I’m a bit late with this week’s weird tale, and I’m not really offering a review because I’ve already done that.
Review: “The Shunned House”, H. P. Lovecraft, 1924.
On re-reading this story after a number of years, I noticed that this story has one of the earliest references to the Exeter vampire story which only got wider coverage in the 2000s. (At least the Wikipedia entry only has sources that recent.)
It also strikes me as a transition story for Lovecraft. It’s a gothic tale centered around the rumors about a house and the evil affecting it is traced through history. It strikes me that this 1924 story prefigures 1926’s “The Call of Cthulhu” which is sort of an international gothic tracing evil through history in several locations. The idea of a malevolent presence sapping people’s lives figures prefigures 1927’s “The Colour Out of Space”. The introduction of a new scientific ideas and apparatus (the acid and Crookes tube and flamethrower) point the way to greater use of science in later Lovecraft stories though only the acid works here in destroying the monster.
And here’s a picture of the shunned house still standing at 135 Benefit St in Providence, Rhode Island — just where Lovecraft put it.
More reviews of fantastic fiction are indexed by title and author/editor.
MarzAat 
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