From Sherlock Holmes to the Cthulhu MythosAugust Derleth introduced the world to Solar Pons and Dr. Lyndon Parker in the 1920's. Pons, like Sherlock Holmes, solved crimes using deduction and ratiocination, often referring to Holmes as "The Master" or "My illustrious predecessor". Since his first appearance, Pons has been a favorite with Sherlockians.In the 1930's, Derleth coined the term "Cthulhu Mythos" to describe the weird fiction written by the writers in the Lovecraft circle. After Lovecraft died in 1937, Derleth created Arkham House Publishing to make certain Lovecraft and other writers of the Cthulhu mythos, himself included, remained in print. Derleth wrote a number of tales of the Cthulhu mythos including The Mask of Cthulhu, The Trail of Cthulhu, and The Watchers Out of Time (collaborating with Lovecraft).Now, for the first time ever, the estate of August Derleth has authorized a one of a kind anthology combining Derleth's Solar Pons, the Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street, with his Cthulhu Mythos and horror tales. Join us in the foggy streets of early 20th Century London where horror is lurking on the streets and also at the veil of reality.Nine new tales of terror and detection including: The Rondure of Cthulhu by Stephen Herczeg - Solar Pons must solve the mystery of a man seemingly torn to shreds by invisible forces. The Meandering Mathematician by Robert Perret - A mathematician's strange disappearance leads to visions of an otherworldly realm, a witch, and a sinister rat with a human face. A Matter of Blood by Nick Cardillo - Dr. Seward brings Pons a case involving a a notorious Transylvanian Count. Fans of Stoker's Dracula will love this sequel. To Everything There is a Season by Stephen Persing - The Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street has a Lovecraftian Final Problem. The Adventure of the Book and the Gate by Eleanor Sciolistein - The Necronomicon is used to access a horrifying power source. Solar Pons and the Testament in Ice by Jeff Baker - Pons must face an evil Arctic entity. The Adventure of the Drowned Genealogist by I.A. Watson - How did the body of a recently deceased woman end up in a two century old tomb? It is up to Solar Pons to solve this Dunwich horror. The Man with the Writhing Skin by David Marcum - Mrs. Velda Knoll, a lecturer on "The Great Old Ones" is being stalked by a man with masses of open sores moving about his skin. The Devil's Tongue of Blue John Gap by Derrick Belanger - Solar Pons must solve the case of strange symbols mysteriously appearing in the fields of Blue John Gap.Plus a bonus Sherlock Holmes adventure!

In the 1920's, college student August Derleth wrote to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, asking if any more Sherlock Holmes adventures were going to be published. Upon receiving a negative reply, Derleth decided to provide some of his own. However, rather than relating more tales of Holmes and Dr. Watson, he ended up introducing the world to Solar Pons and Dr. Lyndon Parker, living in London during the 1920's and 1930's. Pons solved crimes using deduction and ratiocination, often referring to Holmes as "The Master" or "My illustrious predecessor." Since his first appearance, Pons has been a favorite with Sherlockians. Now, for the first time ever, the estate of August Derleth has authorized the first ever anthology of Solar Pons stories! These twenty new adventures range from soon after Pons and Parker met in 1919 to a story that occurs after Germany has been defeated in World War II. Each of them fully and traditionally falls within the Pontine Canon.The authors of these stories have contributed their royalties to the Jan Stauber Grant Fund for the Beacon Society, which provides scholarships to educators, schools, and Sherlockian Scion societies, allowing them to purchase Sherlock Holmes books and materials in order to introduce young people to The Canon.Join us again at 7B Praed Street where The Game is Afoot!

The Return of Solar Pons ScholarshipIn 1928, college student August Derleth wrote to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, asking if any more Sherlock Holmes adventures were going to be published. Upon receiving a negative reply, Derleth decided to provide some of his own. However, rather than relating more tales of Holmes and Dr. Watson, he ended up introducing the world to Solar Pons and Dr. Lyndon Parker, living in London during the 1920's and 1930's. Pons solved crimes using deduction and ratiocination, often referring to Holmes as "The Master" or "My illustrious predecessor". Since his first appearance, Pons has been a favorite with Sherlockians. Between the 1920's and the early 1970's, Derleth produced over seventy Pons short stories and novels, publishing them through his own imprint, Mycroft & Moran. The Pons stories were beloved within the Sherlockian community, so much so that scholarship developed about the character.We continue that tradition of Solar Pons scholarship with The Pontine Dossier, Millennium edition. Read essays on August Derleth and Solar Pons by today's Pontine scholars as they analyze the Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street. "The Game" is afoot!

This long-awaited second collection of pastiches of the immortal Sherlock Holmes offers eleven new adventures of Solar Pons, who has been called by Vincent Starrett "a clever impersonator, with a twinkle in his eye, which tells us that he knows he is not Sherlock Holmes, and knows that we know it, but that he hopes we will like him anyway for what he symbolizes." Here are such fascinating stories as "The Adventure of the Paralytic Mendicant", an account of as unique a vengeance as was ever perpetrated between boards; "The Adventure of the Circular Room", a tale of a diabolic plot which will rouse many a memory of the old Master; the complex puzzle which will be of particular interest to bibliophiles told in the Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine Contest prizewinning "The Adventure of the Six Silver Spiders"; the curious affair which is "The Adventure of the Tottenham Werewolf'; and others which will bring back old, long-vanished Baker Street days. Once again in the London of years ago "the game is afoot." Certainly no living writer has brought the Holmesian pastiche to a higher development than this. There is very little difference, indeed, in the atmosphere of the stories, once they have begun to unfold; No. 7B Praed Street readily becomes 221B Baker Street; and Solar Pons, attended by his Dr. Lyndon Parker, often becomes curiously interchangeable with the Master of Baker Street and his Watson. "There is no intention to deceive," as Vincent Starrett wrote in his introduction to the first collection. "These nostalgic reminders of vanished days and nights in Baker Street are intended only to please."

THE MONSTERS ARE DUE ON BAKER STREET! Between the shadowy realms of fear and the unforgiving glare of science lies a battleground of unspeakable horror. In vile alleyways with blood-slick cobblestones, impenetrable fog, and the wan glow of gaslight, lurk the inhuman denizens of nightmare. CAN REASON PREVAIL WHEN ELIMINATING THE IMPOSSIBLE IS NO LONGER AN OPTION? Faced with his worst fears, Sherlock Holmes has his faith in the science of observation and deduction shaken to the core in 13 all-new tales of terror from today's modern masters of the macabre!

"Trust me, this book makes a mind-blowing addition to your weird fiction criticism collection." --- Ross E. Lockhart, editor of The Book of Cthulhu "As a writer in this tradition, I devour books about the Mythos. . . [A Look Behind the Derleth Mythos] is the finest such book that I have ever read." --- Wilum H. Pugmire, author of Some Unknown Gulf of Night and Uncommon Places An instant classic when first released, John D. Haefele's critically acclaimed account of the birth of the Cthulhu Mythos is now back in a completely revised trade paperback edition overflowing with fascinating new insights and discoveries. In 1939, the prolific Wisconsin writer August Derleth launched Arkham House, one of the most influential small presses in the history of publishing. Its mission: to preserve in the permanence of hardcovers the writings of Derleth's late friend, the legendary horror fantasist Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890-1937). During three decades of editing and storytelling, Derleth became the major player in the explosive growth of the "Cthulhu Mythos" into a worldwide cultural phenomenon. Does the Cthulhu Mythos owe its existence to the Lovecraft Mythos -- or is the parallel fictional world of the Derleth Mythos even more influential? Comparatively shallow works such as S. T. Joshi's The Rise and Fall of the Cthulhu Mythos are filled with misconceptions and tell only a small part of this hotly controversial story. Now join Haefele as he digs far deeper, unearthing important layers of the saga neglected by past scholars. A Look Behind the Derleth Mythos answers numerous questions with fresh evidence and thunderous revelations, covering in unprecedented detail everything from the notorious Black Magic Quote to Derleth's infamous "posthumous collaborations" with Lovecraft. One of the most striking books of criticism ever written on the works of H. P. Lovecraft, A Look Behind the Derleth Mythos is a riveting chronicle no fan of Cthulhu, Yog-Sothoth and Nyarlathotep should miss!

"The best writer in the genre since H. P. Lovecraft." - Los Angeles Herald-Examiner "Outstanding in the genre." - August Derleth "In the same class as M.R. James and Algernon Blackwood." - Michael and Mollie Hardwick "One of the last great traditionalists of English fiction." - Colin Wilson Frederick Plowright, a well-known scientific photographer, is recruited by Professor Clark Ashton Scarsdale to accompany his research team in search of "The Great White Space," described in ancient and arcane texts as a portal leading to the extremities of the universe. Plowright, Scarsdale, and the rest of their crew embark on the Great Northern Expedition, traversing a terrifying and desolate landscape to the Black Mountains, where a passageway hundreds of feet high leads to a lost city miles below the surface of the earth. But the unsettling discoveries they make there are only a precursor of the true horror to follow. For the doorway of the Great White Space opens both ways, and something unspeakably evil has crossed over-a horrifying abomination that does not intend to let any of them return to the surface alive . . . One of the great British horror writers of the 20th century, Basil Copper (1924-2013) was best known for his macabre short fiction, which earned him the World Horror Convention's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010. The Great White Space (1974) is a tale in the mode of H. P. Lovecraft and is recognized as one of the best Lovecraftian horror novels ever written. This edition, the first in more than 30 years, includes a new introduction by Stephen Jones.