It's the Most Terrifying Time of the Year

Over at Tor. com, 'tis the season for alien horror: December brings a full month of H.P. Lovecraft features under the rubric of "Cthulhumas."

 

And why not? When you find yourself facing down the seething crowds in the mall on a Saturday afternoon in mid-December, with those dogs barking "Jingle Bells" over the P.A. and a knowledge that it's going to take you another 45 minutes just to navigate out of the parking lot...well, then, the confrontation with fungoid horrors from beyond the edge of space can seem soothing by comparison.

 

Things get off to a particularly good start with Stephen H. Segal's essay on Lovecraft as the original science fiction nerd -- "Geek Prime. Fanboy Alpha."

 

-BILL TIPPER

 

May 23: Girolamo Savonarola was hanged on this day in 1498 and then incinerated in the same piazza in which the citizens of Florence had earlier attended more than one "bonfire of the vanities." George Eliot's 1863 novel Romola,

advertisement
Books CDs, DVDs to know about now
Paris, I Love You but You're Bringing Me Down

When a job at a French ad agency landed in his lap, novelist Rosecrans Baldwin had the chance to fulfill a lifelong dream of living la vie Parisienne. And though cold réalité  -- in the form of financial struggles and an office culture where his rudimentary Francais didn't quite cut the mustard -- intruded, the result was a more mature take on the city of his fantasies, flaws included.

Why Cats Land on Their Feet

The feline acrobatics and other mysteries of everyday physics that Mark Levi explores in this charming book are just the beginning. A fun and enlightening workout for your gray matter.

Dead Men

Scott's doomed Antartic expedition and the haunting mysteries surrounding its failure lead to obsession in Richard Pierce's debut novel. As painter Birdie Bowers pursues her fascination with the explorer and his death, she risks both her body and her heart for answers.