Poe's Lighthouse [Hardcover]

Christopher Conlon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2007

New stories by Edgar Allan Poe?

Impossible, you say?

Not at all. Admittedly, Mr. Poe is in no condition to be writing much these days—which is why in this anthology he’s getting a little help from his friends. Friends like Chelsea Quinn Yarbro. Carole Nelson Douglas. John Shirley. Mike Resnick. Some two dozen in all.

These writers were given a task: to take a little-known, unfinished story fragment which Poe wrote near the end of his life and turn it into a complete story—in any way they wished. The only rule was that they use Poe’s language, his images, his ideas—that they truly work together with the master.

Today’s best authors. Joining forces with Edgar Allan Poe himself.

Posthumous collaborations for the ages—collected here in this extraordinary anthology.

Since the Poe fragment’s original publication some sixty years ago, a few authors have attempted to complete it—but this collection marks the first sustained gathering of talent to work on the piece. Editor Christopher Conlon provides an Introduction which explains the background of Poe’s unfinished tale and includes its original, unaltered text, while the completed stories reflect the amazing variety of the writers themselves—from lighthearted fantasy to gothic horror, from romantic adventure to hard-edged science fiction.

This book, then, is a celebration of the art of storytelling—hosted by two dozen dazzling talents, with Mr. Edgar Allan Poe as Guest of Honor.

Care to join the party?

The lamp is lit. The door is open. Step in…

Welcome to Poe’s Lighthouse.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Conlon asked 23 top authors to complete Poe's story fragment "The Lighthouse," and the mixed results suggest that Poe and his posthumous collaborators probably work best independent of one another. A few entries are Poe homages, including John Shirley's "Blind Eye," which capably echoes Poe's old-fashioned gothic prose, though its plot is frankly modern. George Clayton Johnson's "A Literary Forgery" resurrects Poe's detective C. Auguste Dupin in a caper that hints creatively at the origins of several Poe story plots, while Paul Di Filippo's "Days of Other Light" is an interplanetary adventure that commands sympathy for a tortured Poe-like artist underappreciated by his extraterrestrial culture. Most of the contributors try to work Poe's prose into their narratives, but their stories show little interest in his concerns as a writer. The book ends with Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's witty "A New Interpretation of the Liggerzun Text," a tale of a future society's misinterpretation of Poe that unintentionally critiques most of this volume's contents. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Found among Edgar Allan Poe's papers after he died (at 40, all too young) was an untitled story fragment with an intriguing preamble. Consisting of three short diary entries by a newly indentured lighthouse keeper, the fragment affords few clues about Poe's plot intentions. The assignment for the 23 contributors to this unique collection was to finish the tale by using Poe's language, themes, and predilection for curdling the blood. The results range from stylistically faithful narratives to improbable yarns that use Poe's introduction as a springboard for the author's own vision. In one entry, the diary pieces make up an ancient artifact viewed by an archivist in a future civilization. In another, the journal is inspected by detective Auguste Dupin, a figure familiar from such Poe classics as "The Purloined Letter." Perhaps the most outstanding entry is John Shirley's masterly continuation, in perfect faux-Poe fashion, of the diary to disclose the lighthouse keeper discovering a macabre use for his polished lantern. Must reading for Poe enthusiasts, in particular. Carl Hays
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Cemetery Dance Publications; Deluxe edition (March 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 158767128X
• ISBN-13: 978-1587671289
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,070,823 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Michael Arnzen (http://gorelets.com) is an award-winning author of horror and dark suspense fiction, a poet, and an English professor. His trophy case includes four Bram Stoker Awards and an International Horror Guild Award for his often funny, always disturbing stories. The best of these appear in the Bram Stoker Award-winning career-length retrospective, Proverbs for Monsters, which Dread Central called "a guided tour of insanity and the macabre, with a few moments of touching grace combined with repulsive terror...[which] serves to document the evolution of a great writer."

Arnzen holds a PhD in English from the University of Oregon (where he researched his non-fiction book, The Popular Uncanny) and he is presently a Professor at Seton Hill University, where he teaches horror and suspense fiction in the country's only graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction (http://fiction.setonhill.edu).

Arnzen resides near Pittsburgh, PA, with his wife of many years, Renate, and a brood of deranged cats.

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"In a little over a decade, Michael A. Arnzen has achieved what few writers manage in a lifetime. He has become the master of a brand of literature that is uniquely his own, and I do not doubt that his approach to horror will soon (if it has not already) be referred to as 'Arnzenian.' When you begin an Arnzen story, you embark on a journey where the old maps do not apply. Soon you find yourself deep in new territory, barreling through landscapes more fascinating and twisted than any previously encountered. Be assured, you will be amazed, startled, amused, and creeped out along the way, but whatever the road has in store, you will not be able to stop reading until the story ends. Horrifying, captivating, ironic -- Arnzenian! -- the works of Michael A. Arnzen are in a class all their own. Fasten your seat belts and enjoy the ride!" -- Lawrence C. Connolly, author of Veins

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars well written homage as the light shines on Poe evermore, April 4, 2006

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Poe's Lighthouse (Hardcover)

The underlying theme of this superb collection is modern authors completing a fragment written by Edgar Allen Poe sort of like Natalie Cole singing Unforgettable with her father Nat King Cole. In the Introduction Christopher Conlon explains that just before his death, Poe, though depressed and an alcoholic, was still writing, but never finished his last work. That fragment (included in the Introduction) and his strong literary résumés serve as the basis for the twenty-three tales that make up POE'S LIGHTHOUSE. The contributions are fascinating just to follow the various interpretations that led to the stories. On top of that obvious allure, the compilation is well written with a who's who contributing their interpretation. Interestingly the stories run the speculative fiction gamut to include fantasy, gothic, horror (of course), romantic suspense, mystery and science fiction; all this from the fragment as the authors stayed true to Poe and to their particular writing style. This is a well written homage as the light shines on Poe evermore.

Harriet Klausner

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An eclectic and engaging collection, June 27, 2006

By 

Tzoner - See all my reviews

This review is from: Poe's Lighthouse (Hardcover)

What do you get when you submit a literary legend's tantalizing, uncompleted story fragment to twenty-four imaginative and disparate writers? You get POE'S LIGHTHOUSE, an engaging collection that lives up the promise of its offbeat concept.

Poe's skeletal tease of a tale serves as chum to whip up a feeding frenzy among a group of modern authors. The results are as eclectic as one might expect. Several of the writers take a stab at channeling the master and finish the short story as might Poe himself. Others add their own unique talents and sensibilities to the mix.

Much of the charm in such an experiment is seeing Poe reflected through the prism of these other writers, who often display the same fertile mind and gift for imagery as their absent host yet offer fresh perspectives on Poe's vision. The wildly diverse offshoots presented here ricochet into nearly ever genre or sub-genre one can imagine: pure horror, hard science fiction, broad comedy, psychological drama, whodunit mystery, explicit romance, and grand adventure. In addition, passionate affairs between these topics treat us to bastardized offspring that defy both convention and categorization.

Naturally, as with any anthology, some tales are better than others, and with such a variety to choose from, personal taste will cause one to gravitate towards (and away from) certain stories. But when the lesser lights in this collection flicker dimly, it is not because they are unfit or unworthy; they are simply outshined by the more audacious and creative tales. If a complaint must be mustered, it is the necessary evil of constantly re-reading Poe's original lines, which become brittle with repetition. But even this nitpick has an upside: Discovering Poe's narrative, and noting the clever ways in which the authors intertwine or bury them within their stories, becomes sort of a subliminal game for the reader.

Kudos to Christopher Conlon for conceiving of such an offbeat anthology and pulling it together with style. POE'S LIGHTHOUSE collects talented authors both well-known and obscure, and highlights their diversity of style. Upon completion, I found myself longing for the discovery of another lost fragment of Poe's work to serve as fodder for a sequel. Perhaps Mr. Conlon can exhume similar outlines or lesser-known short works from other masters (Lovecraft? Bierce?) and call upon his cadre of writers to work their magic again. This is a winning formula.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An anthology that delivers, May 26, 2006

By 

Gevaisa (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Poe's Lighthouse (Hardcover)

This collection is based around such an unsusal premise, but it works, thanks to the efforts of both well-known writers and a few people I never heard of--who ever would have thought that The Waltons creator Earl Hamner would come up with such a story about rats? I was struck by the story by Hilary Tham, which I thought was very atmospheric. I have to give credit to Christopher Conlon, the book's editor, who was justified in including his story about an abused child--no vanity piece there. I thought Carole Nelson Douglas' cat story was a little cutsie for me, but that's just me. Perhaps the stories that will haunt me longest were those of Steve Schlich, whose work interpreted the idea very creatively in a story with grim warnings for those inclined to experiment with drugs, and of Gary Braunbeck, whose contibution, a story about bereaved parents who find themselves communicating with their missing son through a toy lighthoue.