"The Philosopher's Stone"

by Colin Wilson
originally published Arthur Barker Ltd, 1969

Howard Lester is a young intellectual living in small-town England.  In the 1950's, when he is a teen, he befriends Sir Alastair Lyell, a noted scientist, and becomes his sort of unofficially adopted son.  Some years later, when Lyell dies, he leaves Howard a small fortune.

Young and now wealthy, Howard does what young suddenly-rich guy would do: spend his life in intellectual pursuits! Particularly of interest are issues of human consciousness, ESP, and longevity (why do some people seem to live longer than others for no apparent physical reason).  His researches and writings bring him into contact with Sir Henry Littleway, an older scientist also engaged in similar research.  They travel to the countryside, where they meet Henry's pervy brother Roger and study a local farm worker who, thanks to a brain injury, has become psychic.  They experiment with the farm worker for a period of time, until a brain tumor does him in.  They believe that somehow their experiments, and his psychic gifts, are a root cause of the brain tumor.

Howard and Littleway press on with their studies.  They devise a simple brain implant (a tiny length of wire) that produces remarkable, but slightly different, effects in a local wino and a local artsy-suicidal girl.  Finally, they decide to take the plunge and put the brain implants into themselves.

The result is greatly expanded consciousness, intellect, awareness, and learning capacity.  They pursue their studies even more doggedly.  Howard (especially, and then he leads Littleway into it) develop psychic abilities.  They can mentally travel through time, receiving vivid waking dreams of past eras.  They develop forms of telekinesis and psychometry.  They continue to learn.  But there are oddities.  At Stonehenge, Howard perceives not only the ancientness and some of the uses of the megaliths, but also a powerful presence of menace and evil.   Similarly, when Littleway hands him a small stone idol thought to be of Hittite origin, Howard perceives that it is actually far older - pre-human, in fact.  And again, that there is a powerful and menacing presence connected with it.  

Sometime later, a picture of a similar item leads Howard and Littleway to an investigation of ancient Mayan culture.  And a bizarre experience on Silbury Hill in which they perceive the presence of a great, very ancient, and alien power that has the ability to block their psychic perceptions.

Their investigations now lead them to the metaphysical theories of Rene Guenon and the works of H.P.L.  They also learn that the presence from Silbury has the power to mentally attack minds, causing them to become distracted, and causing weaker minds to snap completely.  Thus the people around Littleway become difficult, either acting as nuisances or, in some cases, genuine menaces.  In time, these situations ease, but Howard believes the presence (or presences) are attacking him in other ways - leading him down blind alleys or false trails in his research, his falling in love and marrying (thus making him more vulnerable).  He begins to search for the Necronomicon - or rather, the actual works Lovecraft's fictional grimoire might be based upon.  They learn of the origins of man (created by the Ancient or Old Ones, as Howard names this presence), and the fate of the Old Ones, who still live beneath the earth, in a state akin to sleep.  Howard comes to believe the development of the brain as in the operation he and Littleway have undergone, is the key to meeting the Old Ones on their own terms, when they revive.  If there is enough time...

In his introduction, Wilson describes The Philosopher's Stone as a novel of ideas.  And that is an accurate description.  There is not a lot of action.  Not much happens.  Howard learns about things, then theorizes on them, then discusses them with Littleway or some other character.

In fact, The Philosopher's Stone reads very much like Wilson's books about the occult The Occult: A History, Mysteries, Beyond the Occult and Alien Dawn (there are others), with Wilson theorizing and speculating in a breezy, logical and highly readable manner about ESP, ancient civilizations, art, philosophy, science and history - occasionally interrupting it with some narrative events. 

Now, you either find this engaging or boring.  Me, I love those aforementioned occult books and I thoroughly enjoyed this one as well.  But it is not a thriller nor even a horror novel - I had expected Wilson's Old Ones to turn out to be more malevolent, but in the end, Wilson perceives them merely as a challenge (albeit a monumental one) for future man to overcome.

Similarly, Wilson is not interested in perpetuating Lovecraft's mythos.  Essentially, his discoveries about the Old Ones and the ancient world are the proposed inspiration for Lovecraft's writings, the truth behind the Lovecraftian metaphors.

Those looking for chilling cosmic horror, anti-Cthulhu action, or anything remotely "canonical" are going to be let down.  But let it be known that I found The Philosopher's Stone a thoroughly enjoyable read.

 

 

 



 

"The House of the Temple"

by Brian Lumley

Published Weird Tales #3 1981

It's time I said something about Brian Lumley.  C'mon - you knew it was coming!  I mean, Lumley was the keeper of the Cthuflame for so long.  When everyone else had forgotten, it was the Lum who cranked out rote Cthulery for the loyal fanzes.

Okay, I'm being really facetious here.  In point of fact Lumley, like Aug Derleth, has taken an awful lot of heat from the fandom communicable for his various sins.  In fact, Lumley, like Derleth, is a good writer.  In double fact, Lumley, like Derleth, is usually at his worst when playing in Lovecraftville.

Outside of that, Lumley has written scores of horror stories - some of them corny, some memorable, and occasionally, a real gem.  In the mid-80's he hit sales gold with the Necroscope series, a wild ride of espionage, adventure, ESP and vampire monsters - and I don't mean Anne Rice-type vamps - we're talking tentacled blobs that take over the bodies of the dead and turn them into bloodthirsty fang faces - Draculas with tudes.  The books are loaded with action, enough sex to make Sidney Sheldon blush, and more gore than dozen Italian zombie movies.  Hardly great literature, but thoroughly fun and enjoyable reads.

I must also mention his short story "The Viaduct", a non-supernatural suspense thriller about two schoolboys and a bit of boyish daring that goes horribly wrong.  The story is one the most brutal, nail-biting things I've ever read.  

But, we're not talking about his best stuff.  Nah - today we're talking about Cthulhu-land.

John McGilchrist lives in NYC with his painter friend Carl, having been dumped by his fiancee.  But he's originally from Scotland.  And one fine day, he's contacted by a Scottish law firm, informing him that his uncle Gavin has died (heeeeeere weeeee goooooooo), leaving him an estate and a big ol' isolated house.

So, off go John and Carl to shack up in the house for awhile.  Well, sure enough the house is isolated, big, a little run-down, and spooky - especially a small man-made lake (referred to as The Pool) surrounded by columns that sits on the property.  

John is given Uncle Gavin's (in an at least slight variation, John actually knew and liked Uncle Gavin, who was hale and hearty and an adventurer, not a creepy recluse) last will, a letter, and a notebook.  The letter is friendly but a little strange.  It seems Unc died somewhat mysteriously, was in good health at the time ("that terrible, pleading look in his wide eyes" sez the lawyer), and was expecting it.  He has some explicit but odd instructions for John - destroy the house in no less than 90 days (even that's pushing it).  He's helpfully provided enough dynamite to do the trick.

Oh, and did I mention there's muttering about a family curse?

Well, problems start quick.  While Carl runs off to stock up the fridge, John sits around looking into Unc's notebook, and letter, and his well-stocked library of rare old books (heeeeeere weeeee goooooooo), which contains such bestsellers as Unter-Zee Kulten, Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon, Gaston le Fe's Dwellers in the Depths, De Vermis Mysteriis, a copy of Unaussprechlichen Kulten (which John, of course, knows is "hideously disquieting" by reputation) and something called Cthaat Aquadingen.

John's evening's entertainment is interrupted when Carl comes back with groceries, wondering where the "gypsy music" is coming from.  What gypsy music?  John doesn't know - he's been reading those nutty books all this time!  And the radio doesn't work!  Uh-oh!

Well, before you can say Cthaat Aquadingen three times fast, Carl, who just loves the place and can't imagine why John would want to blow it to smithereens, has started a new painting - of a bunch of mysterious revellers dancing in flames around The Pool...

Ruh-roh.

So, the days go on, the weather's hot hot hot, Carl (who, we come to learn, is descended from Hungarians from Stregoicavar) keeps on painting and John keeps on reading those notebooks.  John learns that the house was once the site of a temple founded by some Romanian expats in the 16th century.  It was eventually destroyed, and the worshipers exterminated, apparently by local townsfolk.

Soon, the painting has taken on more detail - the dancers are now leering figures and now have been joined by a "familiar" - a lumpy grey "leprous" tentacled thingie.  And Unc's notebook reveals his researches - that the worshipers had a "familiar", that it lived in The Pool; a vampiric gloop-monster that ate the souls of its victims....

Finally, as John sits putting all the twos-and-twos together (actually, Unc pretty much spells it out for him), he sees something rise out of The Pool.  Grey, "leprous", tentacled, etc.  The gloop-monster heads into the house (John watches in horror) and makes straight for Carl's room.  John gets there just in time to see it eat Carl's face.  Quite literally, as Carl's face, as well as Uncle Gavin's and those of previous victims manifest themself in the beasty's gloop-form, before John drives it off by ... turning on the light!

So, John loads Carl's bod into the car, dynamites the house, and drives away.  Now he's writing the whole thing from Oakdeene Sanitarium.  And he still hears the gypsy music.  And is haunted by the fact that Carl painted his own face on the familiar in the painting.

Okay, let's get straight.  This isn't awful.  I mean, I actually enjoyed it in a pile-on-the-cliches sort of way.  But it's nothing special either.  And pile on the cliches it does.  Deceased Uncle.  Family secrets.  Biggest chunk of the story the narrator poring over some notebook full of Cthulhu-isms and name-dropping and vague hints.  

This story was published in `81, may have been written earlier.  By this time Lumley was close to retiring from the army and becoming a full-time author; and also his largely moving on from writing Lovecraft-Derleth pastiches.  One gets the sense even reading this that the Lum himself is getting a little bored.  He starts down all-too-familiar slopes such as a bunch of random, Cthulhu-name-dropping-notes that serve no purpose to the story - then stops and moves on.  It's got a payoff (albeit an underwhelming one), and Lumley does enjoy his monsters.  He has his own voice, and all this elevates him above Carter Country.  But only a little.

"Fat Face"

by Michael Shea
originally published by Axolotl Press, 1987

Patti is a hooker who works out of a run-down hotel.  She and her friend Sheri are often watched by a fat bald creep who sits in the window of the next building.  He runs a hydrotherapy clinic and vets service (!!) out the office there.  They decide to have some fun with him.  It turns out he's a shoggoth, crammed into a human mask and some clothers.  Yeesh!!

This is a very well-written story.  I've read a handful of short stories and a couple novels by Shea and they were all quite good.  Despite good build-up, great characters and writing, the pay-off to this story strikes me as so unutterably stupid that I can't get behind it.  

"Jihad Over Innsmouth"

by Edward Morris
originally published Pseudopod, 2008

Sabbah, our protagonist, is on a plane to Boston.  Sharing the flight is Rev. Irving Waite, the fishy-looking current head of the Esoteric Order of Dagon, and a million-selling self-help guru.  Sabbah is there to assassinate Waite. While watching Waite, he chats briefly about comic books with a young crew-cutted guy sitting next to him.

The plane hits turbulence, and things are being tossed around.  Waite is apparently crashing the plane, to pay for the destruction of a Deep One community due to the sinking of a nuclear sub.  Sabbah kills Waite, with the help of the crew-cut kid - who's from Arkham, and knows his Deep Ones.  They also kill the even more fishy-looking pilot, then fly the plane to a safe landing.

An enjoyable enough read.  Reasonably well-done, but hardly a classic.

"Cinderlands"

by Tim Pratt
originally published Drabblecast, 2010

Dexter has purchased a fixer-upper house in a rundown, mostly deserted part of some blighted urban landscape.  Besides being generally icky, he has problems with things that scuttle through the pipes, which he takes for rats.  Well, they are - but not normal ones.  One night hordes of mutated, parasite-infested rats pour out of the pipes, being chased by some awful thing, which goes after Dexter.  Space and time seem to bend as it closes in on him.

Plenty of atmosphere, but rather pointless.

"The Shadow Out Of Space"

by August Derleth
originally published The Survivor and Others, Arkham House 1957

Nathaniel Corey, a shrink, is brought an unusual patient - one Amos Piper, an anthropologist.  Piper has had some kind of breakdown.  Some years back, for a period of time, he suddenly lost his ability to speak, his motor skills, and his personality.  He quickly recovered the first two.  He spent a fair bit of time travelling, and researching various outre things - including the usual Cthulhu-isms.  Three years later he returned to normal.  He is plagued by detailed dreams and visions of life on another world, in the body of the cone-shaped Great Race of Yith.

 Corey naturally figures this all to be psychological phenomenon.  Piper becomes paranoid, convinced the Great Race still have him under observation.  He sends Corey a rambling letter in which he vaguely speculates about the events related in "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" and "At the Mountains of Madness".  Corey goes to see him, but, despite Piper's sister's claims of a relapse, Piper seems perfectly normal, and well-adjusted.  Well, except he seems ... too intelligent. 

Piper says he's headed off for the Arabian desert on an expedition.  Corey goes back to his office and finds all his notes about Piper's case stolen.  But  he made copies, smart fellow that he is!  He begins researching some of Piper's claims - and finds validity in them.  It turns out there's been a bunch of cases identical to Piper's.  And hey - that expedition?  All those victims of the identical cases are in on it!  And hey - guess what - the entire expedition is lost!

Corey begins to notice people following him.  His manuscript cuts off as someone approaches from across the street.  Dr. Corey and an unknown man are found in Corey's office trying to burn his manuscript.  They're having problems because they don't seem to know how to use their hands, and they can't speak....

A rather pointless re-hash of "The Shadow Out Of Time", even down to the name.  And a silly ending.  Derleth was really phoning it in with this one.

"Bad Sushi"

by Cherie Priest

originally published Apex Digest No. 10, 2006

Baku works as a chef in a sushi place, and is haunted by his experiences in the war.  The place starts getting its fish from a new company, and something about the new stock reminds Baku of a terrifying encounter he had with a strange sea creature as a young man.  He investigates.  And finds something awful going on.  Baku infiltrates the fish warehouse, and has an encounter with a monster.  He sacrifices himself to destroy it.

This is an effective but slight tale.  Priest is strong on characterization and atmosphere, but its Baku's memories that are the most effective moments.

"Lord of the Land"

by Gene Wolfe
originally published Starwater Strains, 1990

Samuel Cooper, aka "the Nebraskan" is collecting regional folktales for a book he's writing.  An old man named Hop Thacker tells him the story of his encounter with something he calls the "soul sucker", years ago when he was young.

Thacker and his daughter Sarah put the Nebraskan up for the night.  The Nebraskan finds a parallel between Thacker's "soul sucker" and creatures out Egyptian myth.

Thacker turns out to be under the control of the soul sucker, a parasitic otherworld creature.  He attacks the Nebraskan, who is able to fight him off.  As Thacker dies, it appears he passes the parasite to Sarah.

Leave it to Gene Wolfe to compose a simple, but potently creepy, story that isn't exactly clear.  This is typical Wolfe, and either it infuriates you, or you love him for it.  I happen to be a fan.  

"Waiting at the Crossroads Motel"

by Steve Rasnic Tem

originally published Black Wings II, 2012

Walker, an extremely sociopathic drifter, checks into a motel almost literally in the middle of nowhere, for no particular reason known to him.  He cuts himself and discovers his blood can form into an independent creature.

Walker comes to realize that he is descended from something inhuman.  He waits at the motel, not actually knowing why.  He realizes that his children, too, are descended from this or these inhuman things.

Other people come to the motel.  They too are half-human.  They wait in the desert.  Their fathers emerge out of the night.

Somewhat reminiscent of Clive Barker's "Skins of the Fathers", and an interesting, updated take on the spawn of Yog-Sothoth theme.  An evocative but minor story, with very unappealing characters.