TYPED LETTER SIGNED (TLS). 1 page, dated 22 May 1978, to "Dear Kirby" [McCauley], signed "Brian." On Lumley's pictorial letterhead, with typed return address Roussillon Barracks, Chichester, W. Sussex. Except for brief mention of a few minor business matters, this letter is devoted to a progress report on Lumley's RETURN OF THE DEEP ONES, a short novel he is writing for Arkham House. "... it's a real shocker and comes to some 50,000 words (just right for Arkham) and will be finished all bar the cleaning up by the time you get this or shortly after. The damned thing wrote itself!:- which in the past has been a sure sign of a good one. It is of course deep [underlined] Mythos, very horrid, and with a title like RETURN OF THE DEEP ONES how can it fail with Arkham clients? I'm sure Jim Turner will like it..." (RETURN OF THE DEEP ONES was rejected by Arkham House. It was first published in FANTASY BOOK as a three-part serial, March, June and September 1984.) Lumley, who started his career (like so many others) as a Lovecraft disciple, has been a prolific author of supernatural horror (of which his occult/Cold War Necroscope series is his best and best-known work), even while he was serving, as at this time, in the Royal Military Police. Kirby McCauley was probably the most important literary agent of horror, fantasy and sf writers in the boom years of the 1970s and 1980s. Some creasing along the top edge, 6 mm tear at upper left top edge, faint creases where folded for mailing, near fine. (#102649).
Price: $125.00
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