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Post by paulfinch on Sept 16, 2011 13:04:31 GMT
The first ever horror anthology edited by my good self – TERROR TALES OF THE LAKE DISTRICT – will be available for pre-order from Gray Friar Press from tomorrow afternoon onwards (Sat Sept 17). It contains ten original works of fiction from some of the current best chill-meisters in the business and three classic reprints, all set in the Lake District. For full details, including cover art, TOC and background details, check on my blog page: paulfinch-writer.blogspot.com/
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Post by dem bones on Sept 16, 2011 16:06:07 GMT
Paul Finch (ed.) - Terror Tales Of The Lake District (Grey Friar, Sept. 2011) Steve Upham Adam L.G. Nevill - Little Mag’s Barrow The Mad Clown of Muncaster Simon Clark - The Coniston Star Mystery The Croglin Vampire Paul Finch - Devils of Lakeland The Mumps Hall Murders Simon Bestwick - The Moraine The Tawny Boy Carole Johnstone - The Claife Crier The Monster of Renwick Peter Crowther - Jewels in the Dust The Devil’s Hole Ramsey Campbell - Above the World Nightmares of Burnmoor Gary Fry - The Jilted Bride of Windermere The Horror at Carlisle Castle Steven Savile - Walk the Last Mile The Poltergeist of Walla Crag Peter Bell - Framed Fiend’s Fell Anna Taborska - Night of the Crone The Tortured Souls of Lord’s Rake Gary McMahon - Along Life’s Trail The Black Hound of Shap Reggie Oliver - Striding EdgeBlurb The Lake District – land of mountains and megaliths, night-black lakes and fathomless woods filled with spectral mist …
The eerie entity on Striding Edge The living corpse of Croglin The demented clown of Muncaster The winged horror of Langdale The drowned bride of Windermere The hairy brute of Beetham The nightmares on Burnmoor
And many more chilling tales by Ramsey Campbell, Adam Nevill, Simon Clark, Peter Crowther, Reggie Oliver, Gary McMahon and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Handsome line up, Paul and i like the way you've interspersed the fiction with legends and 'true' stories like the Vampire of Croglin Grange. Very reminiscent of Fontana's much-loved 'Tales of Terror' series. Was that deliberate? Have posted the details for the benefit of those who find clicking on links taxing on their energy. Hope you don't mind me shifting you into the anthology section, but you'll get more exposure here.
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Post by paulfinch on Sept 16, 2011 17:04:45 GMT
Much appreciated, D.
And yes, you're absolutely right. It is hugely influenced by the Fontana series - the full collection of which I still treasure - and if I can get as many volumes out of it as they did, I'll be a happy man.
Hopefully fellow authors who read this board will not be miffed that they weren't approached when I was firt putting this anthology together. There will be others, and I'll be approaching loads more people in due course.
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Post by Johnlprobert on Sept 16, 2011 17:27:26 GMT
I'm certainly planning on getting a copy of this - it looks quite splendid!
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Post by dem bones on Sept 16, 2011 21:57:25 GMT
me too! And yes, you're absolutely right. It is hugely influenced by the Fontana series - the full collection of which I still treasure - and if I can get as many volumes out of it as they did, I'll be a happy man. we've individual threads for each of the 'Tales Of Terror' paperbacks and even a POLL (ten weeks on, one vote cast!). They barely gets a look-in in compared to Fontana's Ghost and Horror series', but, give or take the Sea Tales Of Terror, i absolutely adore them and i'm delighted that you're carrying on such a worthy tradition.
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Post by paulfinch on Sept 17, 2011 12:31:24 GMT
me too! And yes, you're absolutely right. It is hugely influenced by the Fontana series - the full collection of which I still treasure - and if I can get as many volumes out of it as they did, I'll be a happy man. we've individual threads for each of the 'Tales Of Terror' paperbacks and even a POLL (ten weeks on, one vote cast!). They barely gets a look-in in compared to Fontana's Ghost and Horror series', but, give or take the Sea Tales Of Terror, i absolutely adore them and i'm delighted that you're carrying on such a worthy tradition. It's long been an ambition but finally, this last year, I was in a financial position to realise it. Obviously the books have got to sell, otherwise it just isn't worth it. However, if we merely break even I'll be happy to keep going. For this reason, any publicity anyone can give this book will really help.
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Post by Dr Terror on Sept 17, 2011 13:39:08 GMT
Will it be available at Fcon, Paul?
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Post by paulfinch on Sept 17, 2011 17:01:54 GMT
Will it be available at Fcon, Paul? I'm strongly optimistic that it will be.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 3, 2011 5:43:19 GMT
After the supremely unsubtle horrors of Death Rattles where better to recuperate than the Lake Distict with its breathtaking views, idyllic villages, quaint customs, bracing fresh air, bone-crushing hags, petrified hikers, mobile monoliths, disquieting gummy ferrymen, ancient witchcraft, black sorcery, and more White Ladies of this or that lake than you can shake a stick at? Keep your wits about you, kids. You're in cagoule country now. They do things different 'round here. Adam L.G. Nevill - Little Mag’s Barrow: Kitty Yew, bullying, P45-dispensing senior editor at London-based NPD Books is in an even fouler mood than usual. She's lost the company three consecutive unfair dismissal hearings and now the powers at NPD are getting jittery. In short, Ms. Yew is obliged to seek psychiatric help if she is to survive the impending takeover. Hearing of her boss's troubles, Morag Cascard sportingly offers her the use of Little Mag's Barrow, a remote holiday cottage on the outskirts of Glenridding, and Kitty really should have smelled a rat. Why would the wretched old spinster do her any favours? Now Kitty has set disbelieving eyes on the dilapidated dump, she realises Morag is having a laugh at her expense. Well, first thing in the morning, Kitty intends to drive straight back to London, fire off another lovely redundancy notice and see who's laughing then! But first she has to survive the night in this most appropriately named haunted house, and wait until she comes face to wooden face with 'Little Mag' herself! Paul Finch - Devils of Lakeland: Graham Foster returns to the Lakes to investigate the mysterious circumstances surrounding his brother Tim's death. According to the police, it was suicide - he deliberately drove over the cliff at Black Sail Drop - but Graham can't believe that of him, and the staff at The High View Hotel confirm Tim was cheerful enough when he arrived. Graham knew the mad reason why his brother had returned to Keswick (and it's one which will strike a chord with our readers). Tim was a lifelong collector of horror stories and he'd remembered spotting a copy of the impossibly rare The Devils Of Lakeland in a local bookshop when they'd spent a glorious holiday here with Dad and a good-time nanny in their childhood. Well, perhaps it wasn't all that 'glorious'. Something so traumatic occurred toward the end of their stay that Graham has successfully blocked it from his mind all these years. A passing remark about a 'woman in a white dress' kick-starts a chain of events which lead to horrific enlightenment. Simon Clark - The Coniston Star Mystery: In 1910, renowned escapologist Iskander Carvesh drowned while performing his most audacious feat to date. Chained to the funnel of pleasure steamer The Coniston Star, a rifle primed to blow his chest to pieces at 7pm , 'The Master of Keys' hadn't counted on a freak storm sinking the vessel before he'd time to break free. His corpse was never recovered. One hundred years later, scuba divers Blake Keller, Andrew Harper and a mysterious blonde they'd met the previous day, dive into the black waters of Coniston Lake. The bullying Keller has been tormenting the girl all morning with tales of a face-eating giant eel and other monsters of the deep, but she's quite happy to suffer his stupid remarks. The men may be in this for wreck salvage but Enid has her own reasons for being down there .... Ramsey Campbell - Above The World: The Swan Hotel, Keswick, has mixed memories for Knox. This is where he spent his honeymoon with Wendy, who liked the place so much that she returned when she remarried . And it was in the surrounding hills that Wendy and her second husband, Tooley, died of exposure after getting lost in the mist. Now Knox is reunited with the pair - or, at least, their slate replicas - when he too is stranded on a fog-shrouded peak .... Carole Johnstone - The Claife Crier: Much to mum's despair, now she's a teenager Kerry and her dad haven't been getting along as they once did, so this mini-hiking tour of Claife Heights is intended as a father-daughter bonding exercise. But just as the garrulous old ferryman warned, the Heights are the haunt of a hooded terror known as the phantom crier and the tourists are better advised to make straight for their hotel rather than linger in the steep woods after dark. Pity Dad had to laugh off the old fools warning but then, as Kerry reflects after her rescue, maybe every cloud really does have a silver lining.. Anna Taborska - Night of the Crone: Zed and his four teenage hoodlums are the terrors of Langwathby village. The locals are long wise to their antisocial pastimes - drink, drugs, vandalism, animal abuse, cat theft mugging, the occasional gang rape & Co. -so now they mostly persecute yuppie tourists like the two teenage birds they meet at Great Salkeld's famous Bronze Age stone circle, AKA 'Long Meg and her daughters'. Johnny, Spike, Rizla and Franko are all for giving the pair a seeing to, but Zed says no, they'll keep. Besides, today the lads are on a serious mission. They're going to dig up the ancient megalith and get at the alleged treasure trove beneath. This proves to be too much like hard work and, when the fog descends and a lightening storm breaks, they need little excuse to down pick-axes and go after the girls. But their desecration has released the ancient witch entrapped in the stone and, in true slasher movie fashion, she sets about picking them off one by one. More to follow. i've liked 'em all so far, but the stand-outs for me are the Simon Clark, Ramsey Campbell (must be the fourth time i've read it and the creepy ending still gets me), Paul Finch's suddenly-turns-plain-nasty Devils Of Lakeland and another wonderful offering from Anna Taborska whose teenage gang put me in mind of Mule Skinner and his bikers from GNS's The Living Dead
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Post by dem bones on Oct 4, 2011 10:00:32 GMT
Anothe pair of corkers. 'pologies if the first commented upon is a little on the spoilerish side though it doesn't quite give the game away.
Gary Fry - The Jilted Bride of Windermere: As the title suggests, a trad ghost story set in the modern day, and a bloody decent one at that. Two nights before his wedding to the lovely Trish, Martin gets smashed on his stag do and winds up screwing the local femme fatale, Alice Simmons, in the gents bogs. His best man, our narrator, is distraught. As a Policeman and childhood friend of the bride (who he is in love with), he was entrusted with preventing just this type of calamity, but he's teetotal and the smallest sip of the hard stuff saw him retire from the field early. Come the next night in Bowness and he's booked into a Bed & Breakfast, tucked up with copies of M. R. James ghost stories and a guide to Cumbrian history. From the latter he learns of a tragedy from 1934 when a young woman drowned herself in the Windermere after her louse of a groom ditched her at the altar. It transpires that our policeman friend is sleeping in what once was the suicide's bedroom. When he awakens, the sheets are all soggy and his bed looks for all the world as though somebody else has snuggled up beside him!
The happy day. The arrival of a smirking Alice Simmons is the catalyst for an almighty punch up after the best man - who by now can't bear the thought of Trish wasting herself on that drunken philanderer Martin - goads her into making a clean breast of things, something she's all too happy to do in her current inebriated state. The cop assists the disgraced Martin back to the B & B and graciously allows him the luxury of his room while he takes the one next door. And listens through the wall ....
Simon Bestwick - The Moraine: Lost in the mist, squabbling fell-walkers Diane and Steve take a wrong path down the mountain. Before they know it, something deadly is on their trail. Something that can mimic human speech and attacks from beneath the Moraine. GNS fans' hearts may skip a beat when they learn that it also goes click. click. click.!
Well! who would've thought, following hot on the heels of the Pan Horrors, a Tales Of Terror revival. I hope it's the first of a decent run as the project is clearly in good hands. Well done Mr. F. and all concerned!
More to follow: one last push should do the job
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Post by paulfinch on Oct 4, 2011 11:39:14 GMT
Gad you're enjoying it, D.
We're aiming to please - hopefully on a regular basis.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 5, 2011 18:00:49 GMT
on the strength of ... Lake District, i hope you get your wish. Great fun so far (only two to go) and you've done a fine job of capturing the spirit of the Fontana series. i'm taking it you wrote up all the true ghost stories, folklore material, etc?
Gary McMahon - Along Life’s Trail: A weekend at the Lakes for Murray and Polly, ruined somewhat by last nights heated argument in the bar of The Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel. Polly has set off across the Bowfell wilds alone leaving her hungover husband to catch up. Caught in a downpour, he shelters at a derelict pub. The Fellwatch Inn was the scene of a gruesome mutilation murder in 1806 and, according to a memorial plaque, the dark deed was the handiwork of a giant winged cat with the face of a young woman! These simpleton country folk and their ludicrous superstitions, eh? A trail of fresh blood leads down to the cellar .....
A couple of new names on me:
Peter Bell - Framed: A neat E.C. comic feel to this one. Grange-over-Sands. Jake Banks, 25, and his low-wattage brother Joe, 17, steal two priceless Turner sketches from Helton Hall. To dispose of the huge gilt frames they remove a slab from a tomb in St. Bedes churchyard. Unlucky for them, its occupant is the Aloysious Slee, the fearsome verger of St. Bedes who is as down on grave desecration in death as he was in life.
Steven Savile - Walk the Last Mile: Beetham. Two young lovers make their way to the waterfall. She's a pub landlord's daughter, he's a wannabe goth, all inverted cross, Jesus & Mary Chain album and trendy death fixation. The latter, at least is no pose and a grisly murder gains him admittance to the evil fairy realm. Very mid-period Pan Book Of Horror Stories.
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Post by paulfinch on Oct 5, 2011 21:02:18 GMT
on the strength of ... Lake District, i hope you get your wish. Great fun so far (only two to go) and you've done a fine job of capturing the spirit of the Fontana series. i'm taking it you wrote up all the true ghost stories, folklore material, etc? Gary McMahon - Along Life’s Trail: A weekend at the Lakes for Murray and Polly, ruined somewhat by last nights heated argument in the bar of The Old Dungeon Ghyll Hotel. Polly has set off across the Bowfell wilds alone leaving her hungover husband to catch up. Caught in a downpour, he shelters at a derelict pub. The Fellwatch Inn was the scene of a gruesome mutilation murder in 1806 and, according to a memorial plaque, the dark deed was the handiwork of a giant winged cat with the face of a young woman! These simpleton country folk and their ludicrous superstitions, eh? A trail of fresh blood leads down to the cellar ..... A couple of new names on me: Peter Bell - Framed: A neat E.C. comic feel to this one. Grange-over-Sands. Jake Banks, 25, and his low-wattage brother Joe, 17, steal two priceless Turner sketches from Helton Hall. To dispose of the huge gilt frames they remove a slab from a tomb in St. Bedes churchyard. Unlucky for them, its occupant is the Aloysious Slee, the fearsome verger of St. Bedes who is as down on grave desecration in death as he was in life. Steven Savile - Walk the Last Mile: Beetham. Two young lovers make their way to the waterfall. She's a pub landlord's daughter, he's a wannabe goth, all inverted cross, Jesus & Mary Chain album and trendy death fixation. The latter, at least is no pose and a grisly murder gains him admittance to the evil fairy realm. Very mid-period Pan Book Of Horror Stories. That's correct, D. All the connecting material was researched and written up by moi.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 6, 2011 21:44:59 GMT
To finish off, one i didn't much care for (sorry!) and a straight ghost story with decidedly weird touches. Peter Crowther - Jewels in the Dust: Ever since her beloved husband Jack passed away, Abigail Rutherford has wasted her days looking forward to death, much to the exasperation of her son, daughter-in-law and grandchild. Eventually Jack's ghost appears to patiently explain the error of her ways. Morality tales and nicenesss in general ain't really my thing, so will leave it at that. Reggie Oliver - Striding Edge: Finally, we find ourselves on Helvellyn, desperately trying to avoid the Greenwood Folk, a cranky nature worshipping version of the boy scouts with alleged fascist sympathies. The narrator knew two of their number from Okeham school where Derek Shorecliff and his toady, Nelson, were hugely unpopular for no particular reason. Now Shorecliff is an aspiring Grand Wizard while, on account of his ineptitude, the hapless Nelson is bullied by even the junior Folk. As punishment for tardiness, he is obliged to climb Helvellyn alone at dawn with predictably dire consequences. The body is never recovered, but his ghost lingers at the Striding Edge awaiting revenge .... That's it for the fictional material. i might come back to the 'non-fiction' interludes at a later date as there are some good 'n grisly legends among them, including our old friend The Croglin Grange Vampire. It would be great to see Terror Tales Of The Lake District do well and i hope other readers enjoy it as much as i have.
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Post by paulfinch on Oct 7, 2011 8:10:44 GMT
Thanks for that positive round-up, D.
At this stage, it's doing very well indeed. But more publicity is always welcome.
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