Black Goat Blues: All the pieces are in place for a killer third installment

Black Goat Blues by Levi Black

Levi Black’s Black Goat Blues (2017) is the follow-up to his fantastically twisted horror novel Red Right Hand, and while it wasn’t everything I hoped it would be, Black Goat Blues is still a compulsive page-turner that I couldn’t put down until I’d reached the end. Warning: it is essential that you read these books in order. Seriously.

Charlie Tristan Moore is now in possession of a sentient angel-skin coat and eldritch magicks of her own, thanks to the “generosity” of some elder gods in Red Right Hand. Her best friend, Daniel, is deep in a coma after the horrors he experienced at Nyarlathotep’s hands, and Charlie is convinced that destroying Nyarlathotep (he of the Red Right Hand, as well as innumerable other appellations) will return Daniel’s soul to his body; killing the Man in Black before he achieves his goal of collecting three soul-gems from other elder gods will also prevent unspeakably bad things from happening to the whole of existence, so that’s a nice bonus.

Even with some pretty impressive augmentation and deadly weapons, Charlie is still only (mostly) human, and she hasn’t had much luck in tracking down her quarry. Along the way, she receives some unexpected company from a young man named Javier, who’s got his own dark secrets and bottomless anger, and the fallen goddess Ashtoreth, once worshipped as Ishtar. Their combined determination is enough to bring them to the court of The King in Yellow, but will it be enough to stop the Son of Azazoth before reality as they know it is undone?

Black Goat Blues wears its influences proudly, and Black does a superb job of incorporating classic elements of Weird tales in with the modern story he’s telling. In particular, the court of the King in Yellow is a ghastly place, and he and his minions are terrifying. The dichotomy between the plane of existence experienced by humans and the layers of reality beyond is put to good use, along with the growing distance between Charlie and “regular” people like Javier. Charlie’s continued exposure to magick and otherworldly forces is changing her, sometimes by degrees and sometimes by leaps and bounds, and I’m curious to see what awaits in the next MYTHOS WAR book.

On the other hand, much of what made Red Right Hand so inventive is repeated in Black Goat Blues, and the repetitions often ring hollow. Charlie needs a human sidekick to draw magickal energy from, and Daniel’s in a coma, so Javier provides the impetus for expository dialogue and acts as hostage to the cruel whims of immortal beings. Her quest can’t be completed without divine aid of some kind, and where Nyarlathotep acted as guide and mentor in the previous book, Ashtoreth steps in this time. An elder god is in the same predicament, though with a shift in confinement and end result, as a god in Red Right Hand. That’s not to say Black Goat Blues was boring or that the ending was predictable — neither would be true — but there were times that it seemed that the narrative was walking in circles rather than a straight line.

Thus far, the MYTHOS WAR is shaping up to be an interesting series. Levi Black’s work challenges many of my expectations, and the way he adapts (or doesn’t) the conventions of the Weird genre surprises me. After two books, I think he’s got all the pieces in place for a killer third installment, and I’m dying to see where those pieces land when they fall.