The Strange Dark One by W.H. Pugmire

The Strange Dark One Reviews

• 
  Brian Sammons

  W. H. Pugmire takes H. P. Lovecraft’s Crawling Chaos, Nyarlathotep, and makes it his own in this collection of eight stories all about the Mighty Messenger. Fans of the Cthulhu Mythos or Pugmire’s hypnotic and poetic prose should pick this one up immediately. My full review can be found here:
  http://horrorworld.org/hw/2012/12/the...
• 
  Melissa

  This book features eight tales of Nyarlathotep, one of HP Lovecraft’s most popular creations. The title of this collection, “The strange dark one,” is taken from the second line of HPL’s poem Nyarlathotep.
  
  According the Robert E Price in the forward to The Nyarlathotep Cycle (Chaosium, 1997), Nyarlathotep has three roles to the Great Old Ones: The messenger, the soul, and the “crawling chaos.” Pugmire is able to capture all three elements in this collection
  
  The character Nyarlathotep came to Lovecraft in a dream so it is fitting that dreams play so prominently in this book. There is repeating imagery of the moon, the nighttime sky, piping, and rare occult tomes. The senses are described thoroughly and the reader is acquainted with the dark scents and hot dry temperatures that accompany the crawling chaos. I don’t see many writers of this genre focus on all of the senses the way Pugmire does, and it adds another dimension to the stories.
  
  All but one of the stories in this collection are set in Pugmire’s sensual and mystic Sesqua Valley. Sesqua Valley is a place that appears to exist tenuously in our world but touches other realms as well. Many of the residents are silver-eyed shadow people; immortals that have taken mortal form. There are some repeating characters, Simon Gregory Williams being most prominent.
  
  Rare, occult books are a favorite of the denizens of this place. Humans who have read the arcane lore found in occult books such as the De Vermis Mysteriis or the Necronomicon often gain a sense of the other-worldly and find themselves drawn to Sesqua Valley. There are many strange artifacts in Sesqua Valley, one of note is the stained glass window from the Free-Will Church of Providence from HPL’s The Haunter of the Dark.
  
  The tales (in order):
  
  The Strange Dark One: One of the longest tales in the collection. A women inherits her grandfather’s bookshop and enters Sesqua Valley to sell books. She becomes enmeshed in the mysteries of the valley after finding an altar to Nyarlathotep.
  
  Immortal Remains: Simon helps a woman re-experience her strange childhood dream after visiting a mummy in an ancient tomb of Sesqua Valley.
  
  Past the Gates of Deepest Dreaming: A tale about Nyarlathotep’s sister, Selene, told from three different perspectives. Bonus points for the scene in which a nightgaunt braids Selene’s hair while she sits by a pond talking to Nyarlathotep (I love, love love nightgaunts and their faceless faces and tickling claws).
  
  One Last Theft: A ne-er do well comes back to Sesqua valley for a celebration in honor of Nyarlathotep.
  
  The Hands That Reek and Smoke is a direct nod to Lovecraft’s prose-poem Nyarlathotep. It also includes my favorite line in the book: “I tell you, go see Nyarlathotep, and he will drench your dreams with wondrous vision.”
  
  The Audient Void: A woman finds the Book of Eibon and uses it to inspire dreams of the crawling chaos.
  Some Baccante of Irem: Simon leaves Sesqua Valley to see an art exhibit modeled after the lost city of Irem. He meets with the artist and helps her reach her dreams.
  
  To See Beyond: If you ever wanted to know what happened to Erich Zann, you should read this. A writer who is about to commit suicide rather than live with the horrible truths he has discovered is instead transported to Sesqua Valley. There he has a tenuous relationship with Simon Gregory Williams and meets a violin player who has been given the gift of voice.
  
  Criticisms: Dialogue is difficult, and I don’t always think it is Pugmire’s strong point. In addition some tales really are more fragments that fully developed short stories. Also, as with most small press and e-books, there are some typos.
  
  A casual reader unfamiliar with the works of Lovecraft might find themselves lost when reading these tales. However, HP Lovecraft fans should read this work that not only pays homage to the Mythos but actually progresses it. Much like outsider artists who do not use the established conventions to express their art; Pugmire does not always use conventional writing techniques. However his methods work in these tales of weird fiction; where is can be difficult to describe sights that can barely be understood by the human mind! Overall a great read!
• 
  Jacob Frank

  Pugmire clearly had a gift for the Lovecraftian short story. He managed to create a distinct space of his own within the Lovecraft idiom, something that, in my reading heretofore, only Brian Lumley convincingly accomplished. That being said, the stories in this collection seem a bit redundant, though the net effect of the redundancy is to firmly establish Sesqua Valley and several of it inhabitants firmly in the reader's imagination. I'll probably read more of Pugmire. I'm also intrigued by his biography, which you can check out for yourself on Wikipedia.
• 
  Andrew Cousins

  W H Pugmire's Sesqua Valley is a fascinating place, I'll be picking up another collection soon. It's hard to put a finger on what makes his writing so special, ultimately though it's weird fiction at it's best.
• 
  Isidore

  Pugmire is a miniaturist. His prose poems are usually a delight, but he really is not at his best when forced to sustain a longer narrative. Even so, his short stories and novelettes are often studded with memorable passages.
  
  So, why two stars? I don't feel this collection of stories shows Pugmire in top form.
  
  Most of the tales are oriented around Simon Gregory Williams, the sinister and sometimes beguiling "beast" of Pugmire's fictitious Sesqua Valley. The trouble is, the character remains static through all the different narratives; since he is always depicted the same way, using much the same language and imagery, and does not develop or reveal unexpected facets, his frequent reappearances lead to ennui rather than the frisson he is supposed to elicit.
  
  Pugmire's writing sometimes suffers from repetition of words or ideas. Judging from the present collection he appears to have cured himself of his obsession with the word "wee", but unfortunately he has found other devices to overuse: the eerie/erotic kiss, what one might call the Nyarlathotepic Lick, and climaxes where characters bay like beasts as they are subsumed by the Crawling Chaos. All of these are initially effective, but wear thin the third or fourth time they are brought out.
  
  The Strange Dark One contains three stories from earlier collections, which means, if you are a Pugmire fan, you already own about a third of the book. On the other hand, he has extensively rewritten the three before reprinting them. On the other other hand, one of the stories, a small masterpiece entitled Immortal Remains, has been ruined in the process. I can't imagine what drove him to dilute and defuse one of his best short stories, but if you want to read it in its proper form, you'll have to find a copy of Mythos Book's Sesqua Valley and Other Haunts. It's worth it.
  
  Even more than is usually the case with small press publications, the book suffers acutely from poor editing. Pugmire will be working hard at conjuring up weirdness, when the whole thing gets short-circuited by a grammatical error, an inadvertently omitted word, or a Spell Check error which turns the eerie right word into the risible wrong one. A striking instance of the latter is found on page 63, where, in citing Clark Ashton Smith, Pugmire gives us:
  
  A wizard wind goes drying (sic) eerily,
  
  evoking a good day for hanging out laundry, rather than the Eldritch Dark.
  
  Pugmire is definitely worth reading. At his best he can put more imagination into a single line than you will find in the entire oeuvre of some writers of weird fiction. But don't start with this one; try his Hippocampus Press collections, which offer decent texts and better prose.
  
• 
  Otto Hahaa

  WHP:n novellikokoelma, jossa keskitytään Nyarlathotepia liippaaviin tarinoihin. Tykkäsin. Vaikka N. on kaikissa taustalla, niin silti tarinat eivät toista itseään. En kauhean usein ole tykännyt WHP:n kirjojen kuvituksesta tai kansikuvista, mutta tässä kirjassa kuvitus toimii. Tässä kirjassa esimerkki tarinasta, jonka WHP on kirjoittanut aika kokonaan uudestaan, toimii aika hyvin. Olisiko näissä tarinoissa tavallista enemmän outoa erotiikkaa? En ihan tiedä, en ole pitänyt tarkkaa tilastoa asiaan. Tilastoista puheenollen, jotkut hahmot esiintyvät novellista toiseen, jotkut satunnaisesti. Pitäisikö tästä yrittää pitää lukua? Pitikö WHP itse?
  
• 
  Eric

  Pugmire is a singular writer, decadent and surreal. His creative visions are spellbinding, but in this collection I found too much repetition. I give him props for his obsessively realized approach to Sesqua Valley and its supernatural inhabitants. I prefer his other collections that contain more variety.
• 
  Francz Varga

  Thoroughly enjoyable with darkly florid and atmospheric prose. This collection of stories focusing on the interactions of the Faceless God and the shadowy residents of Sesqua Valley is a must for any Lovecraft enthusiast.
• 
  eV-Γ

  Pugmire is a master at their craft. Incredibly uncomfortable, but it only adds to the horror both psychological and physical. Vivid writing that led me into the Dreamlands after finishing.
• 
  Justin Steele

  W.H. Pugmire is one of the finest modern authors of the Lovecraftian tale. He has been described as "prose-poet", and writes all manners of haunting tales, many of which are set in his fiction Sesqua Valley.
  
  
  The Strange Dark One: Tales of Nyarlathotep is a collection of Pugmire's finest tales dealing with the dark god. Eight stories are collected in this slim volume (weighing in at 153 pages) and makes for a nice quick read. Readers of Lovecraft should be quite familiar with Nyarlathotep, as this dark god has appeared in more Lovecraft stories than any of his other creations. Nyarlathotep also stands apart from Lovecraft's other Old Ones in several ways. While most of the Old Ones (Cthulhu, Shub Niggurath, etc.) are unfathomable and seem mostly indifferent to humanity, Nyarlathotep doesn't seem to fit these rules. Ofttimes roaming the Earth in one of his various forms, many of which are human in appearance, Nyarlathotep acts as a messenger or a herald of the end times, and seems to take delight in cruelty and deception.
  
  
  Several of the stories are interconnected, and all but one take place in Pugmire's Sesqua Valley, a mysterious, hidden valley of haunted secrets. With that being said, several Sesqua Valley characters recur throughout the stories. This gives the effect of each story being a smaller piece of the whole. The stories all serve to explore the interesting relationship between the Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep, the inhabitants of the Valley, and certain outsiders who are allowed to enter.
  
  
  Another theme that runs heavily throughout the novel is that of dreams and their power. Most of the stories involve dreaming rather significantly, and the dreaming seems to serve as a conduit between humans and Nyarlathotep. Pugmire paints him as a dark, seductive figure, that seems to draw people of artistic and occult bent.
  
  
  The stories in the book are all great, and Pugmire's Valley and it's strange, mystical rules is very intriguing, along with the shadow-people who live there. The one story that does not take place in the Valley stands as one of the best ones in the book, and was recently included in The Book of Cthulhu II where it was a standout tale.
  
  
  Overall this book showcases Pugmire's talents, and is another success for Miskatonic River Press. Any fans of Lovecraft should put Pugmire at the top of their to-read list, and The Strange Dark One could be a great place to start. As for myself, I look forward to diving into Pugmire's other Sesqua Valley tales.
  
  Originally appeared on my blog, The Arkham Digest.
• 
  Steven

  Wonderfully atmospheric, building on several of HPL's tales (I recognized "The Man of Stone," "The Music of Erich Zann," "Nyarlathotep" - doubtless there are more) as well as Pugmire's own Sesqua Valley.
• 
  Ahimsa

  There's all kinds of stuff to like in these tales of the forlorn Sesqua Valley and Nyarlathotep and cultists and old books, all written in a style evocative of Lovecraft without being derivative.
• 
  Roger Walker

  This book preaches to the choir. If you're already initiated into the ways of the Faceless God, you might get something out of it. As for me - no thanks!