Reviews

At the Mountains of Madness and Other Novels of Terror by August Derleth, H.P. Lovecraft

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jimbowen0306's review against another edition

3.0

I turned to Lovecraft because I read some where that Stephen King (an author I enjoy) liked them/used them as inspiration. I can certainly see why King was drawn to them (or more accurately, elements here had echoes/ripples in King's work), it's just they sometimes felt... underdeveloped. I'd have liked to see these novellas turned into longer works that had a more developed stores, and were fully developed novels in their own right.

You know when you had to write an essay under exam conditions at school, you sometimes run out of time, and end up saying the main character woke up and found it had all been a dream? Well in some of these stories, it felt like Lovecraft ran out of steam, and ended up writing "Well we bricked up the holes, and went on with our lives, but some of us had nightmares." For much the same reason. This problem was less acute here, but in his shorter stories, it was a pretty common occurrence, so if you were to read any Lovecraft collection, this might be as good as any.

squeakybones's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

wakkle's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

zozosbooks's review against another edition

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2.0

Boring as hell! Must have been good for its time….. but even then there’s literally no plot or character development or emotions. How can so many words say so little?

duke_'s review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No

3.0

jarofbees's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious slow-paced

2.0

Tekeli-li! What nameless preternatural aeon could compel me to enjoy this dense overwrought itty bitty tome? If only it had been shorter, or edited.

This book dragggggged, with a capital D. There were moments that captured my attention and intrigued me and it was this hope alone that got me through.

But wait! Here comes our narrator to tell me something important. “Hey bro, you heard about these rocks? Sometimes they’re carved, sometimes they’re icy, sometimes they’re carved and icy, also sometimes they’re icy but not as icy and snow covered as they were before, also don’t even get me started on the carved icy snow covered rocks because…”, literally stop! I don’t care.

It felt like this book wanted to frustrate me to make a point, and I took that personally.