I have posted in the past on Sinister Cinema’s Armchair Fiction books. A new numbered series they kicked off is “MH,” which stands for “Masters of Horror.” Larger volumes than most, clocking in at about 350 pages, the first two are out.
The first volume reprints works by Weird Tales author Allison V. Harding. The second is a volume of H.P. Lovecraft taken from Weird Tales, the first of I assume two such volumes.
Allison V. Harding: The Forgotten Queen of Horror includes 16 stories by her. I had actually never heard of Harding, but she wrote about 36 stories in Weird Tales (and only Weird Tales) from 1943 to ’51, including a trio of tales of the “Damp Man.” Who was Allison V. Harding? That’s the question. Some believe she was Jean Milligan, a lawyer who apparently wrote on the side and hide under a pseudonym, which was common sometimes to hide their gender, sometimes to make sure an employer didn’t know they were writing. But there has never been confirmation of this from her or her family. She passed away in 2004. Did no one approach her before then? Did her family not know?
In trying to find out who Harding was, I stumbled on a posting on the Tellers of Weird Tales blog. Terence E. Hanley‘s posting explains how Milligan was identified as Harding, and who Milligan was. It’s pretty straightforward, and notes that neither Milligan or her family has ever confirmed she was Harding.
Then we come to an interesting point. Milligan was married to Charles Lamont Buchanan, better known as Lamont Buchanan, an author in the 1940s and ’50s of books on sports and American history. Okay. And during this time he was also an associate editor of, wait for it, Weird Tales! So perhaps what happened was that Buchanan was Harding, and used his wife as a blind to submit works to the magazine he edited without getting in trouble. A further idea put forth is that perhaps he and his wife wrote them together. Sadly, as both have passed, there is no way to truly know.
This volume reprints 16 stories, including the first of the Damp Man stories and her last story. I read a few of them, starting with “Damp Man.” Here we have a young girl being stalked by a very weird man. He is more than your normal stalker, and the end of the story is pretty strange. I wonder how the sequels worked out? “The Murderous Steam Shovel,” I thought would be dumb, but it was pretty interesting and atmospheric. I found others that I read interesting as well.
As noted, the second Masters of Horror volume is H.P. Lovecraft: The Ultimate Illustrated “Weird Tales” Collection, Part 1. It collects 21 tales, with illustrations that I had not seen before. While I’ve read these tales and have them collected elsewhere, the bonus of having the illustrations led me to get this one. There is also a nice photo section on Lovecraft as well, and I hadn’t seen some of these before.
I have no idea what will be next in this series. Okay, there will be another HPL/Weird Tales collection. But what others? Certainly I’d prefer stuff that hasn’t already been collected elsewhere. But I’m not sure what. Any ideas or suggestions?
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