Fwah

My house is a house of plague this week. Disease and runny bottoms stalk the house like stinky, drippy lions. The boy was particularly affected this morning. When he is sick his diapers have a... quality to them. It's almost non-biological, like he's been drinking too much paint stripper. It is an odor Lovecraftian in character. It makes me want to use words like,"eldritch." Like, a lot. Practically in every sentence, till it begins to mean nothing. (I did not actually say "eldritch" while changing him, though at one point I did say "gorf.")

Ok, see, here's the thing about Lovecraft. He did present a lot of horrifying and disturbing ideas in his works. The universe is a chaotic meaningless mess of energies, and concepts such as morality, order, and even logic are drivel. That one bothers me. Or that God (or gods) are so alien that they would tear apart the universe; not because they are malevolent, but simply because they don't know any better. That one is disturbing. A lot of writers have Mr. Hewlett-Packard as a major influence on their work, because he had a good grasp of not just what was horrifying, but what was disturbing on a fundamental lever.

However,

The guy was not a good storyteller. With a few exceptions, his stories are actually much better if you have someone else tell them to you. I think he had an overinflated sense of his own mysteriousness. Or perhaps he underestimated his audience's ability to put one and one together to make two. Here is an outline of a typical offering:

The protagonist was always a little strange (He looks/acts like an ape/frog)
The protagonist uncovers information that brings to light strange and disturbing information about his ancestors (They were half ape/frog)
The protagonist travels to the town of his birth to discover more about his family (The half ape/frog side of his family.)
Everyone in the town shows similar strange traits (being that they are all half ape/frog)
Protagonist has strange encounter with indescribable otherworldly being. (Described as being indescribable. Probably has tentacles. Ape/frog people are in attendance)
Protagonist uncovers further clues (ape/frog related)
Protagonist begins to suspect the truth, but refuses to believe it. (by "it", I mean that he's half ape/frog)
After final encounter with amorphous otherworldly being (whose name is revealed to be Aqltrypbnghs) protagonist discovers the awful truth (the whole ape/frogman thing) The revelation drives him insane and he kills himself.

The real problem with the story is that the reader worked out everything that would happen within the first 10 sentences. The suspense and horror you should be feeling is replaced by impatience. You can't help but wonder why the protagonist still isn't putting the pieces together. It might have to do with the fact that he's a half ape/frog, but he seems fairly intelligent in every other way. Plus, lovecraftian monstrosities are always completely indescribable (unless they are octopoid). To make up for the fact that he cannot describe them without contradicting himself, he resorts to over-using uncommon overly-erudite words which basically mean things like "strange" and "wibbly" and "just kind of, you know, odd." In order to truly be horrifying, a monster needs a better description than "thingy."

Anyway, I had to give him a bath because the wipes weren't up to the task.