I just finished reading H.P. Lovecraft’s novella “At the Mountains of Madness.” After finishing the story I believe the madness of Danforth was not caused by whatever frightful thing he glimpsed as they flew over the mountains, but because of his companion’s propensity for speaking like this:
“That seething, half-luminous cloud background held ineffable suggestions of a vague, ethereal beyondness far more than terrestrially spatial, and gave appalling reminders of the utter remoteness, separateness, desolation, and aeon-long death of this untrodden and unfathomed austral world.”
The novella took me a week to finish. It was only 111 pages.
I’m glad to have read the story, as it is usually referenced as a seminal work in the horror genre, but reading it felt more like homework than anything else.
If you’re interested in Lovecraft’s work I’d recommend reading it for free. At least that way you won’t be pissed off at yourself for wasting money on a book that you make up excuses not to finish.
Now I can start Palahniuk’s new book (the cover and link is on my side-bar). He never disappoints…well sometimes he does, but his disappointments are still good.