The shadow over innsmouth

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

These next two entries are both part of the Weird Stories anthology as well, but as longer novellas (and landmark Lovecraftian works), they merit their own entries.

The Shadow Over Innsmouth follows Robert Olmstead, a man who becomes fascinated by the mysterious (sadly fictional) New England hamlet of Innsmouth. As Olmstead embarks on a tour of the town — having heard vague, superstitious warnings from outsiders — he detects something strange about its citizens. Most of whom walk in an odd shambling manner and have unusual facial features, including flat noses and "bulgy, stary eyes."

Olmstead meets an old townie called Zadok Allen, who provides an, er, interesting explanation for the town's peculiarities: that its human inhabitants have devoted themselves to a brutal race of fish-like humanoids known as the "Deep Ones," who have forced humans to breed with them. Those walking the streets of Innsmouth are the resulting offspring — as they mature, they will grow to resemble the Deep Ones, eventually joining them in their underwater cities.

Naturally, Olmstead dismisses Zadok's ramblings. But when the old man disappears soon after, our hero realizes that he could be next… though at the hands of humans or monsters, he can't be sure. This gloriously unsettling tale is also another foundational work of Lovecraft's mythos, introducing the ideas of the Deep Ones (a subset of the Old Ones) and the "Esoteric Cult of the Dragon" that began the practices of worship in Innsmouth.