The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway

written by Carrie Harris with cover art by Martin M Barbdu and published by Aconyte Books.

Thank you to Aconyte Publishing, who provided me with a preview copy of this release to review. Per Aconyte’s site…

An ancient book holds the key to unlocking an otherworldly horror in this gripping new mystery from the world of Arkham Horror

When poet Lucius Galloway is invited to take a prestigious position translating a classical text at Harvard University, he’s suddenly thrust into an unknown world of strange languages, mystical symbols and sanity-shattering nightmares. Haunted by dreams of horrors lurking beneath the waves, Lucius must do everything in his power to solve the mystery at the heart of the translation before the hidden figures dogging his footsteps catch up to him and transform the world forever.

“The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway” marks the return of author Carrie Harris to the Arkham Files line after her fantastic entry in 2022’s short story collection “Secrets in Scarlet”, where she introduced readers to the history of the “Girl in the Carmine Coat” in a wonderful tale of sisters, thievery, and consequences. In her newest effort, Mrs. Harris has returned to provide another introduction to the yet-to-be-released Seeker Investigator Lucius Galloway.

Lu will make his gaming debut as the Seeker investigator in the upcoming “The Drowned City” expansion for the Arkham Horror LCG releasing in Q1 2025. “The Drowned City” is shaping up to be a major event for the Arkham Files IP. The marketing for associated releases points to this being a turning point for Asmodee’s version of Arkham MA with Aconyte releasing not just a short story collection about the campaign, as they did for “Night of the Zealot” and the “Scarlet Keys”, but a trilogy of novels meant to introduce important characters and themes that will be present in the LCG's campaign. Before players can build the future of Lu, readers have the opportunity to pick up this release and see Mrs. Harris’ beautiful explanation of the poet’s motivations, goals, and how he first becomes exposed to the mythos.

Mrs. Harris uses the majority of the narrative in “The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway” to drive home the relationships surrounding Lu and how they inform his life. His mother Alice, who passed away years earlier, is still thought of regularly as Lu credits much of his personality to her teachings and readers are consistently reminded of the lessons she taught and the tension in their relationship. The love of his life, Rudolph “Rudi” LaChappelle, is an outspoken partner whom Lu cares for deeply, but the couple is forced to hide their affection due to the taboos of the 1920s. As shown in the preview chapters of this release the story picks up with Rudi hosting a party to celebrate Lucius having been awarded the Howard, a fictional literary prize the author named after H.P. Lovecraft. It is at this party that the poet’s life shifts as Lucius gets a lead on a summer job at Harvard University working on a translation of a recently donated historic document in the hopes of publishing an analysis of what said document contains. Within this academic setting, the majority of the mystery of this story takes place as Mrs. Harris allows readers to be aware of the forces arrayed against Lucius while also doing a wonderful job of masking the character’s true relationship to Lu. This allows the reader to create their own mental map as they ponder what is truly meant in any given encounter beyond the surface conversation.

Lu’s academic partner for the summer is Helen Berringer a sarcastic, elderly academic who specializes in translation but whose career has been hampered as a result of being a woman pursuing, what was viewed at the time, as a man’s job in academia. Readers get a great deal of interaction between Lucius and Helen as they slowly recognize the importance of the document they are spending their summer working on. This partnership drives most of the reader’s exposure to the inner personality of Lu, as well as the humor found in the story, and is well executed. The importance of this friendship to Lu allows for the character's choices throughout the second and third acts to feel natural and earned as readers understand fully what the friendship means to those involved.

Another key factors that led to the success of this novel for me is Mrs. Harris's balance between Lovecraft’s classic work and the Arkham Files IP itself. Without H.P. Lovecraft this setting I so enjoy simply would not exist, but it must be said that his perspective on the world and its inhabitants was shameful and his stories were often bleak. One of the primary reasons that the Arkham Files succeeds, for me, is that the creatives involved take what Lovecraft established as a starting point, but then move past his limitations, embracing a more inclusive and hopeful perspective. Challenges are not easily overcome but the investigators can save the world, and themselves, in the face of cosmic adversity. One of the aspects of this release that sets it apart from other Aconyte releases is a more purposeful blending of Lovecraft’s original creations with characters from the Arkham Files IP. Harvey Walters makes a brief appearance, to help set the story in motion, but Mrs. Harris also makes time to put a spotlight on an agent of an established secret society who has not been seen outside of the LCG up to this point. The character's involvement in this book turns them from a player some players may know to a more fully formed part of the IP with a perspective that is unique and whose adventures I hope we return to at some point in the future. Alongside these A.F. contributions, the opening line of this book brings one of the most recognized recurring names in all of Lovecraft’s original writings into the Arkham Files IP for the first time, the author of the Necronomicon, Abdul Alhazared. Typically the adversaries presented in Aconyte’s book are engaging original creations of the author. I found it a nice change of pace to see someone presented with a tie to the original fiction of Lovecraft being brought forward for a modern audience. Readers gain insight into the cultist’s personality, goals, and obstacles throughout this tale, taking a name readers may recognize and giving it a backing worthy of the vile scribe. The choice of featuring Alhazared and his fowl creation in the introduction of this multi-media event was a smart choice that shows the stakes have risen in this encounter, much more so than the standard awful events the investigators are trying to address and I can foresee how Abdul Alhazared's actions in this book will have a direct impact on the future of the Arkham Files IP as “The Drowned City” comes. 

“The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway” is another unique take on the Arkham Files universe from Aconyte Books. Featuring engaging character work, it does the heavy lifting of being the first part of a trilogy, leaving plenty of room for future stories, while managing to wrap up the arc it set out to establish and leaves readers with a full understanding of Lucius Galloway and his life.

I hope you enjoyed this look at “The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway”. If you would like more updates about the history of Arkham, its residents, and events tied to the area then you can find me on Twitter or Bluesky and bookmark this site for future updates. If you have any questions or wish to request specific content, please use this contact form. 

Best regards

Dude in progress

The Forbidden Visions of Lucius Galloway is a slow-burn horror, less pulp and more the type of horror actually written by Lovecraft and his contemporaries, where half of it is just daily life with nightmares but you as the reader are becoming more and more aware of all of the things horribly wrong and feeling greater and greater dread. It's incredibly well-written and extremely engaging. I do think that perhaps it could have been a touch shorter; there are parts of it that retreat the same ground narratively and emotionally a few times, but none that actually interfered with my enjoyment. There <i>was</i> one part of the mystery I felt a little lied to about by the narrative, but again, not so much I couldn't find my own explanation for it. 4.5 stars rounded up to 5.

I truly and deeply appreciate the Arkham Horror authors, and Aconyte Books, for making a noted effort to make the majority of their books reflect a diverse experience. There is an appeal especially in Lovecraftian horror to minorities--ironically, maybe, given Lovecraft's overwhelming fear of both visible and invisible minorities, but as a whole while nobody excuses Lovecraft's bigotry (terrible even for his time period), he still wrote books that spoke to an experience of being othered. As a queer person, I understand that pervasive fear of being in danger from the people around you while also a sense of awareness that they are the ones who are likely to hate and fear you for being different; this is integral to reading Lovecraft's work, and a huge reason why it has such an appeal despite its cruelty, and why there is such a huge surge in reclamation works from non-white, female, and queer authors. Arkham Horror as a line seems to <i>get</i> this, and numerous books I've read from them call on this experience. In this case, Lucius is a mid-60s gay Black academic, and every part of this is tied into the story; he has to be secretive about his relationship with his 'roommate' (given the time period) and he has to tangle with not knowing if people around him are being weird in a way that relates to the nightmares he's having, or simply if they're prejudiced against having a Black man visiting Harvard. It's stunningly effective and really speaks toward both that genre trend and makes the story work VERY well.

Great characters, stunning writing, a chilling slow-burn horror. I will definitely pick up the next book when it comes out; I'm very worried about poor Rudi!

I received this ARC in exchange for an honest review.