Black Wings of Cthulhu (Volume Three)

This third installment of S. T. Joshi’s critically acclaimed Black Wings series contains seventeen stories by some of the foremost writers in contemporary weird fiction, using the ideas, imagery, and atmosphere of H. P. Lovecraft’s tales as springboards. Jonathan Thomas opens the book with a chilling tale of biological horror set in Lovecraft’s native Providence, Rhode Island. Caitlín R. Kiernan melds brooding melancholy with Lovecraftian cosmicism in her tale, while Simon Strantzas weaves an ingenious variant on Lovecraft’s concept of the ghoul. Darrell Schweitzer and Donald Tyson probe the notion of alternate worlds in their tales.

This volume takes the reader on imaginative journeys around the world. Don Webb finds Lovecraftian horror in the wilds of Texas; Peter Cannon’s characters encounter the denizens of Innsmouth on a trip to China; Mollie L. Burleson enlivens the American Southwest with terrors out of history. Joseph S. Pulver, Sr., revivifies Lovecraft’s ancient New England seaport of Kingsport, Massachusetts, while in their collaborative tale W. H. Pugmire and Jessica Amanda Salmonson do the same with Lovecraft’s iconic Arkham. The volume concludes with a searching rumination on Lovecraft’s early tale “From Beyond” by Brian Stableford.

Black Wings III demonstrates how H. P. Lovecraft’s work continues to inspire some of the best in contemporary weird writing.