Böcker av Author S T Joshi

As the second volume of S. T. Joshi's comprehensive biography of H. P. Lovecraft begins, we find Lovecraft dwelling in misery in a one-room apartment in Brooklyn Heights: his wife, Sonia, has had to move to the Midwest for work, and he must rely on the companionship of the Kalem Club, the informal band of friends in the New York area. In 1926, in part through the intervention of his close friend Frank Belknap Long, Lovecraft finally decided to return to his native Providence, Rhode Island, effectively ending his marriage. That return spurred the greatest spurt of literary creativity he would ever experience: in less than a year, such works as "The Call of Cthulhu," The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, and "The Colour out of Space" would emerge from his pen, establishing Lovecraft as the leading weird fictionist of his generation. In spite of his increasing poverty, antiquarian travel occupied much of Lovecraft's time, and he gained an impressive knowledge of such oases of antiquity as Charleston, Quebec, St. Augustine, and Richmond. These voyages both renewed his connection with the past and infused his literary work, as such later tales as "The Whisperer in Darkness" and "The Shadow over Innsmouth" drew ever more profoundly upon his far-flung travels. Intellectually, Lovecraft evolved as well. Recent developments in science confirmed his materialism and his atheism, and the onset of the Great Depression gradually caused him to reassess his political and economic theory; he emerged as a moderate socialist and advocate of the New Deal. Late in life he became a giant in the world of fantasy fandom--a development that foreshadowed his worldwide fame in the decades following his early death.

In the tradition of the old "Ace Doubles" two-in-one books (flip one over to read the second title)--here is the first Wildside Mystery Double, featuring two new novels of the 1930s private eye, Joe Scintilla: CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE, by S. T. Joshi. When the lovely Lizbeth Crawford walks into Scintilla's office, she tells him that her father, wealthy industrialist James Crawford, did not kill his brother Frank, even though he confessed and is now serving a prison sentence. Is Crawford shielding someone? Why are both his mother and wife happy to have him imprisoned? And why did Frank's fiancée commit suicide shortly after his death? TRAGEDY AT SARSFIELD MANOR, by S. T. Joshi. Members of the Sarsfield clan have gathered at the palatial family estate under terms of the will of John Sarsfield, who created a riddle they must solve to inherit the family fortune. Scintilla is summoned by his friend (and heir), Charles Jameson, who was found holding a dagger that had been plunged into the back of his aunt, another potential legatee. But the crime is only the final act of a tragedy reaching back centuries. Can Scintilla discover the truth before his friend is convicted?