Monster Month: Cthulhu and related

Monster Month Cthulhu
By Alex Ness
October 19, 2026

While I had given thought to writing a post here distinguishing between Horror and Monster books and movies, I had to pause. Monsters in book and film are fun, rarely spooky, while Horror movies can give you a thrill, disgust, terror, nightmares and joy upon the end. They are different, but they also each have reasons to enjoy. Today is the creatures and weird stories found in the Cthulhu mythos. 

The first creator of the mythos was author, editor, poet and historian of the genre Weird Fiction, H.P. Lovecraft. He encouraged his writer friends to expand the universe and tell stories within it. He was in that way very generous. For me, while I suggest the best of Lovecraft is wonderful, the average Lovecraft work is less than great. That isn't meant to warn others not read it, but that if you read the lesser works, stick around, there are fewer of the lesser works, and a good many of the excellent works. 

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown” H.P. Lovecraft

Lovecraft's greatest work is found most often predicated upon an awareness of the primitive world being fearful of power, and his seemingly supernatural beings being aliens with immense power. The works of Brian Lumley, Ramsay Campbell, August Derleth, Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, RH Barlow, Frank Belknap Long, and still others, often bring new but perfectly welcome angles of storytelling and distinct flavors outside of the that of Lovecraft. Having said that, Lovecraft has been criticized for sharing xenophobia, with his narrators of the stories he tells. It is problematic in that his work is great, but sometimes you wonder if the humanity is elitist or racist. 

That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.” Howard Phillips Lovecraft,

In any event, many of the works found in the Cthulhu Mythology are fun, dark, attack the reader's comfort zones, and a good weekend reading. The mythos alone is a creation of a union of different minds and quality.