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[Jreengus]

Never actually read any of these, I've seen quite a few references to them around the internet though. Wondering what you guys thought and if they are worth buying? If you would say they are worth buying which book is the first?

P.s. Feel free to discuss them in general here but put spoilers in the spoiler box thingymawhatsitjiggydodad.

[Nonanonymous]

Lovecraft honestly isn't an exceptional author.  His writing style is often compared to a scientific report at best, or an unwieldy mess at worst.

The underlying ideas are good, though, profoundly nihilistic, espousing the idea that there are things out there so fantastically horrible, that humanity would be entirely powerless before it.

[McDoomhammer]

You used to be able to just google it and find the complete works published online (No copyright on them anymore).  I've heard they can still be found if you do a little digging.

Sliiightly off topic, since it isn't representative of his greater body of work, but the following was written by Lovecraft under a pen name and is a hilarious bit of parody/satire:

Sweet Ermengarde

[korora]

I've been wondering the same thing.  McDoomhammer:  Despite being able to find plenty of his works, I've never been able to figure out where to actually start.  Hints?  Or does it not even matter?

[McDoomhammer]

Well, I started at the beginning chronologically with short stories and things, but never finished everything (the site I was using went down).  I barely scratched the whole Cthulhu mythos stories.  To be honest, I'm thinking of just borrowing a friend's book.

[Nonanonymous]

I don't know why you people seem to think it is, but the Cthulhu Mythos isn't a series of novels sold in box sets.  It's a setting, and Lovecraft himself never wrote a book in it that had a prerequisite that he had written previously.

[korora]

I didn't have that impression.  However, looking at the 50+ Cthulhu-related works I've collected, I have no idea whether there's any continuity (seems like you're implying no) or which ones are even any good.

It seems like you're pretty familiar.  Care to make a recommendation?

[Nonanonymous]

The Call of Cthulhu, Dreams in the Witch House, and the Rats in the Walls are some of my favorites.

I also like his Dream-Cycle works.

[Idiom]

'The Shadow out of Time' is supposed to be his best.
Also: Wikisource

[korora]

Nonanonymous, Idiom: Thanks!  I hadn't seen wikisource before, it looks pretty great.

[Cthulhu]

Another place to get them is http://dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/index.html.  It's not as comprehensive as Wikisource, but the white on black is very easy on the eyes.

[Keiseth]

Of his shorter stories, my favorite is without argument, "The Quest of Iranon". The ending haunted me for weeks.

[korora]

While I'm here, if you guys like Cthulhu and also text adventures, you should check out Anchorhead.  It's an absolute 10/10 for gameplay and is soaked in Cthulhuian (Cthuluesque?  Cthulhuish? Cthulhonic?) lore.

I started reading Call of Cthulhu and so far it's pretty awesome.

[McDoomhammer]

While we're at it, The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross is pretty good.  It's kind of a Lovecraftian-Cypherpunk spy novel.  The author gets a bit crazy with his techieness sometimes, but the ideas are good enough to carry it, rather like Lovecraft himself.  And it directly refers to the Cthulhu Mythos.

[korora]

I really liked Halting State and loved Accelerando (which should indicate that overboard techieness is not likely to dissuade me), and I've been meaning to read more Stross.  I also read a short story, set (I think) in the same universe as The Atrocity Archives, on tor.com and since then I've been meaning to read more in that universe.