Summary
Summary of The Lurking Fear
The Lurking Fear at a glance
Summary: 7 min to read
- Reading time
- About 35 min25 min fast, 40 min slow
- Length
- 7,840 words
- Library level
- Challenging long sentences, a rich vocabulary
- First published
- 1923by H. P. Lovecraft
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
Free for 3 months
Get the full summary of The Lurking Fear, free
- 200,000+ classics as eBooks, audiobooks and 15-minute summaries, and print and large print at cost
- Up to 5 readers in your home on one plan
Key ideas
Key idea 1
A seeker enters the feared house
The narrator of The Lurking Fear collects horrors, but his visit to Tempest Mountain puts that interest to a terrible test. After a storm leaves a squatter village dead and torn apart, he wants to discover what lives on the mountain. He settles into a ruined Dutch mansion with two armed companions and waits for thunder.
The setting brings his desire for knowledge close to danger. He has deliberately entered a place the whole valley fears, hoping that whatever hides there will reveal itself.
Key idea 2
Careful preparations fail in the dark
The narrator brings George Bennett and William Tobey into Jan Martense's old room.
Start free to read
Key idea 3
A reporter helps trace the danger
Shaken by the disappearance of his companions, the narrator turns to Arthur Munroe, a newspaper man who listens without dismissing him.
Start free to read
Key idea 4
Shelter cannot keep the danger outside
While searching the ruined hamlet, Munroe and the narrator are caught in another thunderstorm.
Start free to read
Key idea 5
The family past directs the search
After Munroe's death, the narrator decides he may be pursuing the ghost of Jan Martense.
Start free to read
Key idea 6
A grave opens onto hidden passages
Digging beneath Jan Martense's grave, the narrator breaks into a tunnel.
Start free to read
Key idea 7
Isolation gives inheritance a fearful meaning
The Martense family's withdrawal is more than background.
Start free to read
Key idea 8
Curiosity pushes him beyond safe choices
The narrator begins as an investigator who plans, gathers evidence, and works with others.
Start free to read
Key idea 9
Repeated clues build the dread
The fear grows through a sequence of places: the mansion vigil, the ruined hamlet, the grave, and the tunnel.
Start free to read
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
Read the rest free
Who it’s for
Readers who love storm-lashed settings, haunted houses steeped in family history, and narrators who chase mysteries beyond reason will relish this novella.
What this book is
Would you spend a night in a house the whole valley fears, waiting for a thunderstorm to call something out of the dark? The teller of The Lurking Fear does exactly that. He settles into a ruined Dutch mansion on Tempest Mountain, deep in the Catskills, with two armed men beside him. By the time the lightning stops, he is the only one left.
H. P. Lovecraft wrote this cosmic horror novella in the early 1920s. Its hero collects horrors, and when a storm leaves a squatter village dead and torn apart, he sets out to learn what lives on the mountain.
In this summary
- 1A seeker enters the feared houseFree
- 2Careful preparations fail in the dark
- 3A reporter helps trace the danger
- 4Shelter cannot keep the danger outside
- 5The family past directs the search
- 6A grave opens onto hidden passages
- 7Isolation gives inheritance a fearful meaning
- 8Curiosity pushes him beyond safe choices
- 9Repeated clues build the dread
Three men wait for the storm
The story opens on a night of coming thunder. The narrator climbs Tempest Mountain with two strong companions, George Bennett and William Tobey. They pass twisted, lightning-scarred trees and strange mounds in the earth. No wild creature stirs anywhere.
He has learned why the mountain is feared. For more than a hundred years, the squatters in the hills have told of a creeping death that seizes lone travelers after dark. A month earlier, a storm destroyed a whole squatter village. The narrator has come to test an idea, that the thunder calls a death demon out of some hidden place.
His plan is careful. He chooses the old room of Jan Martense on the second floor of the empty mansion. He fixes three rope ladders to the big window and drags a four-poster bed against it. The three men lie side by side with pistols drawn, and one is always meant to watch.
Then the plan begins to fail. A strange drowsiness settles on all of them. The narrator wakes to screams, and Tobey's place beside him is empty. A lightning bolt splits a tree outside, and its glare throws a shadow onto the chimney that is not the shadow of any human being. When the light fades, both companions are gone without a trace.
A good plan still fails when you do not know what you face.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
- Nothing to pay today · Renews every year
- We email you before you pay
- Cancel online in two clicks
Take this summary with you
Send to Kindle downloads the file and opens Amazon's page: drop the file there.
Check yourself
What do the narrator and Munroe conclude about the threat?
Right. “The two men conclude that it is a living thing that fears open ground and is stirred by electrical storms.”Not quite. “The two men conclude that it is a living thing that fears open ground and is stirred by electrical storms.”
What does the attack reported after the tunnel escape reveal?
Right. “So there is more than one of them.”Not quite. “So there is more than one of them.”
Why does the narrator keep pursuing the truth despite the danger?
Right. “He says plainly that not knowing seems worse to him than learning the truth, however terrible.”Not quite. “He says plainly that not knowing seems worse to him than learning the truth, however terrible.”
Go deeper: the whole of The Lurking Fear
About 30 min to read.Start freePaperback, hardcover and large print, printed for you at cost, are on their way.Email me when it is printed
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 7,840 words
- Reading timeAbout 35 min
Questions about The Lurking Fear
What is The Lurking Fear about?
It follows a seeker of horrors who investigates a creeping death on Tempest Mountain in the Catskills. After a storm destroys a squatter village, he searches the haunted Martense mansion, studies the family's history and digs into a grave.
Who are the Martenses in The Lurking Fear?
They are a Dutch family who built the mansion on Tempest Mountain in 1670 and withdrew from the world. Their most notable mark is eyes of two colors, one blue and one brown, passed down in the family.
What does the lurking fear stand for?
The narrator calls it a creeping death that comes with thunder, and the legends give it many forms. Readers often link it to themes of isolation, inheritance and the dark side of a place that people have long avoided.
When was The Lurking Fear written, and is it a true story?
Lovecraft wrote it in the early 1920s as a serial for a magazine. It is fiction, set in 1921 in the Catskills, though the Dutch settlers and Albany setting give it a historical feel.
Is The Lurking Fear easy to read?
Its four short chapters, clear scenes and strong sense of place make it approachable. The story moves from a night vigil to a search and a grave, with each part built around a vivid image.
Cite this edition
Lovecraft, H. P. The Lurking Fear. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-lurking-fear.
Lovecraft, H. P. (2026). The lurking fear. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-lurking-fear (Original work published 1923)
Lovecraft, H. P. The Lurking Fear. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-lurking-fear.
@book{lovecraft2026lurking,
author = {Lovecraft, H. P.},
title = {The Lurking Fear},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-lurking-fear},
note = {First published 1923}
}
Free for 3 months
Get the full summary of The Lurking Fear, free
- 200,000+ classics as eBooks, audiobooks and 15-minute summaries, and print and large print at cost
- Up to 5 readers in your home on one plan
