Supernatural Tales

  Go here  to purchase this disturbing image of Santa plus some fiction as well. New stories by: Helen Grant Christopher Harman Michael Chislett Kelly White Sam Dawson Steve Duffy

  Here comes another one! Just in time for the festive season, the fourth issue of NM creeps out into the fading twilight courtesy of editor Tom English. As before, the mag offers a mixture of new stories and reprints, plus plenty of non-fiction content. Among the latter is an interview with Paul Finch - accompanied by a reprint of an excellent story of his - and a look at Val Lewton's lost film The Bodysnatcher by John L Probert. There's also the first part of a history of horror comics by John M. Navroth. Among the stories, Helen Grant's 'Invasive Species' is a fine example of the 'somebody goes back home to find it's changed due to weird stuff happening' subgenre. Here the protagonist returns to a small Scottish island to deal with the aftermath of her father's death, only to find that new housing developments are marring the landscape. But there's more to it than that... Another one that grabbed me is 'The Brightest Heaven' by John L....

Order the print issue here :  New stories by:  Helen Grant Christopher Harman Michael Chislett Kelly White Sam Dawson Steve Duffy

  Paul Lowe cover art, excellent as usual Though warm my welcome everywhere, I shift so frequently, so fast, I cannot now say where I was The evening before last, Unless some singular event Should intervene to save the place, A truly asinine remark, A soul-bewitching face, Or blessed encounter, full of joy, Unscheduled on the Giesen Plan, With, here, an addict of Tolkien, There, a Charles Williams fan. From 'On the Circuit' by W.H. Auden ( About the House 1965) Auden, the great poet of modernity and political engagement in his youth, later found solace in a more conservative (small C) and Christian worldview, which the writings of several Inklings helped him form. While the influence of Lewis and Tolkien on other writers has often been acknowledged, Charles Williams remains a somewhat shadowy figure. Fairly prolific, much admired, but seldom imitated. Too difficult in some ways, too mainstream in others, it has taken two Williams' fans and Sarob Press to produce what mig...

Another modern story with that classic feel by one of the handful of writers who've been contributing to ST from the very first issue. Listen to it at night, in the dark, and enjoy. And don't have nightmares!

Thought I'd include an obscure story of my own, with a nautical theme. Well, a lighthouse theme, anyway. Doctor Who fans will know that this is a homage to a classic Tom Baker-era story. 

Another reading by yours truly. A tale that combines motor racing and folk horror, which must be a first - though of course, automotive ghost stories were nothing new in Rolt's day. As with the steam train, it only took a few years for radically new technology to be used in ghost stories. 

My reading of a classic. Hope you think it's up to the mark! I'm pretty sure MRJ didn't read his stories in a (slight?) North East accent but you never know! 

A modern story, now, but one with a few classic ingredients - not least, a mysterious church!

Hope you enjoy this spooky tale!

Fascinating video about the background to the iconic ghost Sadako and why the various Ring-derived movies are all over the place.

I've watched a lot of films over the years and - inevitably - think some of them deserve to be better known. Here are a few of them, as reviewed or at least noted by me over the years: Static - Todd Levin, 2012 A film that plays with some conventional ideas and does a fine job, for me at least. A couple having serious difficulties try to help a mysterious caller - an attractive young woman whose car has broken down. You think you know where this is going, especially when a home invasion begins. But then everything gets flipped. Some violence, here, but mostly this is a psychological/supernatural thriller.

I received a signed copy of this book from the author , whose short stories have been appearing in ST for a good while. Jump Cut concerns a young woman, Theda Garrick, who ventures to rural Scotland and encounters a very unpleasant old lady who is immensely wealthy and lives in a mansion. If that's not Gothic enough for you, Theda is a widow, still suffering after the sudden death of her beloved husband.  Theda's name reflects her father's fascination with early cinema (Theda Bara being one of the sirens of the silent screen). Theda shares that fascination and jumps at the chance to interview Mary Arden, a 104-year-old British star of the pre-war years. Mary is the only surviving person involved in the making of a lost movie, The Simulacrum. She offers Theda exclusive interviews for a putative book. But it soon transpires that not only is Mary Arden as 24-carat monster, probing Theda's emotional wounds with callous enthusiasm; there is another presence in Garthside Hou...

A film that I rewatch at least once a year because it's one of the best ghost stories of its kind. What kind? The kind that is, in a strange way, life-affirming. Belen Rueda is brilliant, the overall story is superb, the horror is not overdone or too tropey. I defy anyone not to shed a tear at the ending. This is a horror movie for people who might not be that keen on horror movies - another positive.  I have more to say about it here . 

Another great Halloween watch, which I recently enjoyed for the third or fourth time. A Watergate-era horror movie, in that it pivots on more than a mere haunting, but also looks squarely at the illegitimacy of wealth and power when it is underpinned by lies. And it usually is.  I wrote about The Changeling here .

The first of the films I always watch around Halloween. In each case I will use a clip that illustrates how somebody breaks a basic rule of horror. In this case, Don't Open the Door! (Though to be fair, the weather guy didn't know he was in a horror movie. A diploma in meteorology probably doesn't deal with that kind of thing.) I have of course praised The Fog before, find my words here . 

There is a bewhiskered story of an old actor on his deathbed surrounded by relatives and friends. "Oh, this is so hard," said one onlooker. "Nah," said the thesp, "dying is easy. Comedy is hard." Horror comedy is especially hard because the tropes of horror - well-worn as they are - often provoke laughter when they are intended to shock or chill. Most horror comedy is tepid stuff, managing to achieve limited success in either genre. But sometimes they get it right.  Lately, I watched a couple of horror comedies available on streaming that get it right. They're not perfect, but they work as entertainment and have very contrasting approaches. Let's begin with the 'nicer' one... Freaky is a 2020 movie starring Vince Vaughn and Kathryn Newton and directed by Michael Landon, who also co-wrote with Michael Kennedy. The setup is typical small-town slasher stuff.  The Butcher - played by Vaughn - is an immensely strong masked maniac with a big knif...

3 AM is a Malaysian Chinese horror series currently available to watch free on Rakuten Viki . It consists of five episodes all centered on an event/phenomenon at 3 in the morning - when all good boys and girls are tucked up in bed, of course. It explores some familiar horror tropes, including the old 'let's go camping in the forest of death and blood' that Eddie Izzard riffed on. But there's a lot here to enjoy, in part because of the special spin put on certain customs and beliefs. Thus in episode one a young man on his very first day at work upsets an elevator ghost. Things rapidly spiral out of control, and it becomes clear that he really should have listened to his mum. It's ghost month, and she told him to show the dead some respect, whereas the young idiot stumbled over a shrine and caused maximum offence. Other episodes concern a taxi driver who (we learn early on) kills people from supposedly benevolent motives and nastiness on social media. There is also th...

Full Circle (US Title, The Haunting of Julia) was adapted from Peter Straub's 1975 novel Julia . The book was his first to deal with the supernatural. The story concerns Julia Lofting (Mia Farrow), an independently wealthy woman married to the cold and overbearing Magnus (Keir Dullea). The sudden and horrific death of the couple's nine-year-old daughter Kate (played by a young Sophie Ward) leads Julia to leave Magnus and acquire a large, old house of her own in London. This precipitates a series of events that culminate in a final, bleak revelation. The film absolutely exudes Seventies Britishness, not least in the person of Tom Conti as Julia's friend Mark, an antique dealer with a classic footballer's haircut and flared jeans. Contie is just one of a dozen or so familiar faces who appear. Sometimes they are glimpsed in brief scenes - Peter Sallis as a concerned neighbour, Nigel Havers as a smarmy estate agent - but there are also some memorable cameos by the likes of ...

It's October and that means spookiness. I'm sorry, I don't make the rules. Spookiness prevails. But I thought I'd start with something a little unusual as I will, inevitably, trot out some old faithful suggestions for you to watch on or around Halloween. So, let's start with a TV show where an estate agent in a pink suit is a supernatural threat.  Thus Spoke  Kishibe   Rohan is a Japanese TV mini-series with nice production values currently available via Amazon Prime. I was a bit puzzled by this because I stumbled upon it backwards, so to speak. I watched the feature-length spinoff Rohan at the Louvre and was intrigued. Then I jumped to the beginning of the series (there are three short seasons), to find out what the hell was going on with this weird bloke.  The background is by no means simple. Kishibe is a fictional manga artist, or mangaka, created by the real and highly regarded mangaka Hirohiko Araki . Araki's series Jojo's Bizarre Adventure is a vast a...

I've recorded a few stories from Hearn's book Of Ghosts and Goblins. You can find them on my YT site by clicking through the above. 

 I received a review copy of this book.  And a rather lovely book it is, too. As expected with Swan River, the cover is a true work of art. But what of the contents? Well, according to the blurb, Treatises on Dust is not supernatural fiction in the conventional sense. However, as one might expect from a Machen enthusiast, there is plenty to entertain lovers of weird fiction. Several of the shorter pieces can be found on YouTube  if you want to sample the book's' feel', and hear the author himself. I particularly like 'Let It Be a Blood Ape on the Prowl'. We've all had days like that.

  Purchase it here if you think you might like that sort of thing.

Blood Wood is a substantial collection of longer stories and novellas by Christopher Harman, a former librarian who lives in Preston, Lancashire. He’s been writing for decades now, but this is only the second collection of his work – the first being The Heaven Tree in 2017 (also from Sarob Press). Surprising? Perhaps. Harman’s work is relatively low-key and makes demands on the reader thanks to his intense, borderline hallucinatory style. Nobody ever just drinks a cup of tea in a Harman story. There is symbolism in every chipped cup, every soggy teabag. These require immersion, acceptance, and a willingness to sink into the world of seemingly commonplace events that soon acquire disturbing and eventually terrifying implications. Thus in the first story, ‘The Children’, a man with a regular office job moves to a location to cut his commute time. This is as banal as you can get, but from the start you get the sense that things are not quite right with the area. The walk from the new hou...

Thanks to Helen for taking the time to reply to my questions about her life as a writer and her new novel, which sounds fascinating!  Lots of people write in childhood but then stop. Did you – like many writers – simply keep going? I did indeed write in childhood – both for my own amusement and for school assignments, which I absolutely loved. At my primary school we had one particular teacher who was really interested in creative writing and would set us quite challenging topics. The supposed punishment for some misdemeanour or other was to write two sides on "an empty room" and I always kind of fancied doing that! And yes, I did just keep going, though the types of things I wrote varied. When I started working, I didn't have a lot of time for writing, but whenever I travelled anywhere (which I did a lot in my 20s) I kept diaries. I still have them: scruffy handwritten notebooks full of remarks like "We are currently camping in a police compound in Loreli in the...

  New from David Sutton's Shadow Publishing comes the second volume of writings by Ro Pardoe, one of the greatest experts on supernatural fiction and related matters. Like the first Black Pilgrimage , this is a collection of short, non-fiction pieces from various sources. Ro edited Ghosts & Scholars magazine for four decades, and as you'd imagine there are a lot of interesting items from that. She is also one of the founders of The Everlasting Club, a ghost story-oriented Amateur Press Association (APA), contributing a regular column entitled 'Lady Wardrop's Notes'. There are also book introductions - of which she's done a lot! - and book reviews.  Much of this material is of course focused on M.R. James and related matters, such as the role dogs in his stories (canines feature more often than cats, surprisingly), but the sheer range of interests is exhilarating. I didn't know there was a writer called John Harrison (no relation to M. John Harrison). Th...

Our humanity both unites us and divides us. The question is always one of balance. In this debut collection by a rising star of Nigerian fiction, stories range in genre from social realism (sort of) to science fiction by way of weird tales. These stories are sometimes bloody, often magical, and rise to remarkable heights of stylistic power. I learned a lot and was often puzzled - both good reactions to a new author, I find. So, what is going on? The book is divided into three sections - 'Hungers', 'Ghosts', and 'Heralds'. Among the first group of stories is 'Oases'. a terrible, intense account of a refugee family trekking across the Sahel, bringing home the perma-crisis that besets so much of our world. 'Eating Keolin' is a horror/fantasy about a pregnant woman whose world is disrupted by colonial forces that are countered by Amazonian women and leopards.  'October in Eran Riro', a novella, tells of an internal migrant - that most Victor...

  Cover by Sam Dawson - 'Owl and Henge by Moonlight' sort of thing. Really good! But what of the contents, hmm? New stories by:  James Machin Steve Duffy S.M. Cashmore Tina Rath Mark Nicholls Tim Jeffreys

Yes, I'm reviewing a game. No, I didn't get it free or anything, I just bought it myself like a normal person. Well, now you've watched the trailer, let me tell you that it gives you a pretty good idea what's going on. The time period is 'between the wars' and the location is a fictional archipelago where they buy and sell in dollars. It's a New Zealand game, btw, so the dollars aren't necessarily US - but probably are. As the player you take the role of a nameless fisherman answering an ad from a place called Greater Marrow.  Everything is going fine in the opening movie bit until you run your boat aground on the rocks right underneath a massive lighthouse. Your fishing boat is a write-off. You're rescued and the mayor of Greater Marrow offers you a deal - you can use a refurbished old boat if you pay off the cost from a fraction of your catch. You agree and off you go, fishing away merrily. As you amass funds and do research, you improve your rods,...

Issue 3 of Nightmare Abbey is as good as the first two, which means very good indeed. As before, editor Tom English offers us a heady mix of fiction, new and old, plus some excellent factual items. And then there's the artwork, both cover and interior, which recalls the golden age of pulps. Much of what's here wouldn't have looked out of place in Weird Tales c. 1930. However, the bias among the reprint stories is more skewed toward the earlier magazine era when M.R. James and co. roamed the earth. 

NB I received a review copy of this book , and a very fine-looking volume it is. Some authors are inspired by a particular landscape. The obvious example in the context of weird fiction is Arthur Machen, who often returned to the Welsh hills and valleys. In her new collection Rosalie Parker frequents the moors and dales of Yorkshire. Like Machen, her characters often encounter strange, sometimes mystical phenomena. However, they are seldom confronted with outright horror so much as a sense of unease and confusion shading into dread at times. Nature is not always red in tooth and claw but that's the way to bet. The title story, of a farm girl who finds a fox family more loving than her human kin, is playful but does not shy away from the violent implications of rejecting humanity in one way or another.

I pride myself on knowing a good story when I see one, and I'm proud to have published several stories by Charles Wilkinson. He's won mainstream awards for his short fiction, so his work transcends genre. Most of Charles' stories have appeared elsewhere, in publications that are more prestigious than ST. And he has had several collections published by Egaeus Press . I am fortunate enough to own some of these books and can say with confidence that they really are collectors' items.  The latest Wilkinson collection is The Harmony of the Stares , pictured above. 'These are tales in which music often plays a role: music as ritual, music as language, impossible music, lethal music. But here also are the silences, the stop-gaps between notes, the attempted retreats from the audible world.'  Earlier collections are still available. Mills of Silence consists of eleven stories, plus the title novella. The theme of strange phenomena intruding on the everyday world is com...

Over at the realm of the legendary Ellen Datlow, we find the table of contents for the latest of her prestigious anthologies. And gosh, wow, golly gee and so forth, an ST contribution does indeed appear. It's Steve Duffy's story 'The Harvester of Ladslove' from the rather spiffing issue 50, which you can purchase here  if you like. I send every issue of ST (in print form) to Ellen because I think she 'get's it' and she is always very keen to see what I'm publishing. It's interesting that she picked that particular story, given that it is very 'British' The setting is during and just after the First World War, which registers much less strongly on US cultural radar than it does here for obvious reasons. On the other hand, there's a hell of a monster, and the gradual buildup to the final scene is masterly. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that quality will out and it's a good thing that it does. Any road up, congratulations to St...

One of the seven is already destroyed before the main action begins. And that, in capsule form, sums up the problem with this film. It's an international production (Hammer and Shaw, two fine studios) starring Peter Cushing as Van Helsing. It has good production values. It's set mostly in China, so we get a different feel to the usual Gothic castle/London particular stuff. The cast is good to excellent, providing Cushing with a solid crew of martial arts warriors plus a hitherto unsuspected son (yes, Van Helsing junior). And Dracula appears, right at the start, played with aplomb by John Forbes-Robertson (though voiced by the uncredited David de Keyser).  

  David Longhorn - Books and Publications Spotlight | Lulu Link above takes you to the online store wherein you may purchase this magazine or another one or maybe several, you have free will, choose wisely! Not only a great cover by Sam Dawson, and a great line-up of authors, but also a glimpse of my duvet.

  Excellent cover illustration by Paul Lowe *I received a copy of this book from the publisher and am an old friend of the author.  This review contains a few spoilers. In this introduction, Steve Duffy points out that the novelette - there are six here - offers the author a chance to build atmosphere and develop characters in a way shorter tales do not. He also concedes that M.R. James didn't need the long run-up but (rightly, I think) sees this as a mark of the man's brilliance. Whatever your view, though, this book is certainly substantial. Here are half a dozen strange worlds in capsule form. They all resemble our own a little too closely for comfort. 

Codex Antarctica, you say? If there's one region I like, it's the polar region. Something about the vast wastes of ice and snow (with the odd penguin here and there) strikes deep into my Anglo-Saxon soul. Perhaps it's because Antarctica so anomalous in so many ways. A continent that once flourished, rich with life, but is now locked within mile-deep layers of compacted snow. I am not alone of course, and some of the big names in horror and sci-fi are referenced in this, the poet's nineteenth (sort of) in the Codex sequence.  If you don't know the Cardinal's work, it's well worth seeking out just for the arcane knowledge on offer. Here we have a pamphlet of nine poems (most of them sonnets, interestingly) that cover some of the weirdest fictions and strangest facts or factoids about the great southern continent. 

  *Note - I received a review copy of this book signed by the author, Robert Shearman, who contributes an excellent introduction, and artist John Coulthart, whose brooding imagery adorns the cover. Am I proud to have been one of the first editors to publish Lynda E. Rucker ? Yes, very. When her story 'The Last Reel' turned up in my inbox, did I think 'This one, yes, definitely a star in the making'? Well, to be honest, I can't remember. It was a long time ago, and I'm knocking on a bit. But I do remember loving the story and thinking that the author had that combination of originality, love of the genre, and playful energy that distinguishes a fine writer from the merely competent. More stories came, and books, and accolades and awards. I am proud that, in her story notes, Lynda counts me as a friend who helped her get a foot on the ladder's first rung. She's climbed quite a way since then.

Lynda E. Rucker's third collection of short stories, Now It's Dark , is available from Swan River Press. I'm in the middle of it, and a review will be posted here shortly. It contains two stories from ST, proving that I sometimes have good taste. Just not in socks. Seriously, this is brilliant stuff and should scoop the awards. 

A story from the current issue of Nightmare Abbey, edited by Tom English. Reader is yours truly. 

  Science fiction was my first love. Long before I became acquainted with M.R. James, H.P. Lovecraft, or any modern masters of horror and weird fiction, I was having fun in outer space. Asimov, Clarke, Niven, Shaw, Vance - these were my cicerones among far stars and strange futures. Around the same time, my early teens, I also discovered something odd, a thing called 'New Wave', and it too seemed welcoming. Ballard, Aldiss, Spinrad, Disch, Moorcock - they were altogether stranger than the old-school sf writers but just as interesting. Inner space beckoned. And sometimes it was hard to tell the two apart. James Tiptree Jnr (Alice B. Sheldon) was a case in point, as were Ursula Le Guin, Samuel Delaney, Keith Roberts, and many others. All of which leads me to a remarkable new collection by frequent ST contributor Chloe N. Clark, whose new book is rather wonderful. I'm proud to say that I accepted two stories here, 'Even the Veins of Leaves' and 'Who Walks Beside Y...

Sorry guys, but Dracula isn't in it. The original title, 'Chi o suu bara'. means The Bloodsucking Roses.  Now you've got a general idea, let me sum up this film. It combines the bonkers and the banal as many horror films made on the cheap in the Seventies do. More interestingly, though, it combines a Hammer-European sensibility with a thoroughly Japanese setting and characters, and it kind of works. Well, I enjoyed it. But I had to make myself persist when I was about halfway through. It sags a bit.

Click here to get the POD copy if having a physical magazine floats your boat. Next week I'll be uploading the ezines to both Lulu and Amazon. Meanwhile, bask in the contents: 'W is for Whispers' by Steve Rasnic Tem  'Shod' by Sam Dawson  'Emir' by Tim Foley 'All the Devils Are Here' by Michael Chislett  'The Secrecy of the Heart' by Tim Jeffreys  'Crying the Neck' by William Curnow  'Half-Formed in February' by Charles Wilkinson 

Cardinal Cox, occult poet and all-round expert on the occult and arcane, has produced a special poetry pamphlet to mark as special event. The Whittlesea Straw Bear Festival takes place on 13th and 14th of January. The poet writes:  "Years ago I worked with the man (Brian Kell) who restarted the Straw Bear Festival. It was banned by the police in the early part of the twentieth century due to the general drunkenness and the cadging of beggars. Since Brian restarted the festival in 1980 it has been an important event in the calendar of folk dance and folk music." With that impeccable pedigree, it's entirely understandable that the pamphlet commemorating this innocent folk festival is all about The Wicker Man. Entitled 'The Folk Show 3: Fan Mail For A Film', the small collection looks at the real and the fantastical aspects of traditional festivals, many of which do not involve human sacrifice.  The first poem, a sonnet entitled 'Horse Fair', sets the tone wi...