Demiurge: The Complete Cthulhu Mythos Tales of Michael Shea

While remaining true to the Lovecraft Mythos and its pantheon of the Great Old Ones, Michael Shea provides his own more modern unique and entertaining twist on the Mythos in this anthology. Shea moves the focus of the majority of the Lovecraftian horror from the New England east coast to the west coast San Francisco Bay area, although he does return to Antarctica in couple of the stories where HPL set his story “At the Mountains of Madness.” There is a running theme throughout the anthology of the Great Old Ones, with the help of their minions, beginning to establish a beachhead on Earth where they seek to reveal themselves to various individuals and either recruit them or physically absorb and merge them into themselves. A quote from the end of the short story “Dagoniad” points this out. ““But I've been hearing things. Before all this I mean. I've been hearing about shoggoths. I've been hearing about Cthulhu himself. “ What are you telling me?” “That somehow, this is a focus. That the Great Old Ones are...at the gates. Are picking the locks.”” These stories are full of skin-crawling horror that should satisfy fans of H. P. Lovecraft.

Shea does something truly extraordinary here - he faithfully recreates the outlines and the emotional impact of Lovecraft's mythos, but sheds the blue-blood New England setting and the upper class, educated white dude protagonists. You wouldn't think that homeless people, prostitutes, drug dealers, and alcoholics would be suitable as Lovecraftian heroes, but Shea makes it seem perfectly natural.

“Copping Squid” is the clear winner of all the stories. Creepy and otherwordly, while grounded and gritty. Loved it.

“Fat Face” is pretty effective too, although the reveal is unsurprising to any savvy mythos reader.

“Nemo Me Impune Lacessit” and “Dagoniad” are campy fun. I feel like Sam Raimi should adapt “Dagoniad” for film - the super gross-out horror melded with silly slapstick is just his thing.

The other stories range from OK to awful. “Under the Shelf” in particular squanders its strong opening in a laughably stupid climax and resolution.

Worth checking out if you're a Lovecraft fan! Though I did notice that my Kindle version had lots of misprints, unfortunately.