Objects of Worship – paperback edition
Claude Lalumière’s debut collection. Capricious gods rule a world of women. Zombies breed human cattle. The son of a superhero must decide between his heritage and his religion. Young lovers worship a primordial spider god. The apocalyptic rebirth of the god of the elephants. Monstrous chimeras roam through a devastated future Earth. A retired fisherman caught in the middle of a conflict between gods and superheroes. Teenagers struggle to survive a surreal ice age…
Interior illustrations by Rupert Bottenberg (Claude’s Lost Myths collaborator). Introduction by World Fantasy Award-winning author James Morrow. Published by CZP.
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Also available in digital format.
- “Takes us on a journey of the weird. Delving into the darkest corners of ‘primal myths’, bringing forth the inner workings of characters that are rarely seen on paper, we find a highly skilled writer at work … a most engrossing and disturbing collection.” The Novel Blog
- “Strange, sexy, dark-toned fantasies.” Examiner.com
- “Lalumière’s astounding imagination has birthed entire worlds for each story … If you’re hungry for original genre content, Objects of Worship is just the nectar you’ve been praying for.” Rue Morgue
- “Has the eldritch quality of a Lovecraftian nightmarescape.” Tangent Online
- “A fine collection of stories.” Rich Horton
- “Enjoyable and thought-provoking … Lalumière shows us new and unique ways of looking … He exposes the ironic self-consciousness of our species and the communications problems we experience in trying to get through to others … Powerful and creative.” RoverArts
- “Lalumière appears to revel in the playful use of archaicisms which heighten the feel of the Weird in these tales.” – Steven Silver
- “Lalumière is a gifted writer, thoroughly in control of his text … The universe Lalumière has created is a world with the key characteristic that the protagonists often make a fetish of their desires … The rude haunting power of the tales comes from the fetishes that inhabit our own lives … We understand Lalumière’s characters. They are us. We readers are also linked by a rather unique fetish, namely, that of the book. But that is no great mystery. Books like these tell us why.” Strange Horizons
- “Claude Lalumière is undoubtedly blessed with a fertile imagination. His short stories feature moments of striking and memorable imagery. In the best stories in Objects of Worship, Lalumière’s debut collection of short fiction, this imagery combines with original ideas and a keen satirical edge to create accomplished and memorable tales.” SFRevu
- “While the overall tone … borrow[s] heavily from pop culture fare like zombie movies and comic books, the volume is not devoid of a sharp satiric edge … In [Objects of Worship], an archetypal Canadian literary setting becomes ‘an eternally rediscovered country’ transformed by the imagination. In other words: yes, it’s Canadian literature. And it’s fantastic.” Quill & Quire
- “Nuanced … sparse … inventive … raises and leaves open many questions about the issues we as a society need to collectively discuss.” The Link
- “Precision-crafted stories of oddball characters and their yearnings … The theme of power and responsibility is strongly felt throughout the collection … Like everyone, Lalumière’s characters hunger, but hunger can take many forms here, from sex or physical comfort to justice, mystic control, or tasty brains. I wouldn’t want to live in Lalumière’s world, but it’s an interesting place to visit.” The Brutarian
- “Intensely memorable.” Publishers Weekly
- “Most of these stories derive power from a deliberate incompleteness … Stories aiming at unmediated connection with the source of myth … There’s a sensibility here unlike any others.” Hochelaga Depicta
- “Highly enjoyable, ranging from humorous allegories to exciting yarns, with the odd detour into strange erotica.” Montreal Mirror
- “Claude Lalumière’s stories are dark, mordant, precisely formed. His first collection is extraordinarily accomplished in its craft and subversive intent.” Lucius Shepard
- “These stories are terrifically creepy. And not unlike Edgar Allan Poe or Potted Meat Product, they gave me the willies.” Christopher Moore
- “Claude Lalumière has a poet’s sensibility. He suggests; never overstates. This finely crafted, stylishly dark collection is a vitrine of objets and curios, a specimen cabinet of elegant bizarrerie. I recommend it to all connoisseurs of lyricism and things passing strange.” Richard Calder
- “You hear about kids locked away in attics, their only toys broken clothespins, a few pipe cleaners, a spool of yarn. Yet with these toys, they manage to concoct imaginary worlds of great wonder and beauty. Claude must have grown up in an attic because he writes like one of those kids.” Neil Smith
- “Claude Lalumière’s extravagant imagination is matched by only two other qualities: his compassion for his characters, and his sparkling facility with language. His stories resound with the clash of ideas, the music of hearts and the howls of indignation that any sensitive creator emits when confronted with a universe less esthetically pleasing and fair-minded than the ones he daily strives to create.” Paul Di Filippo
- “In these stories, life still aches after death, spirits leave the flesh and return, and the only people comfortable with their bodies are rotting zombies. Disturbing and funny, sexy and psychedelic, this collection marks the debut of a highly original voice in fantastic fiction. Read it for the thrill of getting lost, or the pleasure of letting an author lead you into undiscovered places.” Jan Lars Jensen
- “Claude Lalumière’s stories are delicious.” Anna Tambour
CONTENTS
introduction by James Morrow:
“God of Desire: The Erotic Theology of Claude Lalumière”
12 stories
The Object of Worship | The Ethical Treatment of Meat | Hochelaga and Sons
The Sea, at Bari | The Darkness at the Heart of the World | Spiderkid
Njàbò | A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens | A Visit to the Optometrist
Roman Predator’s Chimeric Odyssey | Destroyer of Worlds | This Is the Ice Age
cover design by Erik Mohr
The People of the Islands