If One Lovecraft Story Was All You Could Read…

[Palanan]

…which one would it be?

I've never read anything by Lovecraft, looking for suggestions, especially those which maximize the Far-Realms-style creepiness.

[comicshorse]

'The Rats in the Walls' was always my favourite

[warty goblin]

Go for the motherload and At the Mountains of Madness. It's one of his longer works (but still very short), has a lot of excellent weird stuff, nothing exceptionally objectionable in the racism department, and is a generally excellent exemplar of early twentieth century genre fiction. Alternatively, go very short and read The Statement of Randolf Carter, or go for the (extremely) weird and The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadeth.

[Palanan]

Thanks for the quick replies.

By "weird," do you mean creepy Far-Realmsy, or generally mind-bendingly odd? I'm looking more for the former, but not having read Lovecraft I'm not sure if those are just different ways of describing all of his work.

[Zyzzyva]

Go for the motherload and At the Mountains of Madness. It's one of his longer works (but still very short), has a lot of excellent weird stuff, nothing exceptionally objectionable in the racism department, and is a generally excellent exemplar of early twentieth century genre fiction. Alternatively, go very short and read The Statement of Randolf Carter, or go for the (extremely) weird and The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadeth.

Seconded on Mountains. Read At the Mountains of Madness.

A shorter one, still good and quintessentially Lovecraft, would be The Colour out of Space. Call of Cthulhu is the big one, of course, and is racist as whoa, but that's honestly something you have to grapple with with Lovecraft, not something to ignore.

Kadath is very good but it's more "strangish heroic fantasy done up in really purple prose" than anything usually denoted by "Lovecraftian".

The Shunned House is, basically, a Call of Cthulhu session set to text, which is probably not what you want but which amused the hell out of me.

ETA:
Thanks for the quick replies.

By "weird," do you mean creepy Far-Realmsy, or generally mind-bendingly odd? I'm looking more for the former, but not having read Lovecraft I'm not sure if those are just different ways of describing all of his work.

Kadath is quite good, and I would very much describe it as "creepy Far-Realmsy", but it's not conventionally Lovecraftian. I'd read it fourth, say, after Mountains, Colour, and Call.

[Manga Shoggoth]

Go for the motherload and At the Mountains of Madness. It's one of his longer works (but still very short), has a lot of excellent weird stuff, nothing exceptionally objectionable in the racism department, and is a generally excellent exemplar of early twentieth century genre fiction.

I'd put this in tied with - or close second to - The Strange Case of Charles Dexter Ward.

Whilst I like At the Mountains of Madness (it's where one half of my handle comes from, after all), it is all about discovering things that manne was notte meant to knowe in a cold and hostile clime. The Strange Case of Charles Dexter Ward is the same sort of thing, but right in the back yard (so to speak).

On the plus side, they are both in the Lovecraft Omnibus (Volume 1).

[warty goblin]

Thanks for the quick replies.

By "weird," do you mean creepy Far-Realmsy, or generally mind-bendingly odd? I'm looking more for the former, but not having read Lovecraft I'm not sure if those are just different ways of describing all of his work.
I don't tend to think there's such a line between those in Lovecraft as the modern perception tends to claim. There's certainly stuff in Mountains that can be creepy, and a lot of it's very strange, but I would hesitate to try to bin the story one way or the other. Frankly I'd shy away from doing that with genre fiction of that period in general; and certainly when using modern genres. I'm halfway convinced that in the 30s and 40s, genres simply hadn't ossified quite yet, and there was still a good amount of flexibility. Either that or they were firm things, but rather out of alignment with our current understandings.

There certainly are Lovecraft stories that fit very well into a single modern genre (The Shunned House is straight horror for instance), but there's a lot that don't.

It's also worth noting that The Shunned House is enormously creepy if you've both studied non-Euclidean geometry, and happen to have more than a passing knowledge of the houses on Benefit Street, Providence, RI.

[Zyzzyva]

I don't tend to think there's such a line between those in Lovecraft as the modern perception tends to claim. There's certainly stuff in Mountains that can be creepy, and a lot of it's very strange, but I would hesitate to try to bin the story one way or the other. Frankly I'd shy away from doing that with genre fiction of that period in general; and certainly when using modern genres. I'm halfway convinced that in the 30s and 40s, genres simply hadn't ossified quite yet, and there was still a good amount of flexibility. Either that or they were firm things, but rather out of alignment with our current understandings.

There certainly are Lovecraft stories that fit very well into a single modern genre (The Shunned House is straight horror for instance), but there's a lot that don't.

It's also worth noting that The Shunned House is enormously creepy if you've both studied non-Euclidean geometry, and happen to have more than a passing knowledge of the houses on Benefit Street, Providence, RI.

Maybe I'm just a splitter, not a lumper, but I'm comfortable drawing a line between Mountains, Color, Call, Rats in the Walls, Shadow Over Innsmouth, etc, and Kadath, Doom that Came to Sarnath, Quest of Iranon, etc. I'll agree there's a continuum, though, with Sarnath certainly being a horrific fantasy/mythology-like horror.

[hamishspence]

I recall liking The Shadow Out of Time.

[Gopher Wizard]

I'd have to go with The Color Out of Space. Second would be Dagon, though Dagon might just be for nostalgia reasons: it was the first HP Lovecraft story I ever read.

[DoctorFaust]

I would say The Music of Erich Zann and Pickman's Model are probably two of his better short stories.

[BWR]

Gah! Only one?

That's a tricky one. For that I love Lovecraft's Mythos stories, his Dunsanian dream stories are my favorites. I think something like "Hypnos" or "the Quest of Iranon" have resonated more strongly with me than just about anything else. Unless you count "The Lurking Fear", which I read at 12. The scene where the main character and a friend hole up in a cabin and the MC goes to sleep in a thunderstorm, then wakes up and sees his friend still sitting in the same position by the window. When he checks on his friend, he finds that his friend's face has been eaten off. I read this in my grandparent's creaky old house, in a thunderstorm, sleeping next to an open window because there was little by the way of AC there.
Guess who didn't sleep a wink that night?

[Zyzzyva]

"The Lurking Fear"

Having just reread The Rats in the Walls and looked at the wiki article for that: man I keep forgetting how spectacularly racist Lovecraft was.

I'm almost thinking of trading my recommendation from Mountains to Rats just because "wow, that is a tremendously unsubtle metaphor for miscegenation" is part of the Lovecraft experience.

[Muz]

"The Shadow over Innsmouth" has always been my favorite. Creepy, gripping. I love the bit in the hotel.

[Aka-chan]

I have to agree with Doctor Faust--"The Music of Erich Zann" is an excellent story.

[Bulldog Psion]

Edit: I'm changing my recommendation to "The Rats in the Walls." I just read it again, and that is some powerful stuff. Personally, I prefer to read it as a really creepy story, at face value. I realize Lovecraft was racist as all get out, but I'm not entirely convinced that was his "point" in writing this specific story. Politics prevent me from delving any deeper that way, but I still think it's one heck of a story on its own merits.

Of course, I'm a bit more of a Clark Ashton Smith fan than Lovecraft. I like Lovecraft, mind you, but I can't pass up the opportunity to put in a good word for Klarkash-Ton. :smallwink:

[BWR]

Edit: I'm changing my recommendation to "The Rats in the Walls." I just read it again, and that is some powerful stuff. Personally, I prefer to read it as a really creepy story, at face value. I realize Lovecraft was racist as all get out, but I'm not entirely convinced that was his "point" in writing this specific story. Politics prevent me from delving any deeper that way, but I still think it's one heck of a story on its own merits.

Of course, I'm a bit more of a Clark Ashton Smith fan than Lovecraft. I like Lovecraft, mind you, but I can't pass up the opportunity to put in a good word for Klarkash-Ton. :smallwink:

Smith was a better wordsmith, certainly.

[GolemsVoice]

Just one? That's hard. Ole' HPL constantly evolved and changed his writing style, and as a result, has several very distinct phases.

However, I'd probably pick "The Music of Erich Zann" as that story. It's short, but impressive, with perfect atmosphere and that lingering sense of dread and cosmic horror of a world that suddenly shifted off-balance.

Honorable mentions:

"The Colour out of Space" has that classic Lovecraftian element of unexplainable stuff happening to undeserving people. It's cosmic in the direct sense of the word, and the descriptions of the wierd nature, the apathetic farmer and his mad wife are creepy and touching at the same time.

"The Innsmouth Horror" one of Lovecraft's more bearable "miscegenation". Creepy, and with a twist ending unusual for Lovecraft.

"The Mountains of Madness" contains the phrase "that night-crafted, penguin-fringed abyss" whcih someone on this forum has as a quote in their signature. Also an excellent story about discovering maddening truths.

"The Dream-Quest to Unknown Kaddath" isn't what people usually associate with HPL, and that's what makes this one so fresh. It replaces some of the dread and disgust most of Lovecraft's protagonists feel with wonder and sheer strangeness, and if you know how Lovecraft felt during his short life, this may be a very direct window into his soul. Gripping for the sheer fantastic scope.

"Nyarlathotep" is a wonderful story, which perfectly showcases what I look for in Lovecraft's writing. It's unexplainable, eerie, and leaves you with a sense of dread when faced with the destruction of humanity by a latter-day pied piper leading a dying universe to its grave.

[the_druid_droid]

There have been some great suggestions so far, and I'll mostly second them, but I'm a pretty big HPL fan, so I'd feel bad not contributing.

My first choice would probably be The Colour Out of Space, which in my opinion is one of Lovecraft's creepiest stories. I also really like Rats in the Walls, but as others have pointed out, it's super racist (depending on exactly how you connect the dots). However, I've always loved HPL for the crazy magic and fantasy ideas he throws out, and Rats certainly has room for all sorts of interesting speculation on horrible cult rituals and the like, if you can deal with the other stuff that's in it somehow.

I'd also recommend Pickman's Model; again you could view it as a statement about miscegenation, but I actually prefer to read it as a dark take on old faerie myths, and it works really well in that role. It also sort of nods to some of Lovecraft's ideas about weird fiction and art, which are interesting in their own right, and make for some historical context.

As far as his really short stories, I agree that The Statement of Randolph Carter is hard to beat for atmosphere, although if you're willing to make the trade of racist undertones for fantasy again, The Festival is also a strong contender.

In general, I'm more fond of HPL's shorter stories than his novella-length works, but tastes vary, and it's worth checking out Call of Cthulhu or At the Mountains of Madness and/or The Shadow Over Innsmouth if you find yourself getting hooked on the atmospheric horror.

[Fralex]

"The Innsmouth Horror" one of Lovecraft's more bearable "miscegenation". Creepy, and with a twist ending unusual for Lovecraft.

Are you sure you aren't thinking of "The Dunwitch Horror (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Dunwich_Horror)"? That's the one where, the monster is actually defeated at the end by a group of researchers who managed to reverse-engineer a spell from the Necronomicon. Well, they got traumatized a little, but at least they got rid of it. That one I enjoyed.

In terms of creepiness, the one that truly disturbed me was "The Whisperer in the Darkness (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Whisperer_in_Darkness/full)." Fascinating concept, horrifying twist that made me regret only reading these stories at night (this isn't even intentional, it just always seems to be late when I'm reading something by him).

If you'd prefer your cosmic horror set to music, I recommend Call of Cthulu - The Musical (http://quaylestation.com/comic/call-of-cthulu-the-musical-page-0001)! It's an amalgam of a bunch of different stories, interspersed with songs set to familiar tunes like "I am the Very Model of a Miskatonic Gentleman," or "Gotta Hide Another Corpse with my Friend"!

[GolemsVoice]

Are you sure you aren't thinking of "The Dunwitch Horror"? That's the one where, the monster is actually defeated at the end by a group of researchers who managed to reverse-engineer a spell from the Necronomicon. Well, they got traumatized a little, but at least they got rid of it. That one I enjoyed.



Nah, I'm thinking of the part where the narrator actually becomes a Deep One and is absolutely ok with the fact

[Bulldog Psion]

Nah, I'm thinking of the part where the narrator actually becomes a Deep One and is absolutely ok with the fact

And seems to be fiercely exultant over it, to boot.

[comicshorse]

And seems to be fiercely exultant over it, to boot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tTHn2tHhcI&spfreload=10

[Bulldog Psion]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tTHn2tHhcI&spfreload=10

:smallbiggrin:

[SaintRidley]

Lovecraft was no slouch at humor, so while I would normally recommend Mountains or Colour, I'm going to recommend "Ibid" - a very short, very offbeat entry in his oeuvre, but well worth the read.

[KillingAScarab]

Having just reread The Rats in the Walls and looked at the wiki article for that: man I keep forgetting how spectacularly racist Lovecraft was.

I'm almost thinking of trading my recommendation from Mountains to Rats just because "wow, that is a tremendously unsubtle metaphor for miscegenation" is part of the Lovecraft experience.Heh, for those same reasons I have the opposite thought of which of those two to suggest.

Then I remembered, "The Temple." The story is written from the perspective of a World War I U-boat captain who knows he will not survive. No one's going to put a reference to it on a t-shirt or a political campaign sticker, but I found it easy to get into the same head-space as the narrator, which made it creepier. It contains a bit of the Mythos, so it might get you interested in learning more, but it's not a requirement to enjoy.

[brionl]

Edit: I'm changing my recommendation to "The Rats in the Walls." I just read it again, and that is some powerful stuff. Personally, I prefer to read it as a really creepy story, at face value. I realize Lovecraft was racist as all get out, but I'm not entirely convinced that was his "point" in writing this specific story. Politics prevent me from delving any deeper that way, but I still think it's one heck of a story on its own merits.

Of course, I'm a bit more of a Clark Ashton Smith fan than Lovecraft. I like Lovecraft, mind you, but I can't pass up the opportunity to put in a good word for Klarkash-Ton. :smallwink:

I've got to say, Lovecraft wasn't noticeably more racist than most other people writing at the time. Read anything else from the period, for instance the Tom Swift stories by Victor Appleton (among others). Finding anything from that era that isn't will be quite a task.

But for the most quintessential Lovecraft story, I'm going to add on to the recommendations for Colour out of Space.

[Fralex]

Nah, I'm thinking of the part where the narrator actually becomes a Deep One and is absolutely ok with the fact

Ah, that's right. That one was actually called The Shadow over Innsmouth.

In all honesty, though, I wouldn't worry too much about which "one" story you choose to read. Lovecraft's work is all available online for free, legally, in various (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Howard_Phillips_Lovecraft) places (http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/) on the Internet. All a story will cost you is your time.

[Zyzzyva]

I've got to say, Lovecraft wasn't noticeably more racist than most other people writing at the time. Read anything else from the period, for instance the Tom Swift stories by Victor Appleton (among others). Finding anything from that era that isn't will be quite a task.

Having read the Tom Swift stories: no, Lovecraft is a hell of a lot more racist. Tom Swift is kinda appalling in places; Lovecraft has whole stories all about the visceral, skin-crawling dread that is miscegenation.

I'm not sure where the board policy line lies, so I'm going to hold my peace on this subject after that.

[nyjastul69]

... The Shunned House is enormously creepy if you've both studied non-Euclidean geometry, and happen to have more than a passing knowledge of the houses on Benefit Street, Providence, RI.

I've never studied non-Euclidean geometry, but I can say, as a lifelong RIer and resident of Providence for 15 years, that being familiar with the specific areas he mentions in his stories is very revealing. I'm very familiar with the East side, although I never lived there. I lived in Elmhurst. I visit his grave site fairly frequently while cycling and the things people leave there are amazing, creepy, and weird.

To the OP, for whatever reason, The Dreams in the Wictch House has always stuck out in my head. Although, I wouldn't argue with any of the other suggestions. Don't read a single story and judge his authorship. Read several and enjoy them.

[smuchmuch]

"Rats in the wall" definitively the most memorable to me.
(Then again I was reading at night it in an old house isolated with some actual mice running in the attic, it probably added to the effect)

""The Colour Out of Spacee too

Though I'll admit neither are particulary 'far realm-y'

[Bulldog Psion]

After reading this thread, I feel like burning my copy of Lovecraft's collected stories... :smallfrown:

[nyjastul69]

After reading this thread, I feel like burning my copy of Lovecraft's collected stories... :smallfrown:

Why is that?

[Bulldog Psion]

Why is that?

Reminded me of his racism -- and glancing over the stories again after not reading them for several years, it's everywhere. :smallyuk:

[nyjastul69]

Reminded me of his racism -- and glancing over the stories again after not reading them for several years, it's everywhere. :smallyuk:

While I agree, I just chalk it up to being a 'product of his times', albeit stronger than most. As clear and present as it is in his works it has never lessened my enjoyment of his work. As an aside, book burning is bad. I suggest donating it instead. ;)

[Talakeal]

I recall liking The Shadow Out of Time.

I second that.

[KillingAScarab]

Reminded me of his racism -- and glancing over the stories again after not reading them for several years, it's everywhere. :smallyuk:While I don't condone Lovecraft's views, I think I would second donating over burning. One of the strengths of a lack of censorship is that we can find a more complete view of the world. I also think Lovecraft's devices have largely outlived his prejudices. Not to say you couldn't find someone who would agree with with him on certain things, but I think the audience which benefits is in the same vein as Brahm Stoker's use of fear of foreigners and disease to come up with Dracula.

[Fralex]

You don't need to like every aspect of a thing to like it as a whole. With regards to Lovecraft's racism, to me it's been "defused" with time. Racism is still prominent today, but it takes much different, more subtle forms than it did back then. Lovecraft's racism is ugly, but nobody is going to take it seriously or have their opinions swayed by it now. It's embarrassing but basically harmless. Fossilized bigotry from an earlier era. If you tell someone you like Lovecraft's work, it's assumed you're referring to things other than the way he handled other races. As long as you acknowledge what was wrong with his writing, there's nothing to be ashamed of.

[BWR]

If I were to avoid all forms of media that contained or were in some way connected to stuff I didn't like there wouldn't be much left. Read Lovecraft, enjoy him (or not) for the strength of his writing and ideas, ignore any unsavory RL items.
I am a bit more careful in my support of any currently living people with distasteful beliefs.

[Ravian]

Hmm... probably either Color out of Space which I thought was one of his creepiest (I'm generally not frightened by written horror, so it's a feat that this one managed to scare me.) or Dunwich Horror which I still think of as the classic Lovecraft story as far as the overall mythos goes. (Color is better in terms of horror, but it's a little less connected in the overall cosmology than Dunwich is)

As far as Lovecraft's racism goes:

Yes it exists, and yes it's uncomfortable, but limiting ourselves by these sorts of criteria would close off so much classic literature in the world. Sherlock's stories had racism in them, Bram Stoker's Dracula was a metaphor for racist ideas about foreigners ravishing young women, even Shakespeare had the Merchant of Venice, which still serves as the basis for anti-Semitic stereotypes to this day. Does that mean that we have to condemn every idea they had, including those stories and ideas that had absolutely nothing to do with racism?

Banning these authors from our societal consciousness only deprives our own culture of these works. Fighting it won't change the opinions of dead authors. It's best to just enjoy it for the good ideas they did have and remind ourselves that we don't have to let the racist ideas influence us in this day and age.

In many ways it's even better that we acknowledge these facts. I fully support the idea of books like Mein Kampf be allowed in libraries, simply because ignoring such a book only gives it a mystique for those seeking to rebel. Understanding the mistakes made in the past allows us to learn from them, and we can only do that through openness. If it offends you, you're free not to read it, but banning books has rarely done good things for society as a whole.

[Palanan]

The author's social views aren't relevant to my OP, so I'd appreciate if that discussion could be taken somewhere else.

[Zyzzyva]

As far as Lovecraft's racism goes:

Yes it exists, and yes it's uncomfortable, but limiting ourselves by these sorts of criteria would close off so much classic literature in the world. Sherlock's stories had racism in them, Bram Stoker's Dracula was a metaphor for racist ideas about foreigners ravishing young women, even Shakespeare had the Merchant of Venice, which still serves as the basis for anti-Semitic stereotypes to this day. Does that mean that we have to condemn every idea they had, including those stories and ideas that had absolutely nothing to do with racism?

Banning these authors from our societal consciousness only deprives our own culture of these works. Fighting it won't change the opinions of dead authors. It's best to just enjoy it for the good ideas they did have and remind ourselves that we don't have to let the racist ideas influence us in this day and age.

In many ways it's even better that we acknowledge these facts. I fully support the idea of books like Mein Kampf be allowed in libraries, simply because ignoring such a book only gives it a mystique for those seeking to rebel. Understanding the mistakes made in the past allows us to learn from them, and we can only do that through openness. If it offends you, you're free not to read it, but banning books has rarely done good things for society as a whole.

The argument isn't that we should ban Lovecraft; I don't think you can find a post here demanding no one ever read Lovecraft again. What me and the other Lovecraft-was-spectacularly-racist* commenters are saying is that because the racism is there it must be grappled with; if you just say "he wrote interesting cosmic horror with a florid prose style, just ignore the pervasive racism" you're not reading the work he actually wrote. To take your Mein Kampf example**, no, obviously it shouldn't be banned. But if you were to press it on a friend, saying, "look at this cool study in rhetoric and persuasive writing! Just ignore the other stuff," that would be both misleading and a little nuts. Obviously people writing in different times and places have different values (sometimes; the other problem with this argument is that you're implicitly arguing that every single person in the 1930s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlem_Renaissance) was exactly as racist as Lovecraft) but you can't just throw up your hands and say "welp, the racist, sexist, generally skin-crawling values of this excellent prose stylist cannot be challenged! Best just to lean back and bask in the prose style." If you just want to relax and read a good adventure without thinking about it too hard, then either read something other than Lovecraft or be prepared for people to keep trying to talk to you about The Racism, because it's there and it's pervasive.

*And he was; waaaay beyond the pale of "eh, it was the interwar period. People said things like that."

**Seriously? Not even, say, Gone With The Wind, to take another popular, well-written, spectacularly racist 30s work?


The author's social views aren't relevant to my OP, so I'd appreciate if that discussion could be taken somewhere else.

As I argued at some length above, it is relevant to the OP, because the author's social views heavily inform his work, and pretending they're not there is silly. That said, if you're in the "don't look directly at it! Look away, Marion!" camp, then I'm going to sigh and suggest At the Mountains of Madness.

[warty goblin]

Palanan did not say he/she was going to ignore Lovecraft's racism, Palanan said he/she was not interested in people's epistles about Lovecraft's racism, which is a different thing. I presume this shocking disinterest is because the goal of this exercise it to identify the more important or influential works from the fairly large quantity of stuff Lovecraft wrote.

[Palanan]

As usual, warty goblin is perceptively correct, although I suspect not truly shocked.

He is entirely accurate that I am not interested in a discussion of Lovecraft's social views. My interest is in recommendations of particular stories which encapsulate the "Lovecraftian" approach.

The one thing I've been able to learn here is that Lovecraft was a diverse and versatile writer, and there may not be any single definition of "Lovecraftian" which covers all of his writing. That's fine, and I'll look forward to the creepiness in whatever form it takes.

[Tvtyrant]

read Dagon first. It is a short work which encapsulates a lot of the Lovecraft formula.

[SaintRidley]

Seriously, it's probably just best to pick up an omnibus of his fiction and chunk your way through. It's really interesting to see how his stories evolve over time, plus you'll get to some of his lesser-known stuff.

[GolemsVoice]

If you can get your hands on it, get something with a little commentary, too. It's very interesting to see how various influences waxe and vane in Lovecraft's writing, and sometimes you have what are almot breaks in his style after he became fascinated with a certain author. Or after he lost interest in him.

[Wardog]

I second third nth Mountains of Madness.

It works well as a story in its own right; it manages to do a "people discover shocking secrets that undermine their notion of human's place in the universe" without coming off as "Things are more complicated than I thought and I CAN'T TAKE IT ANY MORE!!!! WIBBLE! BOING! LALALAL!" the way some of his other stories do; and not only does it avoid the racism that permeates a lot of the other stories, but it actually subverts his more typical "alien = unknowable, and probably evil" theme.

Also, thinking about it, a lot of that applies to Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath as well, if I remember rightly. Which is also a good story, but rather different in style to most of his others.

[brionl]

I was just re-re-reading some of them a couple of days ago (largely because of this thread). Rats in the Walls, didn't do anything for me. Colour Out of Space still gives me the heebie-jeebies though.

[Zyzzyva]

Also, thinking about it, a lot of that applies to Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath as well, if I remember rightly. Which is also a good story, but rather different in style to most of his others.

I reread Kadath this weekend; it would probably work better serialized (since it's fairly episodic) and is a little long, but it's pretty good.

The secret message being "New England is literally better than Heaven" is a little amusing, but I liked it nevertheless.