Sesqua Valley & Other Haunts [Paperback]

W. H. Pugmire (Author), Augie Wiedemann (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 4, 2008

Sesqua Valley & Other Haunts is a collection of horror and dark fantasy tales in the tradition of H.P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith, set in the mysterious Sesqua Valley - a dark and sinister locale imagined by W.H. Pugmire. The reader will find carefully crafted tales of Lovecraftian horror and the Cthulhu Mythos artfully coloured with the lavish touches for which W.H. Pugmire is famous. His stories are not mere pastiche, but finely wrought stories that transport the reader into a foreboding and enticing realm of hororr and dark fantasy. 203 pp. 20 Lovecraftian and Cthulhu Mythos short stories and 1 sonnet cycle, set in Pugmire's Sesqua Valley. CONTENTS: O, Christmas Tree / The Ones Who Bow Before Me / Born in Strange Shadow / Another Flesh / Immortal Remains / Selene / The Darkest Star / The Songs of Sesqua Valley / The Heritage of Hunger / The Imp of Aether / The Million-Shadowed One / The Child of Dark Mania / The Hands That Reek and Smoke / The Host of Haunted Air / The Woven Offspring / The Place of Old Insanity / The Zanies of Sorrow / Beneath An Autumn Moon / The Balm of Nepenthe / The Phantom of Beguilement / A Vestige of Mirth. Full color cover & 9 interior black & white illustrations by Augie Wiedemann.

Product Details

• Paperback: 203 pages
• Publisher: Mythos Books LLC; First Thus edition (October 4, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0978991141
• ISBN-13: 978-0978991142
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #377,739 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Wilum Hopfrog Pugmire, Esq., is the author of many books of weird fiction in the Poe/Lovecraft tradition. His past books include DREAMS OF LOVECRAFTIAN HORROR, SESQUA VALLEY & OTHER HAUNTS and THE FUNGAL STAIN AND OTHER DREAMS. Forthcoming books include WEIRD INHABITANTS OF SESQUA VALLEY (Terradan Works, Summer 2009. His most recent anthology appearance will be in S. T. Joshi's anthology of modern Lovecraftian fiction, BLACK WINGS (P. S. Publishing, Autumn 2009).

2011 has seen Miss Pugmire writing like some daemon-possess'd lunatic. Three new hardcover collections and one new paperback collection will have been publish'd by year's end. Earlier this year the definite edition of THE TANGLED MUSE, a deluxe illustrated hardcover omnibus, was published by Centipede Press. Early this summer Arcane Wisdom Press will publish SOME UNKNOWN GULF OF NIGHT, a book-length prose-poem/vignette sequence inspir'd by H. P. Lovecraft's FUNGI FROM YUGGOTH. The hardcover edition sold out in pre-order, but a trade pb edition will be available here at Amazon early next year. Last summer Dark Regions Press will publish GATHERED DUST AND OTHERS in a hardcover edition limited to 100 copies. After those copies are sold, the book will be available as paperback and ebook. And in October that rad publisher, Miskatonic River Press, will publish THE STRANGE DARK ONE--TALES OF NYARLATHOTEP in paperback. Early next year Wilum's second collection from Hippocampus Press, UNCOMMON PLACES, will see print. And late next year the book he is writing with JEFFREY THOMAS, a collection of Lovecraftian weird tales concerning the sinister New England artist, Enoch Coffin, will be published by Dark Regions Press.
Wilum specializes in prose and poetry of a Lovecraftian nature, supernatural fiction that is set in the fictive world of H. P. Lovecraft or in Wilum's own invented locale, the Sesqua Valley. Unlike Lovecraft's cosmic fiction, Wilum's work is utterly supernatural, at times outlandishly so. His prose style reflects the keen influences of Lovecraft, Poe, Oscar Wilde and Henry James, just as his poetry is tainted by his profound love for the Works of Shakespeare.

At present Wilum is working on two new solo projects, and on a collaborative book with Maryanne K. Snyder. Their first collaboration, "The House of Idiot Children," was published in the famous national magazine, WEIRD TALES.

Wilum is the Queen of Eldritch Horror.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Return to the Haunted Valley, December 6, 2009

By 

Jeffrey Thomas (Massachusetts) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sesqua Valley & Other Haunts (Paperback)

I can't say enough how much I enjoy Pugmire's work, with its poetic approach, emotional content, wild and dream-like imagery. It would be difficult for me to choose a preference between this book and Pugmire's other recent collection, THE FUNGAL STAIN AND OTHER DREAMS, but I am rather partial to this one in that it reprints material from the Necropolitan Press chapbook that I produced back in the 90's, TALES OF SESQUA VALLEY, including the story "The Million-Shadowed One," which was inspired by my son Colin and which might just be my single favorite Pugmire piece. Not just another Lovecraft imitator, is Pgmire, but a voice unlike any other. I'm currently reading his latest collection, WEIRD INHABITANTS OF SESQUA VALLEY, and every time I open one of his books it's like coming home. A creepy, mysterious home, to be sure, but one that never fails to wrap the reader in dark magic.

12 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Few Words from ye Author of ye Nameless Book, February 8, 2009

By 

W. H. Pugmire "I never can be tied to raw, ne... (Sesqua Valley) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sesqua Valley & Other Haunts (Paperback)

My many thanks to those of you who have purchased this and others of my books, and to those of you who have reviewed these items. I know that my style is very strange and different from most modern horror authors, and my books are not for everyone. I wrote these stories as a heart-felt tribute to H. P. Lovecraft, and I wrote them as a devoted fan of the Cthulhu Mythos. In creating Sesqua Valley, I followed August Derleth's superb advice to create one's own Lovecraftian locale rather than try to use Arkham or Dunwich on Innsmouth. Sesqua Valley is inspired by North Bend and its magnificent Mount Si -- a town and mountain that became famous when it was used in the television show TWIN PEAKS. Most of the tales in SESQUA VALLEY & OTHER HAUNTS takes place in Sesqua, and some few of them were written in loving memory of Mythos writers who have passed away. Thus, when I wrote "The Imp of Aether" and dedicated it to August Derleth, I mentioned his fire elemental Old One, Cthugha (mentioned only, the Old One makes no appearance in the tale), and when I wrote "The Child of Dark Mania" and dedicated it to Frank Belknap Long, I wrote a story that mentions his fantastic Old One deity, Chaugnar Faugn. It remains one of my favourite of my own stories. This books shews my obsession with Lovecraft's Nyarlathotep (my favourite Old One -- a magnificent daemon!) but does so best with "The Hands That Reek and Smoke," in which a woman's hands are blessed by the Crawling Chaos so that she can use their transform'd substance as artistic medium. I consider it one of my finest tales. But so many of the stories do not mention Old Ones at all, but are rather an attempt to create authentic Lovecraftian fiction without the clumsy cliches that have been used in so many Mythos stories. Thus, in "The Host of Haunted Air" there is no Mythos entity at all, but rather the sinister relic in which a daemonic form of eldritch effluvium may dwell (obviously an influence of Lovecraft's "The Colour out of Space"). In "The Heritage of Hunger" (one of my few tales set in Lovecraft's Arkham) there are no Mythos elements at all -- instead, it is inspired by Lovecraft's "Pickman's Model," a non-Mythos tale. Too, the book contains some few stories that are not Mythos or Lovecraftian at all, such as "The Woven Offspring" and "The Zanies of Sorrow," in which I have tried to express a sense of doom that may or may not have tints of Lovecraft's influence. The book's final story, "A Vestige of Mirth," is not at all Mythos, but rather a story inspired by HPL's "The Thing in Moonlight" and "The Terrible Old Man," and thus it takes place in a lonely, a haunted, an unspecific place where dwells the antient and abandoned circus wagon in which the narrator finds the jars in which floats what looks like shredded masks of human faces, but what are they really? Brrrrrr! I am extremely pleased that Mythos Books has reprinted this book in paperback, as the original hardcover edition, which sold new at $50, is now selling here at amazon for an absurd $250! With this new inexpensive edition, Lovecraft and Cthulhu Mythos fans can buy the book at an affordable price.

It's difficult, of course, to be original as a Mythos writer; but I believe we CAN be when we write stories that are perversely our own. The thing about Lovecraft's weird fiction, for me, is that, despite his flaws, his dependence on influences -- his fiction was always very much his own thing. It still is, despite all the wankers (guilty) who have tried to write in what is sometimes called the Lovecraftian Tradition -- but which mostly are stories that just rip-off HPL's ideas, his themes, his characters. One way we can be original is by inventing interesting character. It was with this book that I invented my most popular recurring character, Simon Gregory Williams. I had, in some stories, mention'd my own dark tome (like unto ye Necronomicon); I didn't name it, but I mention'd it's author, Simon Gregory Williams. When I rewrote an old story, "Candlewax," for SESQUA VALLEY AND OTHER HAUNTS, I had a wee flash of inspiration near ye end, & decided to actually show the warlock who was the author of this grimoire. (I can never remember how to spell that word, & Amazon always underlines it in red as misspelled; so I need to reach for my handy YE ENCYCLOPEDIA CTHULHUIANA by Daniel Harms and turn to any of the entries that discuss elder tomes of arcane lore -- & there it is, the word, &, yes!, I got it right!). I based my new character on this creepy guy I used to date -- & ye first thing that came to mind was, my character had to be a real creep: conceited, ruthless, nasty, wicked -- yet charming in his own weird way. It worked, & I've now written many tales featuring Simon, & he has proved popular with my readers. I am now working on a new book, of Sesqua stories inspir'd by the weird fiction f Robert Bloch -- & for this new book I have invented two new characters, one based on HPL's Erich Zann, and one based on the singer, Bjork.

If you are writing Mythos fiction, just be yourself. If you make your story personal, if you use the Muse to tell little secrets about yourself that you've never told anyone, then you are going to write a Mythos story that no one else could have penned. It will be yours, alone. I have many fictive influences, but above all is the influence of H. P. Lovecraft.

Here's a wee listing of the stories in this book:

"O, Christmas Tree" -- this is the very first Sesqua tale that I wrote. I sent the original version to SPACE & TIME and Gordon rejected it. I let Jessica Amanda Salmonson see it and she completely rewrote it, and that version was published in SPACE & TIME. This is the only Sesqua Valley story to have appeared in a commercial mass market paperback book, TALES BY MOONLIGHT II, edited for Tor by -- Jessica!

"The Ones Who Bow Before Me" -- this is an extensive rewrite of an old story called "Candlewax". In the original tale I mention a book of daemonic magick and its mysterious author, Simon Gregory Williams (I invented the name in high school; it was gonna be my stage name when I became a famous actor). When I revised the tale for this book, I decided it would be fun to actually shew Simon as a character at the end of the story, so I invented a wee new ending and thus nonchalantly introduced the creature that was to become my most famous character.

"Born in Strange Shadow" -- this is my first "sequel" (of sorts) to H. P. Lovecraft's "Pickman's Model."

"Another Flesh" -- a very early story that deals with that mysterious entity, Shub-Niggurath.

"Immortal Remains" -- a story that is linked to one of my favorite Lovecraft tales, "The Nameless City"

"Selene" -- a story of a phantom-woman who is linked to Nyarlathotep

"The Darkest Star" -- a story that was inspired by "The Feaster from Afar," by Joseph Payne Brennan, which I found in the second edition of Robert M. Price's Chaosium anthology, THE HASTUR CYCLE. Joe's story inspir'd me to write a wee "Hastur" tale of my own, and thus I dedicated my story to his memory.

"The Songs of Sesqua Valley" -- One of my loves is poetry, especially the sonnet; thus I relish the sonnet cycles of William Shakespeare and H. P. Lovecraft. I was determined to write my own cycle of thirty-three sonnets. They aren't very good, I was too experimental in playing with the sonnet form. Some of them are absurd in their attempt to combine Lovecraft and Shakespeare, thus:

"Shall I compare you to the beauteous moon--

You, far more lovely, twice as lunatic?

Rough etchings carved into an antient rune

Are not more covert, more esoteric

As your pale eyes in which I nigh behold

The lazy luster of your hungry beam,

That self-substantial fire, twice more cold

Than those refracted rays of lunar stream.

I'll chance to sink the smooth length of my tongue

Into the crater of your crazy breath;

And sighs of midnight pleasure, ever young,

Will ne'er succumb unto a sunrise kiss.

I'll howl for an eternity this rhyme,

For my forever Mistress masters time."

There are a few of the poems that still please me, but most of them are rotten. I confess to being thrilled that S. T. Joshi has chosen one of them, "The Outsider's Song," to be included in his forthcoming anthology of weird verse.

"The Heritage of Hunger" -- I had a lot of fun with this story. I set it in Arkham, in the graveyard where Lovecraft set his tale, "The Unnamable." I include ghouls, and the house mentioned in Lovecraft's tale; and I introduce the diabolic daughter of Henry Anthony Wilcox, the young artist from HPL's "The Call of Cthulhu."

"The Imp of Aether" -- a Mythos tale dedicated to Augie Derleth. S. T. Joshi wrote of the story, in his book THE RISE AND FALL OF THE CTHULHU MYTHOS: "'The Imp of Aether'...performs the miracle of infusing August's Derleth's fire elemental Cthugha with novelty and distinction. (The story is dedicated to Derleth.) A moving tale of a man who inexorably falls under Cthugha's sway, it concludes cataclysmically:

'I watched, as the parchment in his hand darkened and turned black. In horror I watched as the hand that held it darkened also and turned into a thing of ash. Oh, how his flesh crumbled and separated. Ah, the hot burning wind that came from nowhere, that encircled Wilus and the thing to which he was conjoined. A cyclone of ash rose toward the ceiling, and from within that mania of storm I could see the lustrous eyes of an ageless daemon. It raised an amorphous face and opened a wide expanse of mouth, an orifice that puckered and exhaled. A flake on ash sailed from out the tempest, drifted to me and floated into my heaving... Read more ›

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Dark, lyrical and delicious, June 9, 2011

By 

John Goodrich (Bennington, VT) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sesqua Valley & Other Haunts (Paperback)

Mr. Pugmire writes beautiful, dark and dreamy stories, and this collection is no exception. Where many other writers (often myself included) simply ape Lovecraft, Pugmire draws the reader into a strange, misty world with Lovecraftian elements.

These are stories of decadence, of love and not belonging, of despair and loss. But the characters are compelling ans well-drawn, immediately sympathetic for all of their flaws.

The very definition of weird tales, and well worth reading.