18 Comments
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Jeannine's avatar

This story feels like a collaboration between Charles Dickins and H.P. Lovecraft. Excellent, excellent, excellent!

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Nick Winney's avatar

this is exactly the thing i am trying to achieve... but its actually getting hard to think of long words for vermin, corpses and other dread things haha!

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Jeannine's avatar

Yeah, Lovecraft was the king of literary horror. But you're doing great so far - maybe you need to dog put a dictionary for the next part.

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

I agree - which is a good thing of course. I always found Lovecraft just very funny, rather than scary in any way, simply because of his colourful use of language and being so over the top. Like that amazing line 'and great Cthulhu slid greasily into the water' - it's that word 'greasily' that does it.

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Jeannine's avatar

Lovecraft did love his verbiage.

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

Verbiage is the right word!

I should’ve also said I have one of the coolest cuddly toys ever, which is a cuddly Cthulhu!

Can’t find it though - it must be lurking somewhere. Uh-oh.

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Jeannine's avatar

I found one on Amazon for my son a few years back. He's a big Lovecraft fan! 😂

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

Cool! But make sure he keeps an eye on it - just in case, you know!

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Zivah Avraham's avatar

You’ve dug deep into the surname mine and risen to the sunlight with some brilliant gems! I can’t read anymore until later, but it will be my treat during my break from work.

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Garen Marie's avatar

Another great installment to this story. I am enjoying it so much! The litany of unfortunate events was excellent. I must know what happens when Speighthart walks.

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Keith Long's avatar

Superb. Love the names and the series of awful events — rusty nails to the butt, yikes.

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

Superb stuff! This just gets even better!

And more great names to conjure with too. Kilmister, huh? Have we been listening to Motorhead or Hawkwind lately by any chance?

This is brilliantly written as well and I do adore this kind of comic horror.

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Nick Winney's avatar

actually i have a list of "uncommon gloucestershire surnames" its been a delight... although i did actually know a phillipa flux... her sister was calles Electra Flux... I KNOW! I KNOW.

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Nick Winney's avatar

thanks Evelyn !!!.. your reading my stuff is one of my daily... "has she read it yet? has she?" 😀 i think this is the thing i have most enjoyed writing so far (not because i think its the best thing) but because i know its ridiculous and a pastiche but i can just aim for as OTT as possible. its actually like a mental puzzle writing as long a sentence as i possibly can and finding new adjectives in the genre... am running out...

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

I’m flattered!

And I think it’s very important to enjoy our own writing. That’s one reason why I do the comedy stuff and make myself laugh. And, yes, challenge myself to write a good joke.

That’s a healthy mental puzzle too. I approve. And there were indeed some wonderful sentences in this part.

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Nick Winney's avatar

i didn't know rancourousness was a word - still not sure.

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

I think it's just rancour. But rancouressness sounds better! Keep it up, Sir, keep it up! (as the actress said to the bishop)

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Nicole Paton's avatar

Oh no you didn't!!! Ahhhhh!!!

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