Strange Eons

Strange Eons is a novel by Robert Bloch published in 1978. It is a homage to H.P. Lovecraft's work and consists largely of references to it. These references are loosely tied together but never given a unifying explanation.

Albert Keith, who has a collection of various objects including a shrunken head, sees a large painting of a dog-like creature holding a dead man and just has to buy it. His friend Simon Waverly arrives at his house and realizes the painting is the same as the one from "Pickman's Model". As unfolding events become increasingly strange and disturbing, Keith discovers that Lovecraft's fiction may really be something more.


 * Added Alliterative Appeal: Bloch seems to like using this sort of phrase, such as "mountainous mass of masonry" and "frantic furry forms".
 * Anyone Can Die: The viewpoint characters of the first two chapters -- Albert Keith and his ex-wife Kay -- both die, as well as many others.
 * The Bad Guy Wins: Mark becomes Cthulhu at the end and destroys everything.
 * Death by Childbirth: Kay Keith is said to have died this way during the Time Skip after giving birth to Mark Dixon. This is supposedly because Mark's father is Cthulhu, but he appears to be exactly like a normal human until Nyarlathotep shines the crystal on him.
 * Decoy Protagonist: Keith seems like he's the protagonist in the first chapter, but at the end of it he dies. The second chapter is from Kay's point of view, but the third and last switches to Mark and reveals that she is also dead.
 * Dying Dream: Subverted. Mark thinks he's having one of these when he's taken away by the fish people, but it's real.
 * Emotion Eater: According to Orin Sanderson, the Great Old Ones created humans to feed on their emotions, especially fear.
 * Hollywood Silencer: The revolver Jody shoots Fred Elstree with is totally silent.
 * Human Mom, Nonhuman Dad: Mark is the result of Kay being made the "bride" of Cthulhu.
 * Informed Attribute: After shooting Jody and finding herself lying on the floor, Kay is surprised because she's "not the fainting kind". She then goes on to faint several more times.
 * Literary Allusion Title: The title is part of a couplet from the Necronomicon, found in "The Nameless City" and "The Call of Cthulhu": "That is not dead which can eternal lie / And with strange aeons even death may die". One of the last lines in the book is "Death died", though it's not stated what this means.
 * Nuclear Option: Cthulhu is successfully nuked, but Mark becomes his replacement.
 * Time Skip: Mark is introduced in the last chapter after one of these, since he doesn't exist yet before that.
 * You Dirty Rat: The rats Kay finds in the underground passageway seem to be up to no good, but she runs away and shuts the door before they can do anything to her.