Rating: 
Summary: What's with all the notes?
Review: First off, lets list the stories. First is 'The Picture in the House' a very short, short story. This is followed by 'Herbert West - Reanimator' which was written for a humor magazine so is broken down into six parts. Then we have 'The Hound', 'The Shunned House'(giant elbows - NOOO!), 'The Horror at Red Hook', 'Cool Air', 'The Call of Cthulhu'(a major thread in the myths), 'Pickman's Model', 'The Thing on the Doorstep'(linked to a few stories by its very setting and characters) and 'The Haunter of the Dark'. These latter stories are very common to Lovecraft collections, so you should already know them. 'Herbert West - Reanimator' is not as easy to find and is the main reason I got this copy.
The book DOES have one interesting feature, which is all the information they add. Still, if I wanted to know so much about Lovecraft I would of bought a book about HIM. Also, the notes sometimes get in the way of the story. I suggest reading the stories and ignoring the notes the first time around. There are also nice photos of places that Lovecraft lived at or used within his stories.
Rating:
Summary: What's with all the notes?
Review: First off, lets list the stories. First is 'The Picture in the House' a very short, short story. This is followed by 'Herbert West - Reanimator' which was written for a humor magazine so is broken down into six parts. Then we have 'The Hound', 'The Shunned House'(giant elbows - NOOO!), 'The Horror at Red Hook', 'Cool Air', 'The Call of Cthulhu'(a major thread in the myths), 'Pickman's Model', 'The Thing on the Doorstep'(linked to a few stories by its very setting and characters) and 'The Haunter of the Dark'. These latter stories are very common to Lovecraft collections, so you should already know them. 'Herbert West - Reanimator' is not as easy to find and is the main reason I got this copy.
The book DOES have one interesting feature, which is all the information they add. Still, if I wanted to know so much about Lovecraft I would of bought a book about HIM. Also, the notes sometimes get in the way of the story. I suggest reading the stories and ignoring the notes the first time around. There are also nice photos of places that Lovecraft lived at or used within his stories.
Rating:
Summary: Joshi does it again.
Review: For those interested in the details of Lovecraft's work, or those who want an introduction to the Master of the Weird, this is the book for you. Joshi continues the superb work begun in The Annotated H.P. Lovecraft in this volume, though it is not without its faults. While More Annotated contains some of Lovecraft's finest works, there are several of H.P.L.'s weaker stories included. The serious Lovecraft scholar might haved hoped that the space would have been better used. With luck a third volume will issued with those stories that deserve a closer look. Still, this is an execellent book, well worthy of the price.
Rating: 
Summary: More HP Lovecraft in detail
Review: HPLovecraft was the greatest horror writer since Edgar Alan Poe and there have been none as great since. This is the second volume of hopefully a long series that give his stories with a very detailed annotation on words and items in the story that are no longer in common use (the stories were written in the time frame of 1920 to 1935) and the background. HPL created a rich mythos that was very involved. The annotations here provide crossreferencing to other stories. The stories included in this anthology are not all of his biggest or greatest, but the information makes them all interesting. The only warning is that if you have not read these stories before, either read them from some other book or read them with out the footnotes first time. The stories have a flow that sets a mood. Reading the footnotes the first time will disrupt the continuity.
Rating:
Summary: More HP Lovecraft in detail
Review: HPLovecraft was the greatest horror writer since Edgar Alan Poe and there have been none as great since. This is the second volume of hopefully a long series that give his stories with a very detailed annotation on words and items in the story that are no longer in common use (the stories were written in the time frame of 1920 to 1935) and the background. HPL created a rich mythos that was very involved. The annotations here provide crossreferencing to other stories. The stories included in this anthology are not all of his biggest or greatest, but the information makes them all interesting. The only warning is that if you have not read these stories before, either read them from some other book or read them with out the footnotes first time. The stories have a flow that sets a mood. Reading the footnotes the first time will disrupt the continuity.
Rating:
Summary: Okay, as far as it goes - pale shade from predecessor
Review: Let it be said up front: this volume makes you ask for more, but more because of the meager offering than of a whetting of appetite, like "Annotated Lovecraft" did. This venture into Lovecraft, although with Joshi and Cannon at the helm, fails to make a lingering impression for various reasons that are closely associated, I believe.
Let us begin with the selection of tales. In the preceding volume we had such interesting tales as At the Mountains of Madness, The Colour out of Space, and The Rats in the Walls, but this follow-up (and I don't know if there's another planned sequel?) has stories that are, in my opinion, less impressionable, such as Herbert West - Reanimator, The Horror at Red Hook, The Thing on the Doorstep, and The Shunned House.
Sure enough, these tales, although not all of them equal in quality, are interesting for the Lovecraft scholar to see annotated, but I think it a just a tad too much of mediocrity for a single volume. Rather I'd seen The Whisperer in Darkness, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, or another long piece (the annotated Shadow over Innsmouth has been published by Necronomicon Press, and The Shadow out of Time's definitive text has only recently surfaced) supplemented by shorter works, as the case was with the first volume.
Another thing is that there are far less annotations than in its predescent, sometimes whole pages going by without any footnote. What is worse, is that some footnotes are totally unnecessary, oneliners, or explanations of words that one can glean from any good dictionary. Again, this is not necessarily bad, it's just that it would have been better had there been one or two thoroughly explored (major) tales, and some others as dessert.
Yet not all is lost. I still recommend this one as a must-have for the inclusion of The Haunter of the Dark, The Call of Cthulhu, and Pickman's Model, and more so for the additional photographs of the sites Lovecraft mentions than for the footnotes - if you're an above average reader of Lovecraft and Lovecraft studies you'll know most of the knowledge handed already anyway. And, let's face it, anything on Lovecraft that has been done by either Cannon or Joshi is worth buying for collector's sake.
The bottom line is: get it, but don't freak out with a joyous expectation of anything remotely as "The Annotated Lovecraft". It's okay, nothing more, certainly nothing less.
Rating: 
Summary: Lovecraft Is Good, Notations are Disappointing
Review: The stories are straight Lovecraft, with all of the pros and cons that drags with it. Good creepy fiction, some poor plots and some poor choices of wording. The main problem that I had with this book though was the annotations. Almost every one of them was mediocre, some were truly bad, many were useless (especially the ones about names...only someone interested in genealogy would care, and they don't frequently use fiction as a source), and one that I saw foretold the ending in such a fashion as to destroy part of the ending. Hence, the annotations were rather poor. The illustrations were worse. There were two useful illustrations in the entire book. Other "luminary" illustrations are things like the pictures of three famous poets' graves. Why? The picture of Paul Revere's house. So? Etc. These occur throughout the book and are quite distracting as you expect them to matter, and are greatly disappointed. My recommendation is to simply buy a normal version of these works. It is probably cheaper and definately more useful. The stories are decent (although I personally think that they are overrated), but the annotations are frequently annoying and almost always useless.
Harkius
Rating:
Summary: Good but...
Review: This book is for anyone who has struggled through some of the archacic terms or just wants to know more about Lovecraft. I eagerly await a third edition.
Rating:
Summary: An amazing resource for a true fan of Lovecraft's work.
Review: This book is for anyone who has struggled through some of the archacic terms or just wants to know more about Lovecraft. I eagerly await a third edition.
Rating:
Summary: Definitely worth my time
Review: When I saw MORE ANNOTATED LOVECRAFT in my local chain store, I snapped it up. Loved the photos and the annotations. I hadn't read the weaker stories before, so that was an added pleasure. Actually, I liked those lesser stories more than the editors' introductions would have led me to believe. Although it would have been nice to have seen more of Lovecraft's best stories in this volume, I can understand the mix. If all of his best are annotated first, then readers will have only the lesser stories to look forward to. While I wouldn't wish to rush the editors, I eagerly await another chance to have my Lovecraft experience enhanced.
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