The best Horror Anthologies books: Reddit reviews

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

Just a heads up everyone, Amazon has the price down 40% right now. Normally it's $106, but they have it down to $65!!!

Link here

Can't go wrong with the old masters. Robert Bloch's Mythos writings, Clark Ashton Smith, Ramsey Cambell. I'd recommend all of them. Check out this book. I think it represents the best of "Lovecraftian" fiction. There are some Lovecraft stories in the book, but the other represented authors afford themselves quite well.

The complete works of H P Lovecraft is available as one hardback book on Amazon with a nice sturdy case, thin bible-style pages and a page ribbon. It's a great buy.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Fiction-Lovecraft-Knickerbocker-Classics/dp/1631060015

This review speaks for itself:

"I originally read most of these stories a quarter of a century ago, but it was good to find them all in one volume. Let's face it, Lovecraft needs to be read from a heavy tome, preferably by guttering candlelight, as you strain to hear the strange slithering sound just outside your chamber door, and not on a tablet on the 8.52 to Nottingham. All the classic Lovecraft tales are here, and the book is beautifully bound and printed. The print is a good readable size, and each tale has a brief introduction detailing when it was written and any interesting references. You soon realise how hugely influential old H.P was, sci-fi, fantasy and horror have all learned from him, writers like Stephen King and James Herbert obviously so, but others too. Terry Pratchett referenced Lovecraft too. One slight word of caution, the racial language and descriptions in some of the stories are very much of their time. When I first read them years ago I didn't notice so much, but now, even though I'm not the most PC person in the world, some of the language is fairly shocking. If you've not read Lovecraft before be aware of it, but don't let it put you off. Overall a really nice edition."

I'm not an expert on merch but I imagine Amazon gets it from an official wholesaler of the products and the puts them up for retail. Amazon it pretty good about having official products sold there, and It'd probably be pretty clear if it wasn't official (with a lack of the products info and what not).

I actually just purchased my first LN collection from Amazon earlier today, and they listed the publisher on the page. So I hope my money went to the creator's sales.

Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos is a good anthology to start with. It has a ton of stories by different writers, including Lovecraft himself.

You can also find all of HPL's writing for free, as it is out of copyright. This is a good place to find them.

There's quite a few options since his work is public domain. I've got this leatherbound one from Barnes and Noble.

Amazon also has a cheaper option.

And if you have an ereader, his stories are all in the public domain so you can get them for free.

Both collections are available on Amazon, they are both shipped and sold by Amazon not a 3rd party Marketplace. I bought both mine from Amazon when they were released.

Season 2 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1949980065/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Season 1 https://www.amazon.com/MONOGATARI-Box-Set-Limited-NISIOISIN/dp/1947194399

Sure! You have a lot of ways to start with Lovecraft. He was a very prolific writer, almost exclusively short stories. These days you can pick up "complete" collections of his stuff. However, these tend to be pretty bulky and, if you find that you don't care for his stuff, it'll be a bit of a waste.

Here's what I did: I started with a smaller paperback collection of some of his most essential stories. Amazon still has it: https://www.amazon.com/Best-H-P-Lovecraft-Bloodcurdling/dp/0345350804/

Once I got hooked from reading that, I picked up Necronomicon which is the most well known collection of Lovecraft, though even more complete versions have been released in recent years (even the Necronomicon doesn't have every story he wrote).

If you don't want to commit to a book yet, you can read many of his stories for free online. You can find a bunch hosted here: http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/fiction/

And here are the ones I would recommend starting with, these are some of his most well known stories:

• The Call of Cthulhu

• The Shadow over Innsmouth

• At the Mountains of Madness

• The Rats in the Walls (Darkest Dungeon's entire premise and setting are heavily inspired by this story)

And here's a gentle warning/heads up: these were written almost a century ago, and some of the language used will sound a bit foreign. Some things would even be downright controversial if written today. If you've read any Mark Twain you might know what I mean. Just appreciate the sheer imagination of the author and the awesome ways in which he describes unimaginable horrors.

One of the comments intrigued me into buying some of Lovecraft's books. Found his complete works on Amazon for around 12$. Awesome find if you're interested. It's roughly 1100 pages.

The Complete Fiction of H. P. Lovecraft https://www.amazon.com/dp/0785834206/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_apa_DXpOybAVYD5ZG

There's an official English translation by the publisher Vertical now that is currently translating all the novels, the latest one to have been published is Tsukimonogatari, and they're pumping a new one every 2-3 months roughly. You can buy them on Amazon, for example.

Also, if you're up for it, they grouped the first novels into a First Season Box Set, and a Second Season Box Set is also available for pre-order (but will only come out at the end of the year).

Here's the Amazon page. You can take a look at the table of contents there.

There's also two other Penguin editions of The Call of Cthulhu (one has art of a funny-looking squid man in formal wear, the other has an orange cover with tentacles on it), but as far as I can tell they all have the same content. (I linked the standard Penguin Classics edition since the other two Lovecraft collections are also Penguin Classics and don't have the fancier-looking editions that The Call of Cthulhu does.)

EDIT: jpon7 posted the Amazon links for the other two books' Penguin Classics editions in another reply, so between the two of us it looks like you've got all the links you need!

Here's one for $15. I own this edition. It doesn't have his revisions, but it does contain his primary works. The cover isn't anything special, but at least it's hardback.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0785834206/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Not exactly mythos related, but if you want ‘multiple weird fiction writers’ and want to avoid the ‘never mind the quality feel the width’ aspect to the ubiquitous Amazon ‘megapacks’ I can strongly recommend Jeff VanderMeer’s The Weird anthology. The quality of authors is incredible and includes a lot of Lovecraft-adjacent and Lovecraft-inspired writers (Lord Dunsany, Laird Barron, Robert Bloch, Fritz Lieberman, Ligotti etc etc etc). It should keep you busy…

Oh shit they did?

10 second edit: I dont think they did https://www.amazon.com/MONOGATARI-Box-Set-Limited-NISIOISIN/dp/1947194399/ref=sr_1_17?crid=324K674YOBL7F&dchild=1&keywords=monogatari+box+set+season+1&qid=1610251897&sprefix=monogatar%2Caps%2C305&sr=8-17

He pretty much only wrote short stories and one novella (Mountains of Madness). You can get a complete collection of his fiction pretty cheaply from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Fiction-H-P-Lovecraft/dp/0785834206/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1471620319&sr=8-1&keywords=complete+lovecraft

If you don't mind ebooks, all of his stories are in the public domain.

I got mine from Amazon Germany.

Link.

If you’re into classic horror, this is a book with some the works of H.P Lovecraft. I love diving into it when I don’t want to be immersed in a whole new book, but craving a new story. It’s not the full collection but a good start. H.P Lovecraft, Amazon.

Really kinda shocked at how little it cost; to put it in perspective I read Faulkner's As I Lay Dying a month ago and that cost $15 for a 250ish page trade paperback. They can't be making too much money off this one, lol

Its also nice to see this has some of his lesser known stories as well. Pretty much complete near as I can tell for his standard adult fiction stories. Link for anyone interested: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Fiction-H-P-Lovecraft/dp/0785834206

You can get The Complete Fiction of H.P. Lovecraft on Amazon for about $12, which is kind of hard to beat price-wise, but might be kind of intimidating. "The Call of Cthulhu" is probably his most well known story. "At The Mountains of Madness" gets a little more into the cosmic horror, and is my personal favorite.

This is the best Lovecraft collection IMO and it's dirt cheap. There's only one story about pharaohs (I forgot the title) that's not included but it's worth every penny.

Start playing Arkham Horror the Card Game. I'm only half joking.

I would actually recommend picking up one of the many best of Lovecraft collections. I would recommend this one. It's pretty easy to find cheap in used book stores, covers off 450 pages of his best most iconic stuff, and if you like it, theres a few more in the series by the same publisher to round out the mythos: https://www.amazon.com/Best-H-P-Lovecraft-Bloodcurdling/dp/0345350804/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?crid=2I0ZMP5EQ9TTG&keywords=best+of+lovecraft+macabre&qid=1663311357&sprefix=best+of+lovecraft+mqcabre%2Caps%2C173&sr=8-1

According to a review on Amazon who criticized the version I bought, this version is more complete: HP Lovecraft: The Complete Fiction Barnes & Noble Compilation volume, ISBN 9781435122963.

I bought this one:

The Complete Fiction of H. P. Lovecraft (Volume 2) (Chartwell Classics, 2) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0785834206/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_3ZXQ2NY3H8EQSNGD6091?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

And it’s fine by me. :)

I hope I helped.

Probably better off following specific authors. This is a great anthology that I come back to often: https://www.amazon.com/Weird-Compendium-Strange-Dark-Stories/dp/0765333627/ref=sr\_1\_3?keywords=weird+stories+books&qid=1650061492&sprefix=weird+stories+%2Caps%2C83&sr=8-3

https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Fiction-H-P-Lovecraft/dp/0785834206/ref=mp_s_a_1_4?crid=37Y5V45TMCSGL&keywords=hp+lovecraft+complete+works&qid=1647475253&sprefix=hp+lovecraft+complete+work%2Caps%2C373&sr=8-4

There may be three or four that kind of count as "lesser" stories, but I think overall this book would really fill the bill for what you're looking for.

Content list:

The Rats in the Walls

The Picture in the House

The Outsider

Pickman’s Model

In the Vault

The Silver Key

The Music of Erich Zann

The Call of Cthulhu

The Dunwich Horror

The Whisperer in Darkness

The Colour Out of Space

The Haunter of the Dark

The Thing on the Doorstep

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

The Dreams in the Witch-House

The Shadow Out of Time

The Best of H. P. Lovecraft

I started with this collection in middle school. Everything in here is good.

Not *technically* YAlit but I do love me a good Japanese light novel.

As a high school English lit teacher, I'd never be able to face my students again if they found out I've read stuff like Sword Art Online, lol. The prose is so bad and the story is so tropey but it's all good popcorn fun.

My fave guilty pleasure is definitely the Monogatari series. I only read the original Japanese texts tho because the translation takes out all the flavor :P

Thanks, but I think Ill go with this I see and maybe just read others digitally if needed, because I have money only for one book :/

I always recommend this one, but there's also this spreadsheet detailing which books have which stories.

Not op but I got mine from Amazon