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Hey guys, its Chris
and what a week, huh? Congratulations to all you couples in California
who can get married, and all you couples across the country whose marriages are, like
really, really for real real this time. Congratulations also to all you immigrants
who can now get a green card and stay
in the country with the person you married. Also, great news!
The Supreme Court has announced there's no such thing thing as racism anymore!
(that's sarcasm.)
But I have to admit the really exciting thing for me today
is it's July 3, and that means RELEASE DAY!
My new short story, The Watchers in the Dark,
is available right now for free at JerseyDevilPress.com
That's JerseyDevilPress.com. You should go read it. Right now.
I'll wait.
No really, go ahead.
I think I may also read an excerpt here on YouTube soon,
but first I want you to read it for yourself.
Now I know it's just a short story, not a novel or anything,
but I'm a newbie writer
and its just super-exciting to have something out there that you can read.
...and I know, it's not like I can sign your web browser
but seriously, I want to sign something. Send me something, I'll sign it!
Now I don't want to give a whole lot away
But the whole issue has kind of a Lovecraftian theme,
and if you don't know what that means
we're going to talk about it a little bit right now.
So H.P. Lovecraft, or Howard Phillips Lovecraft,
was an author active in the early 1900s who is often referred to
as the father of modern horror
Lovecraft wrote poems, short stories, and novels, often adopting a somewhat archaic
tone--using really big, old words that give the stories of feeling like they're
set in another time.
Lovecraft's also famous for inventing fictional places; places like Dunwich,
Innsmouth,
and the Miskatonic River.
You may also have heard of Miskatonic Unversity (GO PODS!), and the town in which
it's said to exist: A little town called Arkham.
Although I don't think the Joker was living there when Lovecraft was writing.
Lovecraft also created the idea of an ancient book of the dead,
known as the Necronomicon.
(There was relatively little tree *** in Lovecraft's work).
H.P. Lovecraft is a lot like the Beatles,
in that even if you don't enjoy his stuff, you probably enjoy stuff
influenced by his stuff. Stephen King, for one, cites H.P. Lovecraft
as a major influence on his work. (Someday I'd like to take a train ride
from Dunwich to Derry.)
Lovecraft's stories often involve human beings doing occult
or archaeological research
and unearthing powers
we were never meant to discover. There's a lot of indescribable cosmic monsters and
people going insane because they saw something they just can't possibly
comprehend.
And there's a lot of ancient, monstrous gods who used to rule on Earth
and who hate human beings and want to destroy us.
Lovecraft kind of pioneered this idea of monstrous gods who hate us
and it's one of the things he really contributed to the genre.
Now have to say, in a lot of ways H.P. Lovecraft wasn't the greatest of guys.
He had a lot of negative opinions about people who skin was darker than his,
and he generally expressed those opinions by making those characters
sort of stupid and monstrous. But I'm of the opinion that great art can come even from
terribly flawed human beings, and I think you can appreciate someone's
contribution to the art without appreciating all their opinions.
This is one of those times it's important to throw out the Authorial Intent reading
of literature. "The author is dead," and all that. Which in this case is actually
true, because not only did H.P. Lovecraft die a long time ago; he died
pretty young.
And a lot of other authors have carried on his work, writing stories set in what
they call The Cthulu Mythos, named after one of Lovecraft's most monstrous
creations.
Great Cthulu, who lays sleeping beneath the ocean and...
It's much more entertaining
if you read for yourself.
Even Stephen King might be said to be writing in the Cthulu Mythos. He's said that
one of his greatest villains, Randall Flagg (also known as Water O'Dim)
is an incarnation of Lovecraft's manipulative and deceitful god
Nyarlathotep.
I'm really not sure I'm saying that right
but I'm not sure anybody else knows either. But first I know you're gonna go
to JerseyDevilPress.com, and you're going to read my new short story
loosely inspired by the work of H.P. Lovecraft
as to whether I'm writing in the Cthulu Mythos
I'll let you read and decide.
And while you're at it, you should sign up for my email list, because it's free
and I will send you something cool
and it will also be free.
So if you're in the United States, happy Fourth of July
(if you're going to the beach,
you have some free reading material) and if you're here on planet Earth, happy Pride.
and as always, thanks for watching, thanks for thinking,
and watch out for those tentacle babies.