So I was thinking of reading some books by H.P Lovecraft...

[creepy_rabbit]

Could you guys help me out?
1. Which one should I start with?
2. Which one is the best one?
3. Thoughts on H.P Lovecrafts work

 

[twistedmic]

I could never get into Lovecraft. He uses/used far too many necessary big words (college professor or PHD level big words) for me to be able to read and enjoy. I have a fairly good vocabulary myself, but practically needed a dictionary and thesaurus to be able to understand half of what he was trying to say.

Now, my experience might not be typical, you might be able to read his work easily and find it highly enjoyable. But I'd suggest trying to check out one of his books from a library, or borrow one from a friend so you can see if you like it before you spend your any money on him.

 

[Cowabungaa]

I could never get into Lovecraft. He uses/used far too many necessary big words (college professor or PHD level big words) for me to be able to read and enjoy. I have a fairly good vocabulary myself, but practically needed a dictionary and thesaurus to be able to understand half of what he was trying to say.

Can't be worse than the Dune series. I mean they use the world "beastswelling" to describe an erection once.

 

[Sixcess]

1. Start with 'A Shadow Over Innsmouth', 'At The Mountains of Madness' or 'The Dunwich Horror'.

Good choices, though At The Mountains of Madness takes a really long time to get going. I think Shadow Over Innsmouth is probably his most accessible story, for a newcomer. I would also recommend

Pickman's Model - a personal favourite
The Whisperer in Darkness
In the Walls of Eryx - not a mythos story but sci-fi, with a very clever concept
The Haunter of the Dark

and of course The Call of Cthulhu, which isn't his best, but, y'know, it's Cthulhu.

 

[busterkeatonrules]

Personally, I own and enjoy the three Penguin Classics collections. These include the vast majority of Lovecraft's work, as well as a LOT of helpful annotations which can often make the obsolete cultural references a lot easier to understand!

The titles are:

THE CALL OF CTHULHU and Other Weird Stories
THE THING ON THE DOORSTEP and Other Weird Stories
THE DREAMS IN THE WITCH HOUSE and Other Weird Stories

- and I highly recommend them.

 

[Arluza]

I like having the Necronomicon, which is over 1000 pages of Lovecraft's work. I only paid $30 for it, which isn't a bad deal.

 

[Jerubbaal]

In addition to what has already been said, I'd like to recommend a slightly less popular Lovecraft story: The Dreams in the Witch House. Creeped me out more than any of Lovecraft's other tales.

Also, you can find virtually all of his writings online for free since it's all in the public domain.

EDIT: I see someone already made my recommendation

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath yet. That, At the Mountains of Madness, Herbert West: Reanimator and The Call of Cthulu are the really long works he wrote (as in novella length instead of short story length; the guy idolized Poe) and The Dream Quest of Unknow Kadath is my personal favorite Lovecraft story. It's dark fantasy, and if you read it, you'll understand a lot of what influenced Steven King while he was writing The Dark Tower.

Just so you know, Lovecraft's stories fall into three general categories:

• 
  
  The Cthulu Mythos
  
  The Dream Cycle
  
  Standalone Works
  

The Cthulu Mythos is what most people think of when they think of Lovecraft. It contains stuff like The Call of Cthulu, At the Mountains of Madness, and The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

The Dream Cycle is less known, but in my opinion, better. It includes things like The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, The Cats of Ulthar, and The Colour out of Space. Instead of giant monsters, it deals with where we go when we dream.

The standalone works are just that, works that don't fit into his two big categories. They include things like The Terrible Old Man and Herbert West: Reanimator, the latter of which you may recognize as the story that the cult classic film Reanimator was based on.

One last note: The Cthulu Mythos and the Dream Cycle exist in the same universe, and some stories have some cross over (for example, the plateau of Leng is mentioned in At The Mountains of Madness as being something described in the Necronomicon, and it plays a big role in The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath.) The stories generally have a different feel to them, but they all take place in the same general universe.

 

[UltraDeth]

I've been thinking about reading Lovecraft, but since I'm not much of a reader I probably never will. I am interested in the Elder Gods mythos which plays a big part in his books

 

[Alphakirby]

I like having the Necronomicon, which is over 1000 pages of Lovecraft's work. I only paid $30 for it, which isn't a bad deal.

You lucky mother fucker,I wish I knew where to find Lovecraftian works,for some reason my school doesn't seem to have them...

 

[Kpt._Rob]

Honestly, if I were you I wouldn't bother with Lovecraft at all, I would read a contemporary author who draws inspiration from Lovecraft. Don't get me wrong here, Lovecraft had some really interesting ideas, especially for his time. He is, in many ways, the cornerstone of modern horror fiction. That said, apart from his ideas, he was a terrible author. He was always overly verbose, way too interested in describing things which were unimportant to the plot, and awful at writing characters. Most of his characters are the same person with a different name and job title, and those that aren't are so flat and lifeless I'd think he'd based them on cardboard cutouts. In his book On Writing Stephen King actually used an excerpt from Lovecraft as an example of bad writing.

Your time would be much better spent reading Ramsey Campbell's works. Or even better, picking up Alan Moore's graphic novel The Courtyard (though I hear Neonomicon is good too). But most of the interest in reading Lovecraft himself is primarily historical. His ideas have all been borrowed by superior contemporary authors, and there aren't a lot of good reasons to actually bother slogging through his work.

 

[Uber Evil]

Random H.P. Lovecraft Funfact: Did you know that Conan the Barbarian is set in the same universe as the C'thulhu Mythos? There are even references to the "Old Ones" and "The Snake God Set" in some of the older, original, Conan books.

Let me guess, you got that from cracked.
OT: People have already stated what I'm going to say.

 

[Stall]

He never really wrote any novels... he almost wrote exclusively short stories. Just go buy a compilation of his short stories and start from the front cover. It's that easy.

He's basic Poe-lite though, so unless you enjoy Poe, then don't bother with Lovecraft.

 

[FrostyRoskies]

As soon as I read The Music of Erich Zann I was hooked. Pretty short, but made me want to read the rest of Lovecraft's work. Which I did, and loved it. You can get his complete works from Barnes and Noble for like 20 bucks. Good deal.

 

[Chased]

I could never get into Lovecraft. He uses/used far too many necessary big words (college professor or PHD level big words) for me to be able to read and enjoy. I have a fairly good vocabulary myself, but practically needed a dictionary and thesaurus to be able to understand half of what he was trying to say.

Now, my experience might not be typical, you might be able to read his work easily and find it highly enjoyable. But I'd suggest trying to check out one of his books from a library, or borrow one from a friend so you can see if you like it before you spend your any money on him.

Couldn't agree more with this. I tried multiple times to read Lovecraft's work but I find it so overly wordy that it becomes more of a chore than anything else.

 

[dyre]

I could never get into Lovecraft. He uses/used far too many necessary big words (college professor or PHD level big words) for me to be able to read and enjoy. I have a fairly good vocabulary myself, but practically needed a dictionary and thesaurus to be able to understand half of what he was trying to say.

Now, my experience might not be typical, you might be able to read his work easily and find it highly enjoyable. But I'd suggest trying to check out one of his books from a library, or borrow one from a friend so you can see if you like it before you spend your any money on him.

Couldn't agree more with this. I tried multiple times to read Lovecraft's work but I find it so overly wordy that it becomes more of a chore than anything else.

I'll add my agreement here. I read, or attempted to read, several of Lovecraft's pieces, but parts of his stories will be so horribly verbose that I just can't go on.