The Horror at Red Hook

Lovecraft definitely not at his best, and also at his most overtly-racist. Anyway I wanted to read it before reading The Ballad of Black Tom, so I did!

Two stars because even when Lovecraft is terrible, things are still deliciously weird.

Lovecraft uses the words “hatefully negroid mouth.” No coming back from that, really. It's a short story, and I drifted off to sleep twice. Joke's on old H. P since I read this to prepare for Victor Lavalle's book, a better writer. (Read Lovecraft many years ago, so feel confident in my assessment. )

I read that this is the inspiration for [b:The Ballad of Black Tom 26883558 The Ballad of Black Tom Victor LaValle https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1447086249s/26883558.jpg 46932536], which I want to read soon, and I thought I should read this first. I really am shocked at how openly racist this story is. It is not subtle at all. It's very interesting, too, that the evil in this story is so similar to the villains of today's conspiracy theories. It's reminiscent of every “Satanic panic” type of thing I've ever read about. Anyway, I'm glad I read it (or actually listened to it free on YouTube). Definitely worthwhile as background, not just for my future reading, but in order to understand more about certain types of racism.

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