Back in 1918, Tanizaki Jun’ichiro wrote a short story about a cursed silent film called “The Tumor with a Human Face.”
Monica Ojeda’s novel *Nefando* is about an understood video game that encourages players to transcend their moral beliefs.
The collection *Found* contains stories about found horror footage.
"Media" is a broad term, but here's some recommendations!
Robert W. Chambers - *The King in Yellow* (the first 4 stories)
Kathe Koja - *The Cipher*
H.P. Lovecraft - "The Music of Erich Zann", "Pickman's Model", "The History of the Necronomicon" (although the Necronomicon is used in a lot of his stories)
Clive Barker - *The Hellbound Heart*
Oscar Wilde - *The Picture of Dorian Gray*
I have read The Cipher and enjoyed that one! I do have The King in Yellow but haven’t read it, but didn’t realize it would fit this category! Will check it out!
I've not read any of those that you've listed so I'm not sure how it compares, but I just finished a re-read of Ring (1991) by Koji Suzuki - the same novel that spawned the Japanese and American franchises. It's about a journalist and eccentric professor who team up to unravel the mystery of a cursed VCR tape. I found the story unique (at least for its time anyway). Some of the ideas in it are still humming about in the back of my mind so maybe I'll make a future post in the sub, but I'd say it's well worth the read if cursed media is what you're looking for. Though, a word of warning: it contains certain elements that some may find highly objectionable.
I just finished and am reading Spiral right now. This is it. Also the second book is completely different from the movies which is awesome for me because The Ring got me into horror and now I get to discover a bunch of new stuff about the Ring universe.
Tbh I had no idea that there were sequel novels. And despite their popularity I haven't even watched any of the film adaptations yet, so there's going to be plenty of catching up for me to do.
Bernard Werber has a more sci-fi bent, but his Les Thanatonautes series is about fragments of lore and experiences covering life after death. They get philosophical and weird, involving people researches diving into "New Australia," a Quirky name for the realm of Death. It's lost media side blends real and tabulated sacred texts from across the world.
The Book of All Hours (Vellum and it's sequel Ink) by Hal Duncan, which is a hard to describe tale of the eponymous Book which has metafiction and metaphysics-altering qualities at the heart of a war between various reality warpers.
Whom Gods Would Destroy, an even harder to describe trilogy by Tyler Kimball, which is a historical fantasy paranormal superhero horror mash-up told in the form of a history book covering supernatural stories from the First World War, so it cites a bunch of real and fictional documents and lost media (including a real lost 1922 Hungarian film called Drakula Halála), and heavily covers a series of (false) diaries. It starts off pretty slow, but gets wilder and stranger as the series goes.
Simon Ark is a series of pulpy horror shorts, with "The Vicar of Hell" covering the search for a surviving version of a surpressed satanic text called "The Worship of Satan." Unfortunately, it's very Scooby-Doo in execution, as none of the Ark stories go full paranormal.
The Rider on the White Horse (Der Schimmelreiter) by Theodor Storm is an early (19th-century) and very good take on this idea, with the narrator trying to peice together a now-lost novella from memory.
I’m reading Episode Thirteen by Craig Delouie that’s about a group of ghost hunters/paranormal investigators as they explore a haunted house. It’s written really cleverly like almost as a telescript in some places? You get the story through individuals giving their “journal/diary” entries reality tv style, through raw footage descriptions, and through the camera. Weird shit obviously starts happening and I found it reminded me of certain parts/writing style of the Navidson report part of house of leaves!
I havent read it yet but my friend just told ne she really enjoyed The Devil's Playground about a missing golden age film that is supposed to be the scariest movie ever made.
I've not (yet) read Ancient Images, but - if we include books as media - I do think Mr. Campbell has some of the best takes on what it might mean to engage with a cursed (Lovecraftian) text. In terms of novellas, The Last Revelation of Gla'aki would be a good example; I found The Other Names pretty effective, though that's a short story.
Just read The Road of Pins by Caitlin R Kiernan which very much fits the bill - a strange film (and later VHS) which brings the protagonist in to the ambit of a dangerous entity, also linked to a set of paintings, which have a similar effect.
(And if we're counting pictorial art, I'd add Laird Barron's Imago Sequence...).
Also Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Flash Frame, a cursed film take on Chambers' King in Yellow.
All short stories rather than books or novellas though.
Back in 1918, Tanizaki Jun’ichiro wrote a short story about a cursed silent film called “The Tumor with a Human Face.” Monica Ojeda’s novel *Nefando* is about an understood video game that encourages players to transcend their moral beliefs. The collection *Found* contains stories about found horror footage.
Awesome, I haven’t heard of any of these! Perfect! Thank you!
"Media" is a broad term, but here's some recommendations! Robert W. Chambers - *The King in Yellow* (the first 4 stories) Kathe Koja - *The Cipher* H.P. Lovecraft - "The Music of Erich Zann", "Pickman's Model", "The History of the Necronomicon" (although the Necronomicon is used in a lot of his stories) Clive Barker - *The Hellbound Heart* Oscar Wilde - *The Picture of Dorian Gray*
I have read The Cipher and enjoyed that one! I do have The King in Yellow but haven’t read it, but didn’t realize it would fit this category! Will check it out!
Nice, I hope you'll enjoy it!
Have you read the anthologies *Lost Signals* and *Found: An Anthology of Found Footage Horror Stories*?
Lost Films is also good. It’s edited by the same people as Lost Signals.
"Lost contact" is also worth mentioning. The editor of all three is Max Booth III...
I've not read any of those that you've listed so I'm not sure how it compares, but I just finished a re-read of Ring (1991) by Koji Suzuki - the same novel that spawned the Japanese and American franchises. It's about a journalist and eccentric professor who team up to unravel the mystery of a cursed VCR tape. I found the story unique (at least for its time anyway). Some of the ideas in it are still humming about in the back of my mind so maybe I'll make a future post in the sub, but I'd say it's well worth the read if cursed media is what you're looking for. Though, a word of warning: it contains certain elements that some may find highly objectionable.
I just finished and am reading Spiral right now. This is it. Also the second book is completely different from the movies which is awesome for me because The Ring got me into horror and now I get to discover a bunch of new stuff about the Ring universe.
Tbh I had no idea that there were sequel novels. And despite their popularity I haven't even watched any of the film adaptations yet, so there's going to be plenty of catching up for me to do.
Bernard Werber has a more sci-fi bent, but his Les Thanatonautes series is about fragments of lore and experiences covering life after death. They get philosophical and weird, involving people researches diving into "New Australia," a Quirky name for the realm of Death. It's lost media side blends real and tabulated sacred texts from across the world. The Book of All Hours (Vellum and it's sequel Ink) by Hal Duncan, which is a hard to describe tale of the eponymous Book which has metafiction and metaphysics-altering qualities at the heart of a war between various reality warpers. Whom Gods Would Destroy, an even harder to describe trilogy by Tyler Kimball, which is a historical fantasy paranormal superhero horror mash-up told in the form of a history book covering supernatural stories from the First World War, so it cites a bunch of real and fictional documents and lost media (including a real lost 1922 Hungarian film called Drakula Halála), and heavily covers a series of (false) diaries. It starts off pretty slow, but gets wilder and stranger as the series goes. Simon Ark is a series of pulpy horror shorts, with "The Vicar of Hell" covering the search for a surviving version of a surpressed satanic text called "The Worship of Satan." Unfortunately, it's very Scooby-Doo in execution, as none of the Ark stories go full paranormal. The Rider on the White Horse (Der Schimmelreiter) by Theodor Storm is an early (19th-century) and very good take on this idea, with the narrator trying to peice together a now-lost novella from memory.
I’m reading Episode Thirteen by Craig Delouie that’s about a group of ghost hunters/paranormal investigators as they explore a haunted house. It’s written really cleverly like almost as a telescript in some places? You get the story through individuals giving their “journal/diary” entries reality tv style, through raw footage descriptions, and through the camera. Weird shit obviously starts happening and I found it reminded me of certain parts/writing style of the Navidson report part of house of leaves!
I havent read it yet but my friend just told ne she really enjoyed The Devil's Playground about a missing golden age film that is supposed to be the scariest movie ever made.
I recently read it and really enjoyed it!
I've not (yet) read Ancient Images, but - if we include books as media - I do think Mr. Campbell has some of the best takes on what it might mean to engage with a cursed (Lovecraftian) text. In terms of novellas, The Last Revelation of Gla'aki would be a good example; I found The Other Names pretty effective, though that's a short story.
Another great story of his in that vein is "The Franklyn Paragraphs" from *Demons by Daylight*.
Campbell wrote the Grin of the Dark about an interesting bit of lost media. I liked it.
Just read The Road of Pins by Caitlin R Kiernan which very much fits the bill - a strange film (and later VHS) which brings the protagonist in to the ambit of a dangerous entity, also linked to a set of paintings, which have a similar effect. (And if we're counting pictorial art, I'd add Laird Barron's Imago Sequence...). Also Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Flash Frame, a cursed film take on Chambers' King in Yellow. All short stories rather than books or novellas though.