Fantasy & Gothic Blog

You know Cthulhu. Monster. Scary. Gigantic. Yep, that's the one. If you know who this fearsome god is, you probably know why so many people think he's cool. But as the mythic monstrosity's popularity grows, you may find him wandering out of the ocean into pastures new. Perhaps even, into space.

‘A series of images, thoughts, and emotions, often with a story-like quality, generated by mental activity during sleep’: this is the definition of a dream given by the Oxford English Dictionary. We’ve all experienced it, that bizarre state between wakefulness and sleep (or between lengthy snooze alarms), when REM sleep has had just enough time to set in and pelt you with the strangest sequence of ideas – images sometimes mundane, sometimes fantastical, but always disconcertingly removed from reality. Frightening and exhilarating, that delightfully ambiguous state when the mind is not fully itself is when logic is distorted, traditional paths of thought are muddled and the mind is open to everything. There, there be monsters. The unrestrained creative world of dreams offers endless possibilities for the imagination, and such realms provide the most intriguing, thrilling and in many ways the most beautiful material for art. 

One of the biggest gaming announcements of the year was the unveiling of Bethesda's Fallout 4. Perhaps best known for their sprawling open-world game series, The Elder Scrolls (read, Skyrim), their critically acclaimed Fallout series is not far behind. With Fallout often edging it in when it comes to the critics the games are wildly different in terms of the universes they portray. Where Skyrim is full of rich colour and endless forests, Fallout operates within a desolate dystopian dumping ground. So why then are people so excited for the fourth instalment?

Josephine Wall is a world-renowned artist who has become extremely popular due to her spectacular celestial art. So much of her life has been dedicated to her family and to her paintings. Her fairies, dragons, mermaids and other mythical creatures dive into the imaginations of many individuals. In fact, her fantastical paintings inspire people around the world to paint their own pictures and create their own fantasy worlds. So Josephine Wall is tremendously inspiring, but what inspires her to create these outstanding pieces of art? Today we are going to take a closer look into the personal world of Josephine Wall. 

In the final instalment of our Dystopian Universes series (part 1 / part 2), we look at the best literary depictions of dystopias. Ranging from the classics to other books you might not have heard of. For any sci-fi lover, this is an excellent one-stop list of the best dystopian novels out there. Get some tips courtesy of us and get your weekend reading sorted out right now.

A book bound in human flesh and inked in blood, a book filled with spells to raise the dead and summon ancient creatures, the Necronomicon inflicts insanity and even death upon its readers.

The British Library’s recent exhibition Terror and Wonder: The Gothic Imagination celebrated 250 years since Horace Walpole’s ‘Castle of Otranto’, though the popular exhibition sadly closed its doors last month, leaving fewer ways to now satisfy that thirst for all things gothic. With our new range of ebooks on the subject, we thought we’d take a look back at how the exhibition looked at the gothic genre, and see if we can’t provide some material for those who missed out or simply need another fix!