John Gawsworth – Strange Assembly

John Gawsworth (ed.) – Strange Assembly (Unicorn, 1932)

John Gawsworth – Foreword

M. P. Shiel – The Flying Cat
Sir Ronald Ross – The Vivisector Vivisected
Frederick Carter – The Black Lad
Herbert E. Palmer – The Franc-Tireur’s Escape
Arthur Machen – The Gift Of Tongues
Hubert Crackanthorpe – A Fellside Tragedy
Francis Marsden – The Mask
Stephen Graham – Ilya Vilka
Rhys Davies – The Journey
Stephen Hudson – A Fragment
Wilfred Ewart – Londoners
Frederick Carter – The Harrying Of The Dead
M. P. Shiel – A Night in Venice
Arthur Machen – The Rose Garden

Rosemary Gray – Irish Ghost Stories

Rosemary Gray (ed.) – Irish Ghost Stories   (Wordsworth editions, 2011)

Michael Banim – The Rival Dreamers
William Carleton – The Three Wishes
Daniel Corkery – Eyes Of The Dead
A. E. Coppard – The Gollan
Francis Marion Crawford – The Dead Smile
Thomas Crofton Croker – Master and Man
Thomas Crofton Croker – The Legend of Knockgrafton
Thomas Crofton Croker – The Haunted Cellar
Thomas Crofton Croker – Legend of Bottle Hill
Thomas Crofton Croker – Daniel O’Rourke
Jeremiah Curtain – The Blood-Drawing Ghost
Jeremiah Curtain – St Martins Eve
Anonymous – The Witch Hare
Gerald Griffin – The Brown Man
Douglas Hyde – Teig OKane and the Corpse
Joseph Jacobs – The Field of Boliauns
Hermine Kavanagh – Darby OGill and the Leprechaun
Patrick Kennedy – Hairy Rouchy
Patrick Kennedy – The Ghosts and the Game of Football
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – The Watcher
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – The Spectre Lovers
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – An Account of Some Strange Disturbances in Aungier Street
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – Passage in the Secret History of an Irish Countess
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – Strange Event in the Life of Schalken the Painter
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – The Fortunes of Sir Robert Ardagh
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – The Dream
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone Family
J. Sheridan Le Fanu – Narrative of the Ghost of a Hand
D. R. McAnally Jr. – The Sexton of Cashel  
D. R. McAnally Jr. – The Defeat of the Widows
D. R. McAnally Jr. – The Henpecked Giant
D. R. McAnally Jr. – The Leprechaun
Dorothy Macardle – The Prisoner
Letitia Maclintock – Far Darrig in Donegal
Letitia Maclintock – Jamie Freel and the Young Lady
William Maginn – A Vision of Purgatory  
George Moore – A Play-House in the Waste
Rosa Mulholland – The Ghost at the Rath  
Rosa Mulholland – The Living Ghost
Forrest Reid – Courage
Charlotte Riddell – Hertford O’ Donnells Warning  
Charlotte Riddell – The Last of Squire Ennismore
Bram Stoker – The Judges House
Traditional – Daniel Crowley and the Ghosts
Traditional – John Reardon and the Sister Ghosts
Oscar Wilde – The Canterville Ghost

many thanks to caradini for providing the table of contents

Peter Haining – Death on Wheels

Peter Haining (ed.) – Death on Wheels (Souvenir 1999)

Introduction – Peter Haining

1. Auto Mania: The Machinery of Death

Trucks – Stephen King
The Dust-Cloud – E. F. Benson
Second Chance – Jack Finney
Used Car – H. Russell Wakefield
Duel – Richard Matheson
Who’s Been Sitting in My Car? – Antonia Fraser
Not from Detroit – Joe R. Lansdale

2. Motorway Madness: Murder in the Fast Lane

Never Stop on the Motorway – Jeffrey Archer
The Death Car – Peter Haining
Night Court – Mary Elizabeth Counselman
Accident Zone – Ramsey Campbell
The Last Run – Alan Dean Foster
The Hitch-Hiker – Roald Dahl
Crash – J. G. Ballard

3. Chrome Killers: The Future Autogeddon

The Racer – Ib Melchior
Along the Scenic Route – Harlan Ellison
Auto-da-Fé – Roger Zelazny
Violation – William F. Nolan
Thy Blood Like Milk – Ian Watson

Thanks to Steve Goodwin for providing the table of contents!

Rosemary Gray – Gripping Yarns

Rosemary Gray (ed.) – Gripping Yarns (Wordsworth Special Editions, 2008)

Anonymous – One Night Of Horror
————- The Pipe
————- The Puzzle
————- The Closed Cabinet
————- The Alibi
Stacey Aumonier – Miss Bracegirdle Does Her Duty
————- A Source Of Irritation
————- Where Was Wych Street?
Harold Auten – a Fight To The Finish
Etienne Barsony – The Dancing Bear
Jorgen Wilhelm Bergsoe – The Amputated Arms
Ambrose Bierce – The Moonlit Road
————- A Tough Tussle
————- A Jug Of Syrup
————- The Middle Toe Of The Right Foot
————- John Bartine’s Watch
Algernon Blackwood – a Silent Visitation
————- The Wood Of The Dead
————- A Suspicious Gift
————- Skeleton Lake : An Episode In Camp
George Brame – On The Belgian Coast
John Buchan – The Wind In The Portico
————- The Loathley Opposite
George Washington Cable – The Young Aunt With White Hair
Egerton Castle – The Baron’s Quarry
Wilkie Collins – The Dream Woman
Joseph Conrad – The Secret Sharer
————- A Smile Of Fortune
————- The Black Mate
A. R. Cooper – With The Foreign Legion In Gallipoli
Stephen Crane – Manacled
————- An Illusion In Black And White
————- Twelve O’Clock
F. Marion Crawford – By The Waters Of Paradise
Guy De Maupassant – The Wreck
————- The Terror
John Charles Dent – Gagtooth’s Image
Thomas De Quincey – The Avenger
Arthur Conan Doyle – A Foreign Office Romance
————- The Striped Chest
————- The Croxley Master
————- The New Catacomb
————- The King Of The Foxes
————- The Green Flag
————- The Lord Of Chateau Noir
————- The Three Correspondents
————- The Debut Of Bimbashi Joyce
————- The Doings Of Raffles Haw
Arthur Elck – The Tower Room
A. J. Evans – Exploits Of The Escaping Club
J. S. Fletcher – The Lighthouse On Shivering Sand
Mary E. Wilkins Freeman – The Shadows On The Wall
E. W. Hornung – The Wrong House
————- The Rest Cure
————- A Bad Night
————- The Spoils Of Sacrilege
Bernard Severin Ingemann – The Sealed Room
Maurus Jokai – Thirteen At Table
Rudyard Kipling – My Own True Ghost Story
————- Bubbling-Well Road
————- At The End Of The Passage
————- The Return Of Imray
————- The City Of Dreadful Night
Leoplod Lewis – A Dreadful Bell
Jack London – Siwash
————- The Man With The Gash
————- Where The Trail Forks
Anselme Marchal – Hoodwinking The Germans
Ferenc Molnar – The Living Death
Frank Norris – A Memorandum Of Sudden Death
————- The Ghost In The Crosstrees
Fitz-James O’Brien – My Wife’s Temper
David Phillips – At A Sap-Head
William Pittinger – The Locomotive Chase In Georgia
A. O. Pollard – I Charge!
Saki – Sredni Vashtar
————- The Hounds Of Fate
Mary Shelley – The Mortal Immortal
Robert Louis Stevenson – The Pavilion On The Links
————- The Sire de Maletroit’s Door
Anthony Trollope – The Man Who Kept His Money In A Box
Edgar Wallace – The Lone House Mystery
————- The Dark Horse
————- Clues
————- Romance In It
————- A Certain Game
————- The Swift Walker
————- Nine Terrible Men
————- The Sickness-Mongo
Edith Wharton – A Bottle Of Perrier
————- The Lady’s Maid’s Bell
————- The Bolted Door
John Taylor Wood – Escape Of General Beckinridge
Walter Wood – How Trooper Potts Won The V.C. On Burnt Hill
E. D. Woodhall – Secret Service Days

Blurb
For those who sometimes long to escape the strictures of modern life or to inject a little more drama and excitement into their workday world, the remedy could be the collection of stories you hold in your hand. Here for the taking are tales of high adventure and low intrigue from masters of the genre like John Buchan and Robert Louis Stevenson, classics of crime and detection from veteran thriller writers like Edgar Wallace and Arthur Conan Doyle, spine-chillers from the pens of Ambrose Bierce and other purveyors of suspense and horror, and true accounts of courage and survival from heroic and intrepid individuals caught up in the rigours and insanity of war or battling against the elements on gruelling expeditions of discovery and exploration. Between the covers of this crowded volume, Wordsworth Editions has assembled from the work of famous, less well-known and totally unsung writers a treasure trove of rattling good yarns to fire the imagination, chill the blood and perhaps awaken (or reawaken) the spirit of adventure in any reader who dares to plunge in!

Wordsworth Editions: Best publisher of the 00’s?

As far as i know they’ve never even been shortlisted for a British Fantasy Award but Wordsworth editions have my nomination for publishers of the decade. The good news is, the good work will continue just as soon as 2010 is upon us with a reprint of James Malcolm Rymer’s Varney The Vampyre in January followed by the James Doig edited anthology, Australian Ghost Stories, the following month.

Blurb
Murderous ghosts, horrific curses and monstrous beings haunt an unforgiving landscape into which travelers stray at their peril. Journey through the dark byways of Australia’s Gothic past in the rare stories gathered in this memorable new collection. Work by acclaimed Australian writers such as Marcus Clarke, Henry Lawson and Edward Dyson appears alongside many lesser-known authors such as Beatrice Grimshaw, Mary Fortune and Ernest Favenc. Many of the stories collected here have never been reprinted since their first publication in 19th and early 20th century periodicals and showcase the richness and variety of the Australian ghost and horror story.

James Doig provides an authoritative introduction full of fresh insights into Australian Gothic fiction with detailed biographical notes on the authors represented.

my pick of those i’ve read to date would include:

M. G. Lewis – The Monk
Mark Valentine (ed) – The Werewolf Pack
David S. Davies (ed.) – The Sexton Blake Casebook
Marjorie Bowen – The Bishop Of Hell
Anonymous – Sweeney Todd
E. Nesbit – Powers Of Darkness
George W. M. Reynolds – Wagner, The Werewolf
William Fryer Harvey – The Beast With Five Fingers
David Blair (ed.) – Gothic Short Stories
Dennis Wheatley – The Devil Rides Out

Happy Christmas and thanks for such a great selection, Derek and skeleton staff!

David Stuart Davies – The Casebook Of Sexton Blake

David Stuart Davies (ed.) – The Casebook Of Sexton Blake (Wordsworth Editions, 2009)

Eric Parker, from the cover of the Sexton Blake Annual, 1940 edition

Mark Hodder – Introduction

Cecil Hayter – The Slave Market (1907) In the dangerous depths of Africa, Blake races to the rescue of an old school friend!
W. J. Lomax – A Football Mystery (1907) Blake and Tinker join the England team to beat the cheating opposition!
Ernest Sempill – The Man From Scotland Yard (1908) Blake has his first encounter with the greatest super-villain he would ever meet!
William Murray Gordon – The Law of the Sea (1912) Blake goes down with the ship in his own version of the sinking of the Titanic!
G. H. Teed – The Brotherhood of the Yellow Beetle (1913) – Blake grapples with oriental cunning in the form of Prince Wu Ling!
Robert Murray Graydon – A Case of Arson (1917) – A master crook is at work but Blake is on his trail!
G. H. Teed – The Black Eagle (1913) A wronged man is out for, vengeance, Can Blake stop him before it’s too late?

From the blurb
Welcome to the breathtaking adventures of Sexton Blake!

For the greater part of the 20th century, the countless escapades of super sleuth Sexton Blake kept millions of readers on the edge of their seats. Together with his faithful sidekick, the youthful Tinker, and his intelligent bloodhound, Pedro, he stood firm against an onslaught of crime and villainy, defeating his enemies with his extraordinary powers of deduction, iron fists and unyielding determination. This thrilling collection presents seven exploits from his ‘golden age’:

Another superb offering from Wordsworth editions. See the Casebook of Sexton Blake thread on Vault of Evil

Sheridan Le Fanu – Uncle Silas

Sheridan Le Fanu – Uncle Silas (Wordsworth Editions, 2009)

Introduction by Kathryn White

“I thought I saw a human face, about the most terrible my fancy could have called up, looking fixedly into the room. The face gazed towards the bed, and in the imperfect light looked like a livid mask, with chalky eyes.’

Master of the ghost story genre M.R. James commented that the, ‘final terrific murder-scene and escape can hardly be forgotten’ by those who have read Uncle Silas.

Neither does the opening disappoint. As the November winds wail in ivied chimneys we are drawn into a Victorian Gothic atmosphere of menacing, sombre gloom and ebony shadows. Sheridan Le Fanu leaves us in no doubt that we are in for a feast of exciting drama, luring us into the intensely claustrophobic world of the nineteenth century sensational novel.

Le Fanu is amongst the top-notch exponents of the creepy, the criminal and the oppressive. In this tale of the orphaned teenage heiress Maud Ruthyn, fearing for her life at the hands of her sinister uncle, he has created a rattling good plot with the depth of a social novel and the power of high romance.

Kevin Carolan – Churchyard Whispers

Kevin Carolan (ed.) – Churchyard Whispers (Hodder & Stoughton, 1999)

Cover picture: detail taken from SC24848 Stoke Poges Church by John Constable (1776-1837)
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK/Bridgeman Art Library.

Tales Of Mystery & Suspense

Introduction

W. E. Aytoun – The Man In The Bell
Guy De Maupassant – The Graveyard Sisterhood
Edgar Allan Poe – The Pit and the Pendulum
Viscount De L’isle – The Torture Of Hope
Herman Melville – The Bell-Tower
Walter de la Mare – All Hallows
O. Henry – The Cop And The Anthem
Sherwood Anderson – The Strength Of God
T.F. Powys – The Hunted Beast

Tales Of Crime & Detection

Jack London – The Master Of Mystery
Melville Davisson Post – The Angel Of The Lord
Catherine Louisa Pirkis – The Sisterhood
H. Jenkins – The Gylston Slander
Robert Louis Stevenson – The Young Man In Holy Orders
J. MacLaren-Ross – The Episcopal Seal
E. C. Bentley – The Genuine Tabard
R. Ellis Roberts – The Narrow Way
H.C. Bailey – The Yellow Slugs
Kevin Carolan – Churchyard Shadows

Blurb:
Most of us must have walked around a country churchyard at some time or other, looking at the carefully laid-out gravestones, and felt a sense of peace and order. But there can also be movements in the shadows which make us uncomfortable. The desolation of many churches and cemeteries makes them an ideal spot to commit atrocious crimes. The vicarage can be filled with bitterness and religious frenzy as much as spiritual calm.

Churchyard Shadows draws together the best stories of crime and mystery that take the church as their backdrop, written by some of the greatest masters of the short story. Tales such as Edgar Allan Poe’s The Pit and the Pendulum, T.F. Powys’ The Hunted Beast and Walter de la Mare’s All Hallows hold us in unbearable suspense. H.C. Bailey’s The Yellow Slugs sees spiritual cruelty lead to murder. Robert Louis Stevenson examines the corrupting effect of an enormous diamond on a young clergyman. On the other hand, we witness the celebrated Uncle Abner and Jack London’s tribal shaman solve crimes using their religious insights. This is an anthology to entertain and enthrall – but not to be read in a darkened churchyard!

These covers with embossed lettering are sent to try us, but the content looks very strong. Hadn’t heard of Kevin Carolan before, but, from the back cover, he “writes and lectures on a wide variety of subjects, and is the editor of the short-story collection Celtic Mysteries.”

Vote In The Wordsworth Editions Poll!

It’s one of the enduring mysteries surrounding the awards that horror people are so fond of bestowing upon one another: Why  Wordsworth Editions, arguably the best thing to happen to the genre in the noughties,  are so notably absent from each and every nominations list? Over the past few years their ludicrously tiny staff have been responsible for reissuing long sought novels and collections by the likes of R. Murray Gilchrist, Marjorie Bowen, Dennis Wheatley, May Sinclair, G. W. M. Reynolds and Mrs. Everett at a budget price (most of their stock retails at £2.99) and now here’s YOUR chance to have a shout in which authors they publish in 2010!

There are two polls: one comprising twenty authors whose work is out of copyright from which you may select up to five to be considered for publication in the ‘Mystery & The Supernatural’ series.

The second is limited to five authors – H. R. Wakefield, L. T. C. Holt, A. M. Burrage, Hugh Walpole & Arthur Machen – from whom you may select the two you’d most like to see back in print.

also, our friends at Wordsworth have kindly stumped up for a lucky dip!

“As a token of our thanks, everyone who votes in our poll (or has previously contributed a suggestion through email) will be put into a lucky dip, and 2 of you will win £50 of Amazon vouchers to use as you wish (although if you want to spend them on Wordsworth books, that’s fine with us!)”

Details on the Vault of Evil forum (i’m afraid you’ll have to register: don’t worry – just delete your account at the end of February once you’ve been entered for the lucky dip!)

Polls close on 28th February 2009 so get in quick!

Choose wisely, now.

Direct Links

Out of copyright
Still in copyright

Wordsworth Editions

Jack Adrian – Strange Tales from the Strand

Jack Adrian (ed.) – Strange Tales from the Strand (Oxford University Press, 1991)

Mick Brownfield

Julian Symons – Foreword
Jack Adrian – Introduction

Graham Greene – All But Empty (March 1947)
J. B. Harris-Burland – Lord Beden’s Motor (Dec. 1901)
Hugh Walpole – The Tarn (Dec. 1923)
Rina Ramsay – Resurgam ( Aug. 1915)
F. Tennyson Jesse – The Railway Carriage (Nov. 1931)
Beverley Nichols – The Bell (Aug. 1946)
W. W. Jacobs – His Brother’s Keeper (Dec. 1922)
Sapper – Touch And Go (Feb. 1926)
W. L. George – Waxworks (July 1922)
B. L. Jacot – White Spectre (Jan. 1950)
D. H. Lawrence – ‘Tickets, Please!’ (Apr 1919)
Villiers de l’Isle-Adam – A Torture By Hope (June 1891)
L. T. Meade – A Horrible Fright (Oct. 1894)
H. Greenhough Smith – The Case Of Roger Carboyne (Sept. 1892)
Ianthe Jerrold – The Orchestra Of Death (Dec 1918)
C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne – The Lizard (June 1898)
L. G. Moberly – Inexplicable (Dec. 1917)
L. de Giberne Sieveking – The Prophetic Camera (The English Review, Nov. 1922)
Henry A. Hering – Cavalanci’s Curse (March 1899)
H. G. Wells – The Queer Story Of Brownlow’s Newspaper (Ladies Home Journal, Feb. 1932)
Edgar Wallace – The Black Grippe (March 1920)
Morley Roberts – The Fog (Oct. 1908)
Grant Allen – The Thames Valley Catastrophe (Dec. 1897)
Martin Swayne – A Sense Of The Future (Aug 1924)
Arthur Conan Doyle – The Silver Mirror (Aug. 1908)
E. Bland (Edith Nesbit) – The Haunted House (Dec. 1913)
Arthur Conan Doyle – How It Happened (Sept. 1913)
Edith Nesbit – The Power of Darkness (April 1905)
Arthur Conan Doyle – The Horror of the Heights (Nov 1913)