The Shadow Over Innsmouth by H. P. Lovecraft

Hello and welcome to my Shadow Over Innsmouth Review. This was a very nice quick read and a great break from Les Mis. In fact many of you may be wondering where my Les Mis Review Part 3 is.

So let's talk about this edition. Now, this is probably the worst edition of any book that I have ever read. Firstly, look at the cover. It looks like it was made in Microsoft PowerPoint with the lazily shaded text of the title the bland typeface used and weird cream band on the front. Even the image on the front which initially looks mysterious but is probably just some random stock photo of an old temple. The colours swell are trying to be evocative the ocean or fish but it just looks cheap. But it goes further, because it turns out you should definitely judge this book by it's cover. Not the story and story elements but there very basics of writing. Over the time of reading this book I found over 30 grammatical, punctuation and even simple spelling mistakes scattered throughout the whole text. I eventually switched over to a audio version on YouTube so I could get the proper flow and quality of the story. But with that out of the way let's get down to business. (Warning: SPOILERS!)

We see an antiques dealer heading to the New England area in the U. S. (He's not given a name in the book but apparently the name Robert appeared in Lovecraft's notes.) following up a set of interesting antiques. Consulting the local dealer he sees they are from the nearby town of Innsmouth. He hears of dodgy dealings and goings on from there but decides to head out anyway. He finds that the people there are all deformed in some way and the only bastion of humanity in town seem to be a young grocer boy and an old drunk named Zadok. The boy gives him a map and tells him to see the old man. Zadok, after a little bit of plying with whiskey, gives Robert the run down of the history. It turns out a man called Obed Marsh had found an ancient tribal culture worshipping these creatures known as The Deep Ones that bring them plentiful trade and gold. Obed becomes obsessed and decides to bring this culture to Innsmouth. He convinces many to join and he even goes as far as making a few human sacrifices. The locals have had quite enough and lock Obed and his followers up. Unfortunately, The Deep Ones were quite looking forward to having some new followers so decide to break them out. They go about completely replacing all the churches with this new cult called: The Esoteric Order of Dagon. And soon the town is thriving. HE also makes it mandatory for women to mate with The Deep Ones which is the reason for the townsfolk's strange appearance. Suddenly the old man yells in terror saying that they found him giving away their secrets and he was doomed. Robert takes no heed to his warning, taking his time with going back to the bus stop. He is dismayed, however when he sees that the bus is out of commission and he is forced to stay for the night. He notices that the locks on his doors have been removed and, with Zadok's words finally getting to him, installs his own. This turns out to work in his favour as he hears people clearly trying to get in. After blocking up the doors further he escapes out of the window and makes it to the outskirts of town. From here he sees the abomination that pursues him is a large group of reptilian fish-frog hybrids and Robert becomes so scared he faints. Thankfully the natives don't discover his hiding place and he manages to escape. He makes enough of a fuss for the authorities to have a look around around and whatever they find ends up with the town being demolished. Robert goes back home and over the next few years decides to do some digging on his own past and is horrified to discover he may be a direct descendant of old Captain Obed and a Deep One female. He initially considers suicide but the prospect of living eternally under the waves is starting to grow on him and it's left ambiguous whether he goes to join his long lost family under the waves or not.

So, yeah. All in all a very interesting read. I will say that Lovecraft is a very good atmospheric writer and builds up the tension exquisitely. It's almost halfway through the book before any mention of anything supernatural or cosmic in sale so the mystery is maintained. One of the most fantastic pieces of suspense is when Robert is laying awake at night and hears the slow steps up the stairs by his corridor and the slow testing of all his different locks. You feel Robert's terror and simultaneously admire his quick thinking in the face of danger as he formulates a plan to escape. He does take his time coming around to the possibility of something more than drunk ravings and weird people. It is normal, though, so I guess it works out in the end. However just before he sees the Deep Ones he says that that was probably his last sane moment which makes us question his reliability as a narrator as he would've already been mad by the time he retold this story. It's very disturbing and only adds to the thick tension already in place.

The monsters themselves are very interesting and I'll get to why in a moment. But first I want to talk about The Innsmouth people. They are a very unnerving bunch and you know they are always in the background watching with those bulging, unblinking and lifeless eyes. Robert coined a term that had me chuckling a little bit as I read. He called it the "Innsmouth look" which I laughed at because I just reminded me of that Rimmel London advert saying: "Get the London look". Maybe it's just me. The Deep Ones were built up excellently in the final escape out of town. They were only before seen as blurs under the ocean surface or distant shambling figures. However, The payoff ended up being less than amazing. You get a sense of his fear but you don't feel it yourself. Maybe it's just that we've become desensitised to stuff like this and thus it doesn't have such a profound effect as it probably did in Lovecraft's day.

Overall the theme of the slow descent into insanity was perfectly captured from the travel to Innsmouth to that anti-climactic climax. Lovecraft himself was very critical of his own work but I think it's a great start if you want to get into his works.

(Les Mis Part 3 will be coming as my next review)