Keep Weird Fiction Ticking

Writer Joshua M. Reynolds has an offer you might be interested in. From his website:

Okay, so on Tuesday, as you may or may not recall, I mentioned something about a contest. Which is possibly an erroneous term, as it's more in the way of an incentive drive than a contest, but who gives a crap right? FREE STUFF, that's the point I'm trying to get across here.


Specifically, a free 10,000 word novelette. "The Black-Winged Ones" follows occultist Harley Warren and former-inspector John Raymond Legrasse as they investigate a series of bloody murders and stumble upon a hideous conspiracy in turn-of-the-century New Orleans. AND, to top it off-it's illustrated by MD Jackson!


Interested? Obviously, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this. So, February is Fundraising Month at Innsmouth Free Press. They're attempting to raise the modest sum of $1,500 CAD and because I enjoy the magazine (seriously, check out issue 4), I decided to help out in my own small way (yes, I have indeed also donated cash but this is more fun). 

Reynolds is offering a PDF of his novelette to anyone who donates ANY amount to the cause. You can get the full details at his website HERE. And give the Innsmouth Free Press a look, while your at it.

(Via contributing editor the Hypno Pimp.)

Melbourne was once known as ... Batmania?

The Bronx cover Prince (video above.)

* If it's on the Internet then it must be true: Melbourne, Austrailia, was once known as Batmania?

* De-Animator: Online Flash game pits you against Lovecraftian zombies. Link.

* Casting call for Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit video. Link.

I dig the chainsaw bayonet, but the silencer is probably redundant.

From Something Awful (obviously.)

Cthulhu for Breakfast

H.P. Lovecraft's breakfast cereal by Cyril Van Der Haegen

Q Vs. A: H.P. Lovecraft

Welcome to Q Vs. A, a new regular feature here at Geek for Life. And by "new," I mean I took some old ideas, slammed them together and decided it's an all new concept. Kinda like the guy who "invented" the clock radio.
I decided to throw some questions at some folks I follow on Twitter and Blogger. These are thoughtful, probing questions that will blow the lid off this thing we call life. It's an electric word, life. It means forever — and that's a mighty long time. But our first subject is here to tell you there's something else ... the afterworld. And he should know, having spent a short time dead back in the early 20th century.

So, please welcome to the stage none other than H.P. Lovecraft, who you can follow at Twitter by clicking here.

1: These days Cthulhu seems to be the most famous of the Elder Gods, yet he’s kind of a pipsqueak compared to his brothers. How’d he pull off this PR win?

This is an astute observation. Clearly, Nyarlathotep and Yog-Sothoth in any of their manifestations, are more powerful than Cthulhu. Yet, as the Priest of the Elder Order, Cthulhu occupies a rarefied place within this maddening pantheon. Also, he makes a better plush doll.


2: Jeffrey Combs: Best Actor Ever? Or merely Best Actor Living?

Jeffery Combs is not actually "living," as you or I would perhaps define it. I have it on good authority that he himself has been reanimated, which, when one considers it, makes him a very committed character actor indeed.

3: Who would win in a fight between August Derleth, Stuart Gordon and Bigfoot from The Six-Million Dollar Man? Note: they are allowed to use any weapon they like, including nuclear arms.

I'm not sure what you mean by "nuclear arms." You may be referring to atomic appendages, which may work well in one of my tales. I assure you that no man alone possesses six million dollars. No matter how big one's feet, that is simply absurd. Considering these facts, my august
man Derleth would surely emerge victorious.

4. What was your worst Twitter experience?

I once offended @Amachen by suggesting that his prose was perhaps more florid than necessary. He summarily insulted my fondness of cats. I am, however, pleased to report that our rift, troubling as it was, has been mended.

5: Who (or what) is your favorite Twitterer of note?

I enjoy the tweets by and music of a certain @caseycontrarian. @NicTesla possesses a curious mind, but he is altogether absent from this venue of late. I have had pleasurable interactions with most Twitter denizens, which I find somewhat odd considering my general disinterest in engaging with random samplings of humanity.

6: Peanut Butter: Crunchy or creamy?

In Ulthar, it is both.

Happy Death Day, H.P.!

This just in: people in the 1930s were racist. So were people in the 1940s, '50s, '60s ... I've even heard rumors that a few are still kicking around today. And by "a few" I mean "a few million."

Despite what Hollywood would have you believe, racism and sexism were a formal institution in America until the 1960s when we began the process of dismantling the useless, evil machinery that kept us all in the bonds of ignorance. It's not gone, mind you. It's just wounded and pissed off.

I brought my soapbox to this column because I wanted to recognize the anniversary of the death of H.P. Lovecraft, that lovable woman hating white supremacist who gave us the Cthulhu mythos (which is kinda misnamed, given the low-status that Cthulhu actually has in these stories.)

It's difficult to talk about Lovecraft today without someone in the peanut gallery shouting out "But he was a racist!" Yeah, well so was William Shakespeare. And, most likely, your own parents. So shut the fuck up and quit trying to argue philosophy with a dead man because he's never, ever going to change his mind.

It was on this date 73 years ago that writer Lovecraft died. I've been a fan of his since reading a few of those Del Rey anthologies back in the 1980s. His work was a little more difficult to find in those days because horror was being published in three primary categories: Stephen King ripoffs aimed at the housewife market, out-and-out pulp garbage, and the short-lived Splatter Punk movement which was more interested in moving forward than looking backward. Even though horror was booming, there wasn't much room for Lovecraft.

If you were persistent, though, you could occasionally find Lovecraft's books on the shelves. I think my firsts were The Tomb: And Other Tales, and The Lurking Fear and Other Stories. I've been hooked ever since but have sometimes struggled with Lovecraft's dated, ugly points of view on race and class. I've since reconciled that problem by chalking up those opinions — just like the stories — as products of their times.

Oddly, I haven't been able to do the same with the Our Gang movies.

In recognition of today's date, allow me to direct your attention again to H.P. Lovecraft's Twitter account.

(With special thanks to houseinrlyeh for bringing my attention to the significance of today's date.)

Twittering of the Gods

Speaking of Twitter ...

Here's an account I've been following for a while, first under my band Mary Shelley Overdrive's account, and later from my personal account:

The one and only H.P. Lovecraft.

There are a lot of performance artists using Twitter these days, from Drunk Hulk to Pirate Trent Reznor. Those are all fun but, at the end of the day, I prefer to believe that H.P. Lovecraft isn't another joke ... and that he is still among us and just loves his Twitter.

Anyhoo, you can find him at twitter.com/howardLovecraft. Folow him and you'll get occasional reminders that we live in a bleak world of eldritch horrors that the human mind is too puny to fully comprehend.

H.P. Lovecraft Theater

thefezt from Malpertuis on Vimeo.

I don't know much about this video, but came across it about a year ago and was floored by its beauty. Titled The Fezt, it was posted by someone called Malpertuis. There's a bit of a language barrier preventing Google searches from being fully effective, though. Watch and enjoy.