasingly absorbed, slowly turning the pages with fright-numbed fingers, you’ll see what marvels and terrors have kept many readers loyal to Crypt of Cthulhu, which, yes, I will admit to editing. In this collection I have tried to present a cross section of Crypt, including representative genres, topics, principal contributors to the magazine, and authors treated in our articles. The main focus, as always in the magazine, is on criticism and research, and Lovecraft forms the basis of more of this than anyone else does. But you will also find discussions of Robert Bloch, Robert E. Howard, Henry Kuttner, Lin Carter, Brian Lumley, Colin Wilson, August Derleth, and Clark Ashton Smith. There is a pinch of fiction, including a new posthumous collaboration based on a newly discovered and quite extensive set of notes by HPL. A handful of our trademark satirical pieces round out the volume. Thus I think the book fulfills its promise of providing “the horror of it all, the whole Cryptic gamut. The title is not, as one might expect, The Best of The Crypt of Cthulhu since there is simply too much to choose from. ---contents are: Introduction by Robert M. Price ; Lovecraft’s Revisions: How Much of Them Did He Write? by S.T. Joshi (Crypt of Cthulhu 11) ; The Real World and the Dream World in Lovecraft by Joshi ( 15) ; The Origin of Lovecraft’s Black Magic Quote by David E. Schultz (48) ; Lovecraft’s Ghouls by Will Murray (14) ; Baring-Gould and the Ghouls: The Influence of Curious Myths of the Middle Ages on The Rats in the Walls by Steven J. Mariconda (14) ; The Hound -a Dead Dog? by Mariconda ( 38) ; On The Loved Dead by Schultz (17) ; Digging Up Irem by Lin Carter (45) ; CAS & Divers Hands by Steve Behrends (26) ; The Clark Ashton Smythos by Murray (26) ; The Cthulhu Mythos Fiction of Robert Bloch by Randall D. Larson (40) ; Reconstructing De Vermis Mysteriis by Price (23) ; Solar Pons Meets Cthulhu by Joshi (6) ; The True History of the Tcho-Tcho People by Price and Tani Jantsang (51) ; Obed and Obadiah Marsh by Price and Tani Jantsang (18) ; The Strange Case of Robert Ervin Howard by Charles Hoffman and Marc A. Cerasini (3) ; Gol-Goroth, A Forgotten Old One by Price (3) ; The Statement of Lin Carter by Price (2) ; The Carter-Smith Collaborations by Behrends (36) ; Henry Kuttner’s Cthulhu Mythos Fiction: An Overview by Shawn Ramsey (51) ; The Transition of Colin Wilson by Hoffman and Cerasini (7) ; Brian Lumley—Reanimator by Price (19) ; The Fantasy and Mystery Bookshop by Peter H. Cannon (47) ; The Pool by Donald R. Burleson (47) ; The Volume Out of Print by Jim Cort (52) ; Strange Manuscript Found in the Vermont Woods by Carter (54) ; The Cthulhuers by John Strysik (18) ; Lovecraft as I Seem to Remember Him by Price (as F. Gumby Kalem) (14) ; Lovecraft’s Letters to Santa Claus: An Introduction by Price (46), any image directly beside this listing is the actual book and not a generic photo ///NOT SIGNED ---GUARANTEED to be AVAILABLE/// ---sizes are approximate (generally within 1/8 inch)---. First Edition. Soft Cover. Near Fine (see description). Illus. by Uncredited Cover Art. 5.25w x 8h Inches.