In the Mad Mountains: Stories Inspired by H. P. Lovecraft

“Joe Lansdale squares up to the Great Old Ones―and taps into rich veins of awe and wit, with always a backbeat thrum of cosmic terror.”―Kim Newman, author of the Anno Dracula seriesEleven-time Bram Stoker Award-winner Joe R. Lansdale (Bubba Ho-tep) returns with this wicked short story collection of his irreverent Lovecraftian tributes. Lansdale is terrifyingly down-home while merging his classic gonzo stylings with the eldritch horrors of H. P. Lovecraft. Knowingly skewering Lovecraft’s paranoid mythos, Lansdale embarks upon haunting yet sly explorations of the unknown, capturing the essence of cosmic dread.A sinister blues recording pressed on vinyl in blood conjures lethal shadows with its unearthly wails. In order to rescue Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn traverses the shifting horrors of the aptly named Dread Island. In the weird Wild West, Reverend Jebidiah Mercer rides into a possessed town to confront the unspeakable in the crawling sky. Legendary detective C. Auguste Dupin uncovers the gruesome secrets of both the blue lightning bug and the Necronomicon.Exploring the darkest corners of the human psyche, here is a lethally entertaining journey through Joe Lansdale’s twisted landscape, where ancient evils lurk and sanity hangs by a rapidly fraying thread.Table of ContentsIntroduction by Joe R. Lansdale“The Bleeding Shadow”Dread Island“The Gruesome Affair of the Electric Blue Lightning”“The Tall Grass”“The Case of the Stalking Shadows”“The Crawling Sky”“Starlight, Eyes Bright”In the Mad Mountains

Kim Newman, author of the Anno Dracula series

“Joe Lansdale squares up to the Great Old Ones―and taps into rich veins of awe and wit, with always a backbeat thrum of cosmic terror. You’ll never look at the howling void in the black heart of the universe the same way again.”

Publishers Weekly

“Cosmic horror is alive and well in this eerie collection of what Bram Stoker Award winner Lansdale (Moon Lake) considers to be his eight best Lovecraftian tales, each with different settings and styles and often pulling from other authors’ oeuvres as well. ‘Dread Island’ riffs on Mark Twain, opening with the line ‘this here story is as true as that other story that was written down about me and Jim,’ and going on to tell of how Huck Finn risks his life to save Tom Sawyer from a mysterious evil. Lansdale’s mimicry extends to Edgar Allan Poe as well; ‘The Gruesome Affair of the Electric Blue Lightning’ is a new C. Auguste Dupin exploit, in which the sleuth looks into eyewitness accounts of oddly colored lightning. A third highlight, ‘The Tall Grass,’ evokes Algernon Blackwood, as a businessman traveling in the West has an unsettling experience when his train stops after midnight in the middle of a patch of unusually tall prairie grass that ‘shifted in the moonlight like waves of gold-green seawater pulled by the tide-making forces of the moon.’ Lansdale fans and Lovecraft devotees alike will be impressed.”

Nick Mamatas, author of Move Under Ground

“Here’s Lovecraft’s trick: he uses polyphony, many voices, to build his narrative case for the existence of cosmic squids whistling in the dark. Here is Lansdale's trick: doing it better.”

Laird Barron, author of Not a Speck of Light

“Horror royalty Joe Lansdale’s take on cosmic horror and the Cthulhu Mythos is everything you'd hope for―bloody, profane, grimly humorous, and as vivid as Technicolor hell splashed on a 20-foot tall silver screen.”

Victor LaValle, author of The Ballad of Black Tom

“Playful, ambitious, surprising and so much fun to read. What a thrill to watch a modern master play literary games with the greats.”

Char’s Horror Corner

“In these stories inspired by Lovecraft, Joe lets his imagination run wild . . . Highly recommended!”

Horror DNA

“Showcases a master storyteller riffing on the voices and themes of other writers while crafting something unmistakably his own. Lansdale reimagines the mythos, atmosphere, and some of the characters of cosmic horror and classic literature through his distinct, muscular prose.”

Rae Wilde, author of Merciless Waters and I Can Fix Her

“Lansdale proves once again with In the Mad Mountains, as he has over his long and triumphant career, to be a master of every genre he touches.”

Umney’s Alley

“A consistently entertaining, varied, horrifying, and vividly told collection.”

Paul Finch, author of Never Seen Again

“Exploring the darkest corners of the human psyche, here is a lethally entertaining journey through Joe Lansdale’s twisted landscape.”

Bibliophileverse

“For fans of horror fiction searching for something spine-chilling, this book is exactly what you’ve been waiting for.”

Booklist

“Lansdale has a wide fan base for good reason, but this book presents a wonderful opportunity to expand it even further by suggesting this collection to fans of twenty-first century cosmic horror authors such as Hailey Piper and Lucy Snyder.”

Nonstop Reader

“It’s a perfect spooky season/Hallowe'en read, even better with a buddy. The cover art by Mike Mignola is a nice bonus and suits the book perfectly.”

Silver Screen Library

“An often creepy and always entertaining collection.

Steve Capone, Jr., author of Jimmy vs. Communism 5/5 stars.

“Lansdale’s tales are fun, carefully constructed, and an important contribution to the opus of cosmic horror in our fallen world.”

Hall Ways

“What an eclectic, delicious collection of creepy short stories.”

Read@Joes

“A whip-like tentacle of poison that wraps itself around you, dragging you into deep corners of darkness while your heart pistons into overdrive.”

Dave Writes and Draws

“Scary, fun, and cosmic as all hell.”

Head Full of Horror Praise for Joe R. Lansdale

“[Lansdale]’s abundant talent is on full display.”

New York Times Book Review

“A folklorist’s eye for telling detail and a front-porch raconteur’s sense of pace.”

Washington Post Book Review

“A terrifically gifted storyteller.”

Los Angeles Times

“Like gold standard writers Elmore Leonard and the late Donald Westlake, Joe R. Lansdale is one of the more versatile writers in America.”

Entertainment Weekly

“A zest for storytelling and gimlet eye for detail.”

Booklist

“Lansdale is an immense talent.”

Houston Chronicle

“Lansdale is a storyteller in the Texas tradition of outrageousness...but amped up to about 100,000 watts.”

Austin Chronicle

“Lansdale’s been hailed, at varying points in his career, as the new Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner-gone-madder, and the last surviving splatterpunk . . . sanctified in the blood of the walking Western dead and righteously readable.”

About the Author

Internationally bestselling author Joe R. Lansdale has received the Edgar, Raymond Chandler, Bram Stoker, British Fantasy, and Inkpot Awards. His work includes mysteries, Westerns, horror, thrillers, pulp, crime, and science fiction. He has written more than forty novels, including Dead in the West, The Bottoms, The Thicket, Moon Lake, and The Donut Legion. Lansdale’s short story collections include The Best of Joe R. Lansdale, Things Get Ugly, and Born for Trouble. Lansdale’s short fiction has also been adapted for Masters of Horror; Netflix's Love, Death & Robots; and Creepshow; Bubba Ho-Tep and Cold in July were adapted as major motion pictures; his two most famous characters are the basis for the Hap and Leonard TV series on Netflix. He has also written graphic novels for DC, Marvel, Dark Horse, IDW, and others. Lansdale lives with his wife, Karen, in Nacogdoches, Texas.

Reviews

News