Of course, The Burrowers Beneath was originally written in the mid-70s, and passages of it -- especially the dialogue -- may sound a bit dated and "pulp" to the contemporary ear. There is a certain naïveté about the characters that reminded me of "hip" talk that sounds so stilted in some early science fiction movies that are so much fun to watch again today in reruns. This retro-feel provides some of the story's charm as well, though. And even when considering these stylistic differences between the decades, there is a great deal in Lumley's storytelling that intrigues a writer: vivid storyline, a sense of mystery, the faint but ominous danger of the unknown.

Despite the otherworldliness of the story's topic -- the Cthulhu legend and occult themes in general -- Lumley manages to bring horror down from the stars and up from the seas and position it directly under our feet, where it may strike fatally and with no more than the quirky spasms of a seismograph needle to warn of its coming.

Like Lovecraft, Brian Lumley takes occult legend and writings and makes them fascinatingly real without losing any of the sense of danger and blasphemy that they possess. His characters -- Titus Crow, Henri Laurent de Marigny, Paul Wendy-Smith -- are on one hand, regular people with regular fears, and on the other hand, men with dangerous curiosities, able to see portents of danger long before that danger is visible to the rest of us.

The current Tor trade paperback reprint of The Burrowers Beneath also comes bound with the second novel in Lumley's Titus Crow saga, The Transition of Titus Crow. While I was awestruck by the first novel, I found the second one a bit of a letdown. Its main strength is that it completes -- to some extent anyway, since there are still four more novels in the series -- the story of Titus Crow and de Marigny. However, as a stand-alone story, it doesn't have the artistry or the sense of danger and excitement that is found in The Burrowers Beneath.

In The Transition of Titus Crow, Lumley's propensity for telling the story by looking back -- using journal entries, notes, and transcripts -- becomes a bit tiring and isn't as seamless as it is in The Burrowers Beneath. The characters themselves also lose a bit of depth, and there is less sense of immediate danger, which means many events feel a bit distant, as if the story is being held at arm's length instead of drawing the reader in to share in the experience.

I would recommend the trade paperback reprint version strongly, however. The Burrowers Beneath is well worth the price of purchase, and The Transition of Titus Crow is an enjoyable little romp, if one that doesn't quite live up to its predecessor. The Burrowers Beneath is worth paying special attention to if you are an aspiring (or accomplished) writer too, since there is a mastery of the genre here that is worthy of scrutiny.