The Call of Karen
by Denise Lynn Lambert
DETAILS: Publisher: Mooney and Lambert Publication Date: August 20, 2021 Format: Paperback Length: 224 pg. Read Date: October 26, 2026
You’re in love, Cthulhu, his inner voice told him. And it is messing with your evil heart.
He didn’t try to convince himself that it wasn’t true. Arguing with oneself was not evil, merely stupid. But Karen made him feel good—good in a way he liked a lot.
What’s The Call of Karen About?
I am not making any of this up (Lambert did):
Cthulhu needs to get away from it all—his wife divorced him, he’s essentially homeless, and doesn’t want to take his sister up on her offer to crash with her. So he decides to take a vacation to Delaware for a bit. He’s seen some online memes about him for President and thinks it could be fun to hang out there for a bit. He shows up pretty much human-sized (but looking like himself, don’t get me wrong).
The first thing he sees when he comes out of the ocean is a large woman berating a lighthouse employee for the number of stairs she had to climb as part of the tour, demanding a refund. There’s something about the way this woman works and the way she’s treating the meek employee that gets his attention. It’s not quite love at first sight, but he is smitten. She looks at him and is oddly attracted, too. Her name, of course, is Karen—and she’s the prototypical privileged white woman demanding to see managers. The two leave together.
Meanwhile, one of the Great Old Ones has sent a servant to Earth to bring Cthulhu home. And frankly, while being weaker, he freaks me out more than ol’ tentacle-face ever could. Anyway, this being, Gestalt, hires a couple of treasure hunters to help him find his target in exchange for, well, treasure.
This begins a multi-state chase between Cthulhu (who is feeling all sorts of new things) and Karen—both growing in appreciation for each other’s particular kind of evil, learning to communicate, and falling for each other—while the treasure hunters deal with their creepy otherworldly patron and keeping the collateral damage to a minimum.
Chaos, a little bloodshed, and otherworldly shenanigans ensue.
Why did I pick this up? Why did I keep reading?
I got this a few years ago at one of the Nampa Library Book Fair’s and it’s been sitting taunting me, since. It seemed like a laugh, but not one I wanted to make time for. But it fit a prompt for the The 2026 BookTempter’s TBR Challenge, so I thought it was time to take care of it.
I kept reading because it was quick and goofy. Ridiculous really (in case you couldn’t tell from the above), so it was easy to keep going.
So, what did I think about The Call of Karen?
…you two have the opportunity for a fine love story, one based on mutual hatred of nearly all other things besides each other. It is perhaps the greatest opportunity of all time.
Now I mean this as a compliment, even if it doesn’t seem like one. Reading this reminded me of watching an Ed Wood movie. You take a premise—whether it’s supposed to be a comedy (like in this case) or not—and you play it out earnestly, if not necessarily with great skill. The commitment to the idea, and getting it done with the least amount of resources possible (I’m not even sure a Microsoft Word-level spellcheck was run on this thing), triumphs over the quality of the product. But there’s something heartfelt in it that you can’t help but root for.
The jokes are…well, some of them are pretty good, really. Some of them are good efforts. The light-hearted mood that permeates this thing keeps you going.
There are moments of sweetness—between the humans and between whatever Cthulhu is and Karen. She’s a horrible person, and she’s aware of it—but she makes herself happy with other’s misery and that’s good enough for her. She stands up for herself and her desires in the face of an Eldritch horror—which takes a certain kind of chutzpah. Honestly, you keep hoping this two crazy beings can make it work. Even if you don’t want to spend another moment in their presence.
The Call of Karen is oddly entertaining—see the Ed Wood idea again—and more fun than I may have made it sound. It’s not a novel to take seriously, it’s one to just sit back, turn off your brain, and enjoy.
There was a sequel promised, and I just might go looking for it.
Read Irresponsibly, but please Comment Responsibly