H. P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia

An H.P. Lovecraft Encyclopedia, edited by S.T. Joshi and David E. Schultz, will please HPL purists, since it focuses on the weird writer's literary work with entries for individual stories, the more important poems and essays, fictional locales and characters (including every member of the German U-boat crew named in ""The Temple""). Although Cthulhu and HPL's other ""gods"" don't receive separate entries, there's an essay-length entry on the Cthulhu Mythos. Other longer entries concisely treat such topics as HPL's juvenilia, letters and travels, but his philosophy gets short shrift for, as the editors state in their introduction: ""No separate entry on Lovecraft's philosophical thought is included here, as the topic is too complex for succinct discussion."" Despite such selective coverage, this is an indispensable volume.