Moon Pool

The Moon Pool (1918) is a novel by A. Merritt. Originally published as a pair of short stories in the Argosy All-Story Weekly, Merritt’s novel is an influential work in the tradition of lost world fantasy, a subgenre pioneered by Edgar Rice Burroughs and Arthur Conan Doyle. Thought to have influenced H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Call of Cthulhu,” The Moon Pool is widely regarded as Merritt’s finest work. “Now the Thing was close to the end of the white path; close up to the barrier of darkness still between the ship and the sparkling head of the moon stream. Now it beat up against that barrier as a bird against the bars of its cage. It whirled with shimmering plumes, with swirls of lacy light, with spirals of living vapour.” While on a seafaring expedition, Dr. Goodwin, a brilliant scientist, first makes contact with a being known to some as the Dweller, and to others as the Shining One. Created by a lost race residing in the Earth’s core, the Dweller soon broke free from its masters and took on a capacity for evil. Now, all that remains of the once vibrant and advanced underground civilization are the three Silent Ones, wise and immortal beings whose duty―if they can fulfill it―is to destroy the Dweller once and for all. Joined by pilot Larry O’Keefe, Dr. Goodwin voyages underground to learn more about the creature he first saw by the light of the moon. This edition of A. Merritt’s The Moon Pool is a classic of American fantasy fiction reimagined for modern readers.

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A. Merritt (1884-1943) was an American editor and fantastic fiction writer. Born Abraham Grace Merritt in Beverly, New Jersey, he moved with his family to Philadelphia in 1894. Merritt worked as a reporter for The Philadelphia Inquirer before joining the staff of The American Weekly as assistant editor in 1912. On the side, Merritt―one of the highest paid journalists of his time―found success as writer of popular fantasy tales. He had a run of successful stories and serial novels that appeared in Weird Tales, Science and Invention, and Argosy, including The Moon Pool (1918), The Metal Monster (1920), and Dwellers in the Mirage (1932). Merritt was a direct influence on such writers as H. P. Lovecraft and Richard Shaver and was recognized for his achievements as a 1999 inductee to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.