Ghost Special

[dem bones]

Ghost Special (Panda Publishing, Manchester: n.d.)

Harry North (?)

Here's an oddity. Panda published at least two 'Ghost Specials', the second dated 1976. The debut is a typical hells-broth of comic and adventure strips (Spoofer, Grubby The Greedy Ghoul, Simon Doom, etc..), puzzles, crosswords, Do you believe in ghosts?/ Would You Make A Good Ghost Hunter? features, film stills, a rather harrowing account of the Tay Bridge disaster in word and pictures, & more. Of possible Vault interest, The Wrong Floor and The Ghost Train, are two very tame short stories that would never have cut it with Misty though they'd not have been out of place in the Armada Ghost Books (as with the rest of the content, they are uncredited). The gist of Ghost Train is that Bob and his non soppy sister Jill are visiting the annual ghost fair on the common. She refuses to ride the Ghost Train as they give her the creeps, he won't try the dive bomber, not because he's scared of heights or anything, he just doesn't want to. Eventually, after stuffing their faces with candy-floss, they ride home, past the disused rail-road tracks, except ... what's that noise? and who are all those people in fancy dress (see cover).

If that doesn't sound very interesting it isn't but somehow, like the rest of the book, I enjoyed it a lot! Also, phantom cyclists and hitch-hikers seem to have been very popular at the time.