The Book of Yig: Revelations of the Serpent

A Cthulhu Mythos Anthology

De: David Hambling, Peter Rawlik, Matthew Davenport, Mark Howard Jones

Narrado por: Matt Thomas Battersby

Yig, known as the Serpent God, is older than humanity, and Yig’s reptilian children once ruled the Earth. Now they are stirring in their caves, walking the Earth in forms not quite human, slowly and patiently preparing their plans. Those who stumble on their secrets are in deadly danger...but only they can prevent the return of our darkest fears.

Join us for a collection of novellas from some modern masters of neo-Lovecraftian fiction - Peter Rawlik (Reanimator, The Weird Company), Matthew Davenport (Andrew Doran, The Trials of Obed Marsh), David Hambling (Harry Stubbs, The Dulwich Horror), and Mark Howard Jones (Cthulhu Cymraeg) - telling stories of Yig’s deadly machinations.

Listen to the plot unfold, from the 1920s to the present day, through four chilling episodes!

©2021 David Hambling, Peter Rawlik, Matthew Davenport, Mark Howard Jones (P)2021 David N. Wilson

Amazing group of stories! Worth ever cent!

This was amazing book. Everytime I was finished with one section I couldn't wait to start the next. Each Author is a talented teller of stories and held the source material in an amazing light.

Fangtastic Serpent Man Action

The works of H.P. Lovecraft are notable for the fact that, for all his own accomplishments, he was a very early proponent of open source intellectual property. He encouraged other authors to share his creatures and concepts while doing the same with their stuff. Robert Bloch (Psycho) and Robert E. Howard worked with him on multiple projects. Combined with the work of being like August Derleth and Chaosium, HPL's work continued to the modern day where new authors can play in his sandbox.

The Yig are a somewhat more obscure of Lovecraft's creations, being from his co-authorship with Zealia Bishop in "The Curse of Yig." In simple terms, they are serpent men who worship the Great Old One Yig and primarily dwell in the present-day United States. THE BOOK OF YIG follows in rough chronological order from the early 1920s to the present day with each short story having a slight connection to the previous one.

I've repeatedly stated my enjoyment for author David Hambling's Harry Stubbs books and also have enjoyed the Indiana Jones homage of the Andrew Doran series by Matthew Davenport, so I was very interested in this book since it has stories from both series. Those unfamiliar with them should check both out as they are Pulpy adventure stories where the protagonists act like Mythos Investigators from the Call of Cthulhu game to fight the creatures that defy rationale thinking.

"The Snake in the Garden" is a Harry Stubbs adventure that follows the protagonist as he investigates a murder of a man that had a gun trained on his attacker the entire time. This introduces the Yig and their mysterious culture quite well. As usual, David Hambling tries to tie Lovecraft's mythology to real world occultism with references to RL stories of snake deities as well as various period appropriate authors. I really liked this story and almost wish it was a full-fledged Harry Stubbs novel.

"Andrew Doran and the Journey to the Serpent Temple" has one major mistake. It should be "Andrew Doran and the Serpent Temple." The Journey is totally unnecessary! Otherwise, this was a fantastic story and easily the best of the Andrew Doran novels. It contains twists, turns, and a truly memorable ending. The fact that Andrew actually goes to some exotic locales and explores ancient ruins makes its the most Indiana Jones of the characters' adventures. My only regret, aside from the extra two words in the title, was Andrew not getting with his disguised serpent woman partner. Tsk-tsk. Indy would have.

"Still Life With Death" by Mark Howard is the most traditionally Lovecraft of the stories involved. A man is undergoing occult transformations between man and snake. I think the people involved sort of underreact to this sort of development but the ending was extremely memorable. I think horror fans will particularly like this story.

"Revelations" is a story set post-WW2 and deals with the Yig, Nazis, Nazi Hunters, and other things. I mostly knew Peter Rawlik from his entertaining Reanimators novel but this made me want to check out his other series. It stars the son of "The Shadow out of Time"'s protagonist who has become a somewhat terrifying agent for the US government. Lots of links to modern zoology and cryptids.

Finally, it ends with a coda by David Hambling that nicely wraps things up. Overall, I'm very impressed with these books and while I liked the Hambling and Davenport stories most, I think this was a great installment into modern Lovecraftian anthologies overall. I wish I'd been involved.

Narration is good too.

An excellent addition to the Cthulhu Mythos

An anthology that touches on the Serpent people as otherwise presented in the Cthulhu Mythos. the individual stories are:


The Snake in the Garden
A delightful noir that would share a shot of rum and a professional nod of the head with Sam Spade.


Andrew Doran and the Journey to the Serpent Temple
A lurid romp, good for fans of Indiana Jones, although more in the vein of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull than Raiders of the Lost Ark.


Still Life with Death
A skillful portrait of the ramifications from dealing with things man was not meant to know


Revelations
A multi-part story that builds the world the prior stories were surreptitiously based in. References many other fandoms that fit right in, including The Laundry Files and Indiana Jones. The early parts can drag with their detailed descriptions of breakfasts and morning weather, but once the story gets a full head of steam, the pace doesn't let up. Finishes with a jump forward, showing how as the more things change, the more they stay the same.


Overall, some exciting stories that are presented with flair. The authors obviously collaborated to create a central mythos that fuel their stories, tying them together and strengthening them all. On a personal note, I already have plans for writing the Children of Yig as presented here into my next Call of Cthulhu campaign.

9/10, definitely recommended.

Great Story

Great story and the narration wasn't bad himself, but where he recorded he sounded like he was in a bathroom...the ones we had in fourth grade. I loved the book but was a chore due to that aspect of the narration.

Good stories not so good narration

Good stories, if you like spies, espionage and are they like us stories then this title has them. The biggest problem though is the narrator. He sounds like he was reading in a large unfinished basement 5 feet from the microphone. It’s not a deal breaker but can be distracting. And has a fairly but not completely monotone voice. Some variation but a lot of times I was wondering if another character was speaking or if it was the same the had previously. Stories where great but a lot less grandiose in scale compared to the two previous titles in the series

original and inventive stories!

I loved the stories, all of them! This whole series has been fun and easy to pay attention to. However, the recording is echo-y, and the narrators southern accent is terrible. I almost had to skip those.

Awful Narration. No quaity Control for the Audio

I have / Listend to the other books so far in this series. I enjoyed them greatly. This one is trash.
The narrator sounds like he's reading this aloud is his bathroom. Audio is distant and very difficult to hear.
The entire book sounds like your holding a cell phone conversation in the 1990's. It's like listening to your parents yell at each other accross a house. It's every story, this is shameful on Audible and the publisher.

The stories themselves from what I could hear of them they were in keeping with the other books in the series.

Unfortunate blemish on a good series

Poor recording and even worse narration. the first few in the series were great. this one is a big disappointment