Michael Northrop

This could have been so easy: A few more “Hut, Holland, huts,” a few more positive vibes sent toward the Dutch team… But no, you sat back in classic American indifference or, worse, cheered for Spain. Now, the Spanish have won, the Aztecs are pissed, it’s almost 2012, and far, far worse, Paul the Psychic Octopus has gone eight for eight in World Cup predictions. Eight for eight! Do you understand the significance of that? He’s an octopus—or is he?! Have you seen Paul? Doesn’t he remind you of someone?

See that little boat? That’s you. Jerk.

That’s right, Cthulhu. The Eighth Seal has been broken and The Dread One From Beyond Time, The Profane Abomination From Beyond Space, The Jerk Who Capitalizes Articles and Prepositions will rise, slap high 40 with his little cousin Paul, and set up Dark Dominion over our very existence. And it’s your fault. I hope you will be able to sleep at night, which, by the way, will now be endless.

Meet the child of tomorrow. His name is f’tevangh.

“AAAAHHH! My eyes are up here. AAAAHHH!”

With my second YA and first MG written, I find myself with some time to write a horror novel. Back in the day, I published spooky little stories everywhere from Weird Tales to the Notre Dame Review but, uh, that was a while ago. Let’s just say there was some rust to scrape off. Herewith, the rejected opening lines for my new horror novel:

It was dark, and Stormy Knight moved cautiously. He’d been burned before, and bumped, besides.

In all of nature, there is no animal more ravenous than the shrew, and no rodent larger than the capybara. That is why they should never have been allowed to mate.

I’ve been wanting to write a Cthulhu mythos story for years—some dark and debased tale of ancient evils and “aeons-old dread.” And then the Sox got swept by, literally, one billion dollars of Yankee free-agents, and it was like, yep, now’s the time.

The phrase “Project Cthulhu” came up last week, in an email to the inimitable Matthue Roth (I think I tossed it out there as an alternate title for his mysterious Project Starfish). We are both huge fans of H(oward) P(hillips) Lovecraft but Matthue is busy with Starfish, and a half dozen other projects besides, so I am taking back Project Cthulhu (hereafter: PCth) and using it for my own ineffable ends.

Who knows what will come of it: A horror from beyond time; an evil from beyond space; a terrible and transfixing doom, raining down like volcanic ash upon the land. Or, you know, a really bad short story. All are possibilities. I’ll post the final product here.

I plan to continue rereading/reviewing TRAPPED during the day. Night seems like the right time for PCth, anyway: The darkest corners of the night, where the most profane secrets lurk unseen. In Salisbury, that’s anything after 9:30.