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Lovecraft Country

by Matt Ruff

First published 2016 · 384 pages

About this book

Chicago, 1954. When his father Montrose goes missing, 22-year-old Army veteran Atticus Turner embarks on a road trip to New England to find him, accompanied by his Uncle George—publisher of The Safe Negro Travel Guide—and his childhood friend Letitia. On their journey to the manor of Mr. Braithwhite—heir to the estate that owned one of Atticus’s ancestors—they encounter both mundane terrors of white America and malevolent spirits that seem straight out of the weird tales George devours.

At the manor, Atticus discovers his father in chains, held prisoner by a secret cabal named the Order of the Ancient Dawn—led by Samuel Braithwhite and his son Caleb—which has gathered to orchestrate a ritual that shockingly centers on Atticus. And his one hope of salvation may be the seed of his—and the whole Turner clan’s—destruction.

  • Fiction
  • Kidnapping
  • African Americans
  • Pulp literature
  • Occultists
  • Fiction, fantasy, historical
  • Fiction, satire
  • African americans, fiction

Reader reviews

  • Josh100/100

    Maybe 4.5 stars? A lot of the negative reviews focus on how the book is disjointed or doesn't cohere in the way they wanted. In the afterword, Ruff explains that he initially started working on the story as a serial TV show, which I think explains the style. It is, essentially, a series of short stories that loosely hang together as a novel.

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