Issue 57 - Winter 2024/5

 

Cover illo by Sam Dawson, for Steve Duffy's story 'Forever Chemicals', which offers an interesting take on the London of the early Thatcher era. Spoiler alert - it wasn't very nice. 

Here are the contents in full:

'Forever Chemicals' by Steve Duffy. 

A young man in need of a job ends up as a nightwatchman on the run-down Docklands site. Businessmen of the less honest kind dump stuff in the dock. As Christmas approaches, so does a strange and unwanted 'miracle'. 

'Wendigo' by Michael Kelly. 

Strangers on a train. A Canadian winter. A story about a legendary creature. All this and more as events unfold in a cabin in the wilderness and disturbing truths revealed.

'The Unfortified Heart' by Tim Jeffreys

An affair with a married woman is an exciting thing, what with the thrill of transgression and all that. But what if the husband finds out? An age-old premise given a new, supernatural twist in this gripping tale.

'The Wet Wife' by Reggie Chamberlain-King.

Our second nod to Algernon Blackwood, as a couple spend a holiday by the Danube. The willows are present and correct. But it's not vegetation that proves troublesome when the husband decides to take a swim.

'Episodes From the Life and Death of a Pantomime Horse' by William Curnow. 

Seasonal fun for all the family! No, not really. This tour de force looks at the career of an old-school comedy partnership whose wholesome act seems to evolve over time into a minor circle of hell. 

'The Night Visitor' by Steve Rasnic Tem.

A tale by one of the undisputed masters of the modern genre. An old man, lonely and increasingly fearful, awaits the onset of the festive season. Who would want to send him a volume of classic British ghost stories? A strange form of harassment...

THESE AND OTHER MYSTERIES by Steve Duffy (Sarob Press 2024)

 

Cover by Paul Lowe illustrating 'Screen Burn'

Steve Duffy's latest collection offers the discerning reader eight stories, five brand new and three previously published (two of which appeared in ST). As always, these are well-wrought tales in the great tradition of British supernatural fiction. But they are also modern in the best sense - offering characters and settings instantly recognisable to anyone who inhabits the UK. Drizzle, darkness, and decay are seldom absent. 

'Dead Centre of Manchester', the first story, is a prime example. Steve takes a fragment from a notorious true crime case and runs with it in a strange and gruesome direction. The overall feel might be described as Alan Bennett meets Joel Lane. In a good way, of course. There's a whiff of Vick and a taste of blood. Believable characters reacting to extraordinary circumstances are one of the author's specialities and he does a splendid job here.

Cath, newly retired, joins Facebook groups and does some litter picking to keep busy. She also joins a group that attends what used to be called paupers' funerals - send-offs for those who have no friends or family to mourn them. After one funeral a mysterious figure - somewhat Gothy in appearance - is often glimpsed by Cath but seems to elude the gaze of others. As autumn draws in, a series of deaths linked to the dead man suggest an unholy covenant of some kind is being fulfilled. A first-rate story that has the authentic M.R. Jamesian touch.

'The Harvester of Ladslove' might not have won the approval of Dr. James, though, as the key event takes place during the Great War. Wartime settings are problematic for supernatural fiction, given the horror that's already there. But when I accepted the story for the fiftieth issue of ST I was more than satisfied by the raw power of the narrative. It's bold to suggest that there might be something even worse than the carnage of the Western Front. As we should know by now, things can always get worse. 

That time of year again

 

Issue 56 ezine available on Amazon for download

 The link to the ezine is here.

Issue 56 is out now!

 

Here it is, large as life and twice as spooky! All-new fiction by a host of talents, mostly British but also including our first-ever contribution from Germany. 

Here is the table of contents.

You	Roger Luckhurst
Braunhoffer’s Coaches	Martin Ruf
Violet	Rosanne Rabinowitz
Corpsed	Matthew G. Rees
The Haunting of Ian Bland	Lisa Pritchard
Hell Is	James Everington
The Hands of Men	Sam Dawson

Click this link & it takes you to all available print-on-demand issues

(It will also take you to EPUB versions)

FRIENDS AND SPECTRES edited by Robert Lloyd Parry (Swan River Press 2024)

Splendidly atsmopheric cover by John Coulthart

'Friends and Spectres is a companion volume to Ghosts of the Chit-Chat (2020), an anthology of ghost stories by authors who had been members of the Cambridge University Chit-Chat Club along with M. R. James. Here the associations with MRJ are less formal, but stronger and more enduring: for it is the bond of genuine friendship that ties these writers to him.

'The majority of pieces here were originally published under pseudonyms, and over half appeared first in amateur magazines or local newspapers. All deal with the supernatural, and several of the stories are themselves spectres—or more properly “revenants”, only now re-emerging into the light after decades of oblivion. There are rediscoveries here of “lost” tales by Arthur Reed Ropes, E. G. Swain, and the enigmatic “B.”'

Thus spake the blurb! I greatly enjoyed Ghosts of the Chit-Chat and am pleased to report that Robert Lloyd Parry has once more done a thorough job of selecting and introducing a broad assortment of writings. The first item, which sets the overall tone nicely, is 'A Night in King's College Chapel' by MRJ. There's also an early fragment, one of those false starts most writers are sadly familiar with.

Next up is F. Anstey, a professional writer, and a sad reminder of how fickle the public can be. Anstey enjoyed early success in the late Victorian era but fell out of favour after the Great War. He is represented by two decent stories. 'The Wraith of Barnjum' is a dark comedy of murder and haunting. 'The Breaking-Point' is a very effective treatment of a familiar wartime theme - the 'decent chap' who returns from the front with the MC and a burden he dares not share. But he must...

Arthur Reed Ropes I found less engaging, though his 'Seraphita' does - as the editor points out - contain one brief passage containing  a fairly Lovecraftian dose of tentacles. Much better is 'B', long an enigma, now confirmed to have been A.C. Benson. Benson handles historical settings well and his 'When the Door is Shut' is nicely handled. He seems to have had some issues with ursine threats, as bears or bear-like entities appear in that story and the next, 'Quia Nominor'. 'The Sparsholt Stone' is also pretty good, falling into the folk horror tradition. 

E.G. Swain, author of The Stoneground Ghost Tales, needs no introduction to ghost story fans. Here Parry has provided a detailed and winning introduction to this amiable clergyman. Swain's only collection is well represented by 'The Man With the Roller', which does a good job of integrating the 'modern' hobby of photography into the historical ghostly tale. 'The Greenford Ghost' is a rarity - a longer tale by Swain that amply demonstrates his grasp of period detail and dialogue. MRJ would have approved, I feel. And Parry's introductory material offers an intriguing clue as to the origins of Swain's story, complete with a photo of an unusual church memorial. 

Last but not least is R.H. Malden, one of my favorite 'James Gang' authors. 'A Collector's Company' and 'The Sundial' are both excellent examples of Jamesian ghost stories by a very accomplished writer. Malden's work also, I think, possesses that elusive thing we call charm. He is engaging, like MRJ, so that we feel we are hearing a civilised ranconteur impart a good yarn. 

Overall, then, a very enjoyable book to dip into. You can encounter some old friends, a few surprises, and get a strong sense of how many long-term friendships MRJ cultivated. All credit to Robert Lloyd Parry for not merely assembling a worthwhile anthology, but adding plenty of biographical material to help flesh out the characters behind the fiction. 

'The Fifth Moon'

This is the final part of a running review of Lost Estates by Mark Valentine (Swan River Press 2024)

The final story in this splendidly produced volume is another deep drive into English folklore. A writer, accompanied by a photographer, goes to the region around the Wssh to research a book in a series on myths and legends. The topic he has chosen is the supposed loss of King John's treasure. 

Now, like many people, I was taught that John's baggage train was simply caught by the tide and he lost a lot of precious metal and jewels etc. But as the story unfolds we find that things were not that simple. For a start, there's only one source for the lost treasure story. And a different contemporary account takes a very different line. 

This novella allows the author to plunge into rival theories about not only John and his antics but the way in which the English - both scholar and commoner - have a proprietorial interest in myth and legend. The professional theories corrects the amateur, the writer probes inconsistencies, and people 'in the know' spin a web of misdirection. The fifth moon of the title is a clever reference to Shakespeare's maybe-tragedy about John. 

An obvious comparison is 'A Warning to the Curious', in which an earlier king's treasure is plundered only to bring disaster on its finder. Here the threat, while less clearly defined, is almost as effective. And there is a nice nod to M.R. James in the climactic scene.

So, let me round off my review by saying that Lost Estates is a fine collection of tales that explore the lesser-known byways of the bibliophile world. If you - like me - enjoy rummaging in bookshops you will share the pleasures of many Valentine characters. And if you have every wondered about the boundaries between strange tales and even stranger realities, you will enjoy exploring the author's frequently familiar yet often unsettling world.