The Lurking Chronology: A Timeline of the Derleth Mythos
By Pete Rawlik
Lovecraft eZine Press
August 15, 2015
Reviewed by David Goudsward
For those unfamiliar with the work of Pete Rawlik, let it suffice to say he writes tales set in the Lovecraft mythos, with a twist. Rawlik’s characters interact with the mythos characters and events, both of Lovecraft and his devotees. And he does this interaction within the confines of a chronology of the stories, weaving his stories around this self-imposed canonical timeline, inspired in no small part on the work of Peter Cannon in his 1986 chapbook The Chronology out of Time. Rawlik’s short stories and novels are based on the premise that Lovecraft’s stories are not stand-alone tales, but rather that all of his works take place in a shared universe.
The problem with this approach, as with so many other things Lovecraftian, is August Derleth. Derleth’s stories are based on Lovecraft’s work literarily and figuratively; a number of them are posthumous collaborations. But they often contradict the established events, change the dates, and just muddy the waters.
Rawlik’s solution to these Derleth tales, instead of ignoring or glossing over them, is the The Lurking Chronology, creating a separate timeline of the Derleth version of the Mythos. In other words, Derleth’s mythos is an alternative universe to Lovecraft’s fictional world, separate but equal.
For the casual reader, this is not an issue, but to fans of the Mythos, it is a helpful tool in keep track of events in lesser read tales. And to a Call of Cthulhu role-player building a game, it offers twists to confuse the doomed adventurers before their inevitable slide into madness and death.
It’s a small book, a chapbook really, with 40 pages of text and reasonably priced. But for a little book, it’s a valuable reference tool, and a fun reminder that Derleth’s much maligned pastiches still have entertainment value.
