The Shadow at the Bottom of the World [Hardcover]

Thomas Ligotti (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 2006

Author Signed & number edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 270 pages
• Publisher: Subterraean Press; 1st edition (2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1596060573
• ISBN-13: 978-1596060579
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,655,773 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars disappointing, in the end ...or is it? ...it is not., March 23, 2007

By 

Andelsprutz - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Shadow at The Bottom of The World (Paperback)

I had never read Thomas Ligotti before I bought The Shadow at the Bottom of the World but I had high hopes, especially since Lovecraft is one of my favorite fiction writers. Most of the reviews for Ligotti are very enthusiastic. In the end, however, I was disappointed. Most of the stories have very little plot and the plots they do have are too vague to be very interesting, especially since there is often a suspenseful build-up which doesn't really lead anywhere. I found the best aspects of Ligotti's writing to be his ability to convey surreal, visual, dream-like images, and his very unique, though sometimes monotonous and droning writing style. I especially liked "Purity." That story seemed a little more based in reality than the others and I think that made it more engaging.
Ligotti's writing certainly has its good points but overall I found it disappointing. I don't necessarily object to negativity or pessimism but Ligotti's brand of it is depressing. Three stars for writing style and surrealism.


Added much later:
It has been some time since I wrote the above review. While I still think my estimation of the book's strengths and weaknesses was for the most part a good one, Ligotti's writing seems to have grown on me. I am currently reading another of his books, My Work is Not Yet Done, and have been very much enjoying it. In the above review I mentioned especially liking "Purity", and I do remember that as being a good story, but I think the one that has stayed with me the most is "Teatro Grottesco", a tale about a mysterious something that visits artists and takes away their creativity. Unfortunately I can't edit the number of stars I gave this book.


Added still later:
Thomas Ligotti is now one of my favorite living horror writers, along with Ramsey Campbell, Michael Cisco, Terry Lamsley, and a few others. This is a good introduction to his work. It is a "best of" sort of collection, so if it turns you into a fan and you are willing to pay the sometimes very high prices for his out of print collections, you will soon own duplicates of all the stories in this book. For that reason, this book is useless to me now, except for the excerpt from Ligotti's yet to be seen nonfiction book, which is an interesting read and cannot be found elsewhere.
I considered taking this review off of Amazon. It is now embarrassing to me that I gave an excellent writer like Thomas Ligotti an unfavorable review. However, I think the three parts of this review, separated by time, show that perhaps Ligotti's work can take time to grow on some people. So, if you are reading this review and have never read Ligotti, I suggest reading him, and if it doesn't immediately appeal to you then set the book aside and maybe sometime later you will discover that some strange images have unobtrusively made a home somewhere in your mind...

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential Ligotti, October 21, 2005

By 

Michael Koger "open minded listener" (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Shadow at The Bottom of The World (Paperback)

This is a collection for both old fans of Ligotti and new ones eager to dive head on into his twisted and deformed world. All of the stories (with the exception of "Purity") can be found in The Nightmare Factory, but if you missed TNF, here's your chance to read the best of the best. That's how I think of this - as a "Best of" collection of Ligotti's widely published works. The title story acts as a sort of guidebook for how "existential horror" should look like. Lovecraft fans will probably enjoy "Nethescurial" and "The Tsalal". In my opinion, the last three stories ("Teatro Grottesco", "The Red Tower", and "Purity") are some of, if not the, best stories Ligotti has composed.

This should tide over most of us until Durtro releases what should be THE best Ligotti collection later this year or early next year.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Master of Disaster Strikes Again, May 23, 2006

By 

J from NY (New York) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Shadow at The Bottom of The World (Paperback)

"The Shadow At the Bottom of the World", while only containing one unread story for Ligotti fans, will be entirely new for others ignorant of the Ligottian cosmos. I think that is the point--and even brand new fans get the additional treat of discovering which stories Ligotti himself holds in high regard.

Heavyweight Champion of the macabre, Ligotti's new story "Purity"
shows without a doubt that his reputation as the best since Lovecraft is more than deserved. If I'm not mistaken, the life of "the boy" may have some autobiographical undertones to it. The boy lives in a slum neighborhood that sounds just like Detroit. His relationship with "Candy", a nearly catatonic old black woman, is unusual to say the least for his work. Somehow different, although the same in basic message, than his other stories, Ligotti is "not afraid anymore": there are moments of daring few other authors in this field, Ramsey Campbell or even the old greats like Arthur Machen, would attempt. Not only is this mentally deranged narrator slowly losing it because of his father's bizarre determination to destroy everything "wholesome" and "good": his mind is coming apart in a most creative fashion.

"Because it was a cold night, and the house wasunheated, the smell was not terribly strong. I knelt at the edge of the hole
and shined the flashlight into it as far as its thin beam would reach. But the only other objects I could see were some broken bottles stuck within the strata of human waste. I thought about what other things might be in that basement...and I became lost in those thoughts" (pg. 250).

This slow Lynchian loss of sanity is not new for Ligotti, but the way he employs it here IS new. Anyone who doesn't know about Thomas Ligotti should first purchase this, "The Nightmare Factory" and "Noctuary". These are the real primers.

We also get treated to another one of his razor sharp introducing, slashing our fabricated hopes apart like
ribbons. A must read.