Here’s a quick round-up for December on Tentaclii, for what it’s worth now. In December my ‘Picture Postals’ posts took a look at Robie Alzada Place (1827–1896) and her home place to the west of Providence, this also having been the home place of Lovecraft’s mother; I followed Lovecraft’s travel trail far up into the White Mountains; and I mused on the Ladd Observatory and its relation to time and time-keeping in Providence.

I wrote a long summary here of the year’s more general Lovecraft-related activity by others, in “Lovecraft in 2021: a summary survey”.

Not much in new books in December, but I was pleased to spot S.T. Joshi’s Phantasmagoria: The Weird Fiction, Poetry, and Criticism of Sir Walter Scott and its fine cover. Also the Lovecraft astronomy book El Astronomicon Y Otros Textes En Defense De La Ciencia down in Spain. The French had shipping dates for the various volumes in the sumptuous Editions Mnemos set of Lovecraft’s work in a new translation.

Not much research by me in December, other than for the ‘Picture Postals’, though I am slowly reading through a new book of letters. I did look at who Chapman Miske was, what he published on Lovecraft, and where to find it. I took another look at Lovecraft’s knowledge of Harlem, after finding some new data.

I spotted that H.P. Lovecraft’s first publication (Scientific American, 25th August 1906) was for sale on eBay. Also on eBay I found a good watercolour of the “Longitude” lane in Charleston, which Lovecraft described and admired on his travels. Over on Abe, a set of “At the Mountains of Madness” in Astounding Stories appeared for sale. More significantly, at the end of the month Abe also landed a big bundle of Lovecraft’s earliest appearances in print.

Popping up on Archive.org for free in December was a comprehensive plot-annotated checklist of ‘Bibliomysteries’ (mystery novels across various genres which centre on rare books, book collectors, old bookshops and suchlike); and I was also pleased to see Clifford D. Simak: a primary and secondary bibliography.

Among the audio, the timely story “The Return of the Undead” by Arthur Leeds saw a welcome free release on YouTube. It’s also just gone into the public domain. A new Voluminous podcast looked at ‘H.P. Lovecraft, Detective’, doggedly solving a dastardly crime at the Haverhill Post Office. A books podcast interviewed the author of the intriguing new novel Providence Blue: A Fantasy Quest.

I was pleased to see that the Robert E. Howard Days in Texas announced their 2022 dates. I was also pleased to find a new lost story by Lovecraft’s friend Everett McNeil, “A Descendant of the Vikings” (1906/07).

In software I noted the new writing software CQuill Writer 1.x, an interesting style-prompting assistant which could be filled (in its full paid version) with the works of Lovecraft. I also see that Scrivener 3.x for Windows was released, at long last, something I had missed earlier in 2021. The latter seems hideously complex, but is said to be the best software for writers on Windows. In 3D software I noted free 3D writing accessories for the free DAZ Studio 3D figure rendering software, which could be used with the 3D Lovecraft figure.

Elsewhere I produced a bumper 108-page ‘Moebius tribute’ issue of Digital Art Live, and also interviewed Simon Ravenhill (Striker, in The Sun newspaper) for VisNews. I comprehensively updated my free “The Folk-lore of North Staffordshire” annotated bibliography, now available online in version 1.7. I released my short book Tolkien and the Lizard: J.R.R. Tolkien in Cornwall, 1914, this being a PDF extract from a much larger book on a far larger and more intellectual topic relating to the young Tolkien. Cornwall has sold only two copies, as a fundraiser for the larger book, but did at least help pay for the meagre Christmas food shopping.

All this while having Omicron. From which I’m now recovered — and I presumably now have the latest and greatest antibodies.

Coming soon on Tentaclii… Lovecraft’s almanacks, Tom Baker’s best, and taking the Trans-Europe Express to vampire-country. Not necessarily in that order.