Contest Finalist Discussion - One Thousand Dead Names

Dark imaginings of that which lies hidden behind the veil of reality, terrible tales of woe and horror of those to whom the true nature of the universe was revealed, or revelations of the times when the stars are right? Fiction or Fact? This forum is for Cthulhu and Horror fan fiction. Do you have a story to share?
Mi-Go Agent
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Contest Finalist Discussion - One Thousand Dead Names

Post by Mi-Go Agent »

I've collected everything said about the winner, One Thousand Dead Names, right here. I'm looking forwards to hearing from the author, and the other ten people who voted for it.

"One thousand Dead names". This tale has, in my not-so-humble opinion, quite a few flaws, beginning with an overly abundant flowery language, which can be a bit jarring in places (and seems to oddly lessen as the story continues, and not just due to the introduction of the side-characters and conversation). One of the paragraphs also omits a few words/has a few mistakes in it which, while forgiveable, did break my flow of reading. It also features one of my least favourite types of protagonists: The "Paranormal detective", i.e. the kind that either has super-powers, access to spells or a pretty darn good knowledge of what he is dealing with.
Nevertheless, it had somewhat original concepts, had a good flow in both plot and tension and showed off the lingual mastery of the author (if somewhat abundantly, as previously stated).
-Victimizer
The hard toss up for me is Miskatonic Moon- which as a grad student I thought was great and a thousand dead names- which made me think- yes, a real defender from the forces of darkness would probably be kind of like this. Overall, A thousand Dead Names is, to me, the most polished story and I really enjoyed the many arcane references.
-Welsh
I tend to broadly agree with Victimizer's assessments; s/he has obviously put a lot of thought into hir analyses and taken the time to share hir opinions - admirable when compared to my own laziness.
The whole issue of what constitutes a Cthulhu Mythos story was also a factor in my decision to vote for "A Thousand Dead Names" rather than "Death of Ages".
Where our opinions differ is that, on the basis of content rather than style, I still enjoyed "Names" the most.
I wonder if the writer is a fan of the DC "Hellblazer" comic series, as I was fondly reminded of the sort of atmosphere evoked in the better story-arcs from its pages.
-Mikc
I also admit that "Names" gave off a distinctive John Constantine/Trenchcoat Brigade vibe. Oddly enough, I like all of those characters (despite not having read all that much about them), i.e. the DC/Vertigo practitioners of Magic and such, but for one reason or another I don't like them mixing with my Cthulhu Mythos - peas to the one side, mashed potatoes to the other and all that.
Perhaps I still suffer from the overdose of that mixture that is Titus Crow. Though I look forward to reading the two newish Lumley collections I've acquired - The Taint and Haggopian - I'm still pretty hesitant to pick up Lumley's other longer works like Khai of ancient Khem or his Dreamlands novels. Though I guess Sorcery in Shad wasn't too terrible.
-Victimizer

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