For me, a milestone in the fantasy / horror fiction

"I was extremely glad to meet Merritt
in person, for I have admired his work for
15 years ... He has a peculiar power of
working up to atmosphere and investing a
region with at Aura of unholy dread "

HP Lovecraft's letter to RH Barlow
(January 13, 1934)

Abraham Merritt (1884 1943) was from 1917 in America the most popular authors, who published the legendary pulp magazine Argosy All-Story, where Edgar Rice Burroughs was already known and had become world famous. Merritt was one of the most successful and highest-paid journalist of his time, seemed at the same time under the dirty business days on which he had to write to suffer. A mysterious incident, about nothing more is known, made sure that the young journalist had to be taken for one year from the firing line. It is said that Merritt was looking for distance and rest from business journalism in writing his novels. On his extensive travels to Mexico and Central America, he found the subjects, eventually resulting in his literary work: lost civilizations, witchcraft and magic. Rider Haggard's SHE has Merritt Lost Civilization stories heavily influenced, on the other hand Merritt himself was later a model for Lovecraft and Shaver.

In Germany Merritt has never found the recognition he had the wedding of Pulps in America. His novels are just as paperback editions of publishers Pabel available here (in part scandalous editing and translation, see [...] ..) and fishing from the 70s and 80s.

CREEP, SHADOW! tells of the reunion of the incarnation of the Witch Dohut, Queen of the shadow of the old city of Ys, with descendants of her former lover and murderer Alan Carnac.
Shower romance goes Pulp, and entertaining enough it comes to living shadow, hypnosis, murderous dolls, magic potions and much more; Of course do not forget the four "suicides" that act at the beginning as a catalyst, forcing Alan Carnac in the maelstrom of events.
"Hate and love quarrel," Demoiselle Dahut describes their feelings about Alan, and their beauty and magic seem to turn him into a defenseless doll, when the two meet the 30s again after many centuries in New York. Skillfully lets Merritt open the question whether they are reincarnations of the original antagonists, or whether ancient memories that are laid down in the body wake up again.

CREEP, SHADOW! Merritt's last novel. In it he takes events and people from BURN, WITCH, BURN! on, nevertheless can be CREEP, SHADOW! (Incidentally, the listed by Robert Bloch and others as one of the best Supernatural Horror Novels) also easily read without knowing the predecessor.

CREEP, SHADOW! is a novel of contrasts and rivalries. Alan, the hero finds himself between two women, two eras and two worlds again. He who as the pessimist vico'schen culture cycle theory, it is wise nod.
During the action of the state of the hero Alan is increasingly becoming a delirium until the boundaries between that took place in ancient times and current events are canceled. The senses are always unreliable and witches and witches view hearing besides potions just some of the reasons that Alan his own perception can no longer be trusted. Who raises the question as a reader, what then are the irrefutable facts of the novel, is abundant can speculate, because Merritt has CREEP SHADOW! created as a game of deception, compete in the psychology and magic and allow different explanations. Nothing seems certain, and for a truly incredible strong chapter in which Alan mistaken as (almost) disembodied shadows by a different country, the furious finale is among the best I've read.

Unlike so often as in Lovecraft, who tried to describe the horrors usually adjectival and with his favorite terms, met at CREEP, SHADOW! the horror to the reader on the levels of action, language and perception ("The clock struck the half hour It roused me from the book I smelled a fragrance Curious, unfamiliar, evocative of strange images -.. it made me think of an unknown lily, Opening in the night, under moon rays, in a secret pool, among age-old ruins encircled by a desert ") of protagonist equally strong and convincing. Some of the underlying philosophical passages and relating thereto (souls) landscaping descriptions one can ever think of the Grand Master Poe although ultimately is always clear that Merritt is arrested the Pulps and their rules.
Merritt has built the story sent, so starting on page 1 in the boiler pressure prevails. Consistently he weaves the threads on and it enters the rare event that the reader has to pass through no barren deserts text, but is carried away by the action consistently until the last page.
The 3rd chapter rolled in my mind as a black and white film with Bela Lugosi from the role of Dr.de Karadel, perhaps a man of knowledge, perhaps mad, definitely possessed ("I say that man can imagine nothing That can not be, and That He who speaks contemptuously of any amounted THEREFORE is ignorant to you ... ").
The erotic subtext in Chapter 9. (In Dahut's Towyer - Ys) is extremely high. Opening the gates to the lake in the violent storm, the flooding of the city of Ys, which could well be equated with Dahut: Alain de Cranac destroyed Ys in subtext, by having sex with the ruler of the city, the wicked witch Dahut.
Each chapter has its charm and brings surprises.

But the most important:
CREEP, SHADOW! still operates today as an extremely exciting and creepy fantasy / horror novel, and that's quite a lot. After all, who is in search of classic "horror stuff" is all too often disappointed.

Conclusion: Please read!