A new book from Helen Grant, you say?
Too Near the Dead by Helen Grant | Waterstones
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The Giant on the Hill
The National Trust has just found out that one of its rudest attractions is also one of its oldest. The Cerne Abbas chalk giant is almost as old as the kingdom England itself. Generations have speculated about the age and meaning of the club-brandishing giant hewn into a Dorset hillside. Was he a depiction of the legendary demi-god Hercules, an ancient fertility symbol, or even the soldier and statesman Oliver Cromwell? Another theory holds that the figure was carved around the body of a giant who was slain by local people after he terrorised the countryside. Now, after state-of-the art sediment analysis jointly funded by the National Trust, the University of Gloucestershire, Allen Environmental Archaeology and the Pratt Bequest, National Trust archaeologists have concluded the giant was probably first constructed in the late Saxon period. I always found it rather odd that people thought anyone in the 17th century could construct a huge landscape outline of a club-wi...
Ghosts of the Chit-Chat (Swan River Press 2020)
Now available in paperback ! This is an absorbing collection of stories, poems, and other writings of a supernatural nature by members of the eponymous society. I t was established in 1860 and new members had to be elected by the current ones. Like many similar societies it existed for members to read papers on any topic they considered interesting, to be followed by a discussion. In an excellent preface, editor Robert Lloyd Parry (of Nunkie Theatre fame) offers a perspective on the clubs most famous member, M.R. James, and the way in which his first two ghost stories were read aloud to members. the first two stories in the book are the original versions of ‘Canon Albéric's Scrapbook’ and 'Lost Hearts’. Neither differ much from the versions that appeared in James first collection of ghost stories. While Anderson/ Dennistoun could be taken as a portrait of the author, Mr A bney in lost heart is the diametrical opp...