Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN num: 9780786702350
ISBN number: 0786702354
Label: Carroll & Graf Publishing houses
Manufacturer: Carroll & Graf Publishing houses
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 208
Printing Date: 1995-05
Publishing house: Carroll & Graf Publishing houses
Sale Popularity Level: 932077
Studio: Carroll & Graf Publishing houses
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
The ultimate in subtle horror...Ligotti tells these stories with an eerie, elegant style whose words emphasize the strange as much as the events do.
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Rated by buyers -
As a vampire craves blood, Thomas Ligotti's readers will enjoy Noctuary. The stories are complex, at least some of them. I read one of them over the phone to a woman I know and she laughed a few times. At least at the beginning of the story. Makes me remember the line, "Be careful what you laugh at." The wonderful thing about the stories in Noctuary is that you don't have to understand them to enjoy the writing.
Ligotti shuns the spotlight. But that's okay because he certainly didn't shun the dreams and nightmares that I experienced while reading this book that I consider a masterpiece.
It's a haunting piece of work and my only warning is that Ligotti will take you to a place -- hidden in your mind -- that you don't even know exists.
Flawless. Highly recommended.
Rated by buyers -
...we smile." -Autumnal, from Notebook of the Night.
Thomas Ligotti is one of the most original and unsettling horror writers of this day and age, only somewhat rivalled by his predecessors, Poe and Lovecraft. (One writer who does come very close, however, is Ramsey Campbell.) He is the epitome of the horror writer, thinking of ideas a great deal of us wouldn't even be able to think of: In Part One, we meet Lucian Dregler, an obsessive searcher for the Medusa; Samuel, the deranged postman, descending into his mind on each successive All Hallows' Eve; Arthur Emerson's encounter with a god who may realise his dreams; and Mrs. Rinaldi's ancient wooden chest, home to something infinitely pure and equally corruptable. Part Two take a darker tone. Here we meet Andrew Manning, destined to bring about the end of earthly life; a scientist turned leper messiah and his marvelous machine; a painter determined to become part of his landscapes; and a man pursued by puppet-like horrors, written in the shades of a nightmare. The final section is entirely devoted to vignettes showcasing Ligotti's talent at using very few words to pull off the same effect. The micro-narratives range on subject matter from the unreal ("New Faces in the City") to the Gothic ("Salvation by Doom") to the premundane ("Primordial Loathing"), from the eyes of demons ("The Demon-Man"), from the mouths of the the dead ("One May be Dreaming", "Autumnal"), of the sum of all days ("The Interminable Equation"), on dark, rainy nights ("The Nameless Horror"), ponderings on the mystique of things ("The Mocking Mystery") and the sardonic beauty of it ("The Order of Illusion"). These and many more can be found here. The only piece that came even close to disappointing me was "The Physic", but, thankfully, even that is worth every word.
Rated by buyers -
Thomas Ligotti is a truly unusual author. He has a fascination with "weird fiction," with the unknowable, the macabre. This is paired with a knack for eloquent word-poetry, intelligence and complexity, and a sense of the chillingly unusual. When I finish reading several Ligotti stories, I find that the world looks different. The colors aren't quite right any more, or the angles, or maybe people seem a little darker, a little stranger.
I have several books of Ligotti stories and Noctuary is my favorite. I have often wondered why, and the answer I eventually came to is that most of the stories in here are shorter than those in other books. The longest one is less than 40 pages, and many are only two or three pages long. As much as I love all of Ligotti's writing, he's at his best when he writes in short chunks. Otherwise I find his writing sometimes drags a little.
Ligotti's work is not for everyone. If you don't like the weird or the macabre, you won't enjoy his work. If you prefer your stories to be normal, with a beginning, middle and end, all wrapped up in a neat little ribbon, then this is not for you. If you prefer your world to be its same, comfortable self when you close your books - don't read a word of Ligotti. Ligotti's style is definitely not for everyone. He hands us phrases that no one but he would conceive of, that almost cannot help but elicit a shudder:
"We witness the scene and, with what remains of our mouths, we smile."
But for those of us who enjoy it, it is a dread and harrowing pleasure - one that I would not give up. My only regret is that Ligotti is not a more prolific author.
Rated by buyers -
To realise that for only a few dollars more I could have bought 'The Nightmare Factory' instead which contains all the stories in this book + many more! I guess I will end up owning them both. Ligotti is one of the few creditable horror writers working yesterday and I could never get tired of his stories. They just seem to get deeper and deeper with each subsequent reading. However - if you are looking for blood/gore type horror don't bother - this is a deeply subtle writer at work ..
Rated by buyers -
ligotti is the most disturbing horror writer i've ever encountered, hands down. after i finished "noctuary" i was hungry for more, but unfortunately could not find "grimscribe" anywhere, and am still fiending for a copy. the stories in this book resonate with a kind of sickly unreality (maybe best articulated in "the tsalal") and one gets the sense that while ligotti is on the one hand the impassioned horror writer trying desperately to communicate his vision to the reader, he is on the other hand the avant garde artist in the tradition of duchamp, laughing openly at our pathetic and delusory attempts to impose meaning and order on a universe that in the final equation has neither. it is almost as if he makes a point of pointing out the pointlessness. in this way, he is like his idol hp lovecraft, who constantly added subtle layers of philosophical nihilism and the most extreme forms of pessimism to his work. for those who love tasting the dark, you can't live without this
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