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Publication Order of Necroscope Books
Publication Order of Necroscope Collections
Publication Order of Necroscope: E-Branch Books
Publication Order of Necroscope: The Lost Years Books
Publication Order of Necroscope: Vampire World Books
Publication Order of New Adventures Of The Necroscope Books
The Necroscope series is a well known book series of the paranormal, vampires, fantasy, fiction, and horror genres. It is written by a renowned British novelist named Brian Lumley. The series is comprised of 18 books in total, which were released between the years 1986 and 2013. Author Lumley has defined the work Necroscope in this series as the one who is able to indulge in a communication with dead people. In the later parts of the series, such people are given one more name by Lumley, the Deadspeak. Lumley explains that even though the necroscopes and necromancers do the same thing of extracting knowledge from the corpses of dead beings, there is a slight difference in their approach of doing so. Necromancers carry out brutal eviscerations on the dead bodies for getting information, while Necroscopes do it peacefully without carrying out any kind of physical interference. The abilities that the necroscopes have are defined as one kind of ESP. All the books of this series have the chief character in the role of Harry Keogh. He is shown has having the unique ability of speaking to the dead. With the passage of time, Harry continues to hone his skills and becomes a master of the special gift. He befriends many dead ones and talks to them for long hours. The dead make Harry Keogh learn that death is not the final end, it is just the end of one phase. The body withers away, but the mind does not. Their mind makes the dead beings to continue expanding and improving in death the things that they loved when they were alive. Because of Harry Keogh, the Great Majority in silence starts communicating among themselves. They love Harry for what he does for them. In return, the dead do him favors and help him out in his day to day life. One example of this as shown in the books is that when Harry is in school, a dead mathematics teacher helps him with his studies and master the numbers in math. Harry also learns self defense skills from a dead army sergeant. Apart from Harry Keogh, the other important characters mentioned in the books include Harry Jr., Nathan Keogh, Jake Cutter, and Scott St. John. While Harry grows up, he keeps getting dreams about his mom repeatedly. It is known to him that his mother had died in a tragic accident while ice-skating, however, the reality is that his stepfather, Victor Shukshin, killed her. Victor has a psychic nature and is a sleeper agent of the E-Branch of Soviet planted in the UK. When he learns the truth about his mother’s death and his stepfather’s real identity, he sets himself up on the mission of avenging the murder of his mother. Because of this, he gets dragged into a deep espionage web involving Soviet ESP and British agencies. During the course of the mission, Harry Keogh learns Mobius Continuum. And with the help of this, he begins to transport himself instantaneously in any part of the multidimensional universe. From this point onwards, the British agencies start backing Harry for eradicating the vampire menace from Earth. Eventually, Harry is led to Starside/Sunside, a parallel world dominated by vampires.
Author Brian Lumley is quite famous as a writer of horror-fiction stories. Necrocsope series is his widely popular book series based on this genre. Author Lumley was born on December 2, 1937 in County Durham, England. Before the start of his literary career, Brian Lumley served in the Royal Military Police in the British Army for some time. In his free time during the service, he used to write stories. Lumley retired from his rank of the Warrant Officer of Class 1 in the year 1980. From then on, he started writing novels and became a professional in this field. Throughout the 1970s, Lumley contributed to the Cthulhu Mythos series of stories of H P Lovercraft. He added a few stories as well as a book that featured the character of Titus Crow. Some of Lumley’s earlier books were released by the Arkham House. Lumley’s other initial stories pastiched the Dream Cycle of Lovercraft, but consisted of the original characters of his own, like Eldin, the Wanderer; and David Hero. When questioned about the differences between his characters and that of Lovercraft’s, author Lumley explained that his characters have the knack of fighting back and have a good laugh while on the way. Later on in his career, Brian Lumley wrote the Necroscope books and several spin-offs. He featured the chief protagonist of the Necroscope books, Harry Keogh, in an anthology called Harry Keogh & other Weird Heroes. Author Lumley has held the post of the HWA between 1996 and 1997. He received the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 from the HWA. Lumley has also won the World Fantasy Prize, which was awarded to him in the same year. Lumley says that among the writers who have inspired him the most throughout his life are M R James, Robert Howard, Robert W Chambers, William Hope Hodgson, and HP Lovercraft. Besides his novels and short stories, author Lumley also had many works released in periodicals. He has partnered with different authors for several of his works on many occasions. Lumley believes he was lucky and blessed to have found the path of his interest and excelled in it through his hard work and dedication. Today, he is included among the top authors of the horror genre.
The debut book of the Necroscope series written by author Brian Lumley is entitled ‘Necroscope’. It was released by the Tor Books in 1994, after its first publishing in 1986. The primary characters described by Lumley include Faethor Ferenczy, Boris Dragonasi, Harry Keogh, Thobor Ferenczy, Max Batu, etc. At the start of the book’s story, it is shown that an evil grows in Rumania’s Balkan mountains. This evil has been buried for a long time in the hollowed ground and is bound by silver and earth. But, now it has started plotting scheme for its freedom. This evil, Thibor Ferenczy, seems very hungry for his freedom as well as revenge. He has a human tool in the form of Boris Dragonasi. Boris learns various skills of a necromancer by Thibor with the intention that he will use them to set him free. However, Boris goes on to make use of them for dominating the world. But, Harry Keogh poses as a challenge against the fulfillment of his dreams. Harry has the support of the dead, who will go to any extent to keep him alive and help him defeat Boris Dragonasi.
The next volume of this series is entitled ‘Vamphyri’. It was also published by the Tor publishers in 1989. This novel features the central characters as Yulian Bodescu, Harry Keogh, Zek Foener, Faethor Ferenczy, Alec Kyle, Harry Jr., and Thibor Ferenczy. At the beginning of the story of the book, it is depicted that Yulian Bodescu is planning to take control of the world from a remote village in England. Yulian possesses the powers of a vampire from his birth and uses them to rule the bodies and minds of men. Unknown to the world, Yulian is forming an army full of vampire monsters. After defeating Boris Dragonasi, Harry was hoping that the war against vampires has come to an end, having lost his own life in the process. But, he realizes that he has turned into an undead and his powers have increased more than ever. And when he learns about the evil Yulian Bordescu and his deadly intentions, Harry prays that his new powers prove enough for bringing his destruction too.
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I loved this series and didn’t realize I missed the whole 2nd set of books! I think I stooped at the lost years but I want to read them all over again!