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Post by fritzmaitland on Oct 22, 2020 20:43:48 GMT
High hopes for TTOTHC turning up as I hoped to put that eagerly anticipated JLP story in my October reviews. Anna still hasn't turned up. I'm going to have to write to Mr Sutton , aren't I?
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Post by dem bones on Oct 24, 2020 19:53:50 GMT
Steve Duffy – In the English Rain: December 1980, Surrey Stockbroker Belt. Sally Holden persuades school friend and fellow new wave fan - our narrator - to explore the long vacant 'Shelgrave,' a woodland mansion bought by John Lennon. The Beatle reportedly spent just a weekend there before deciding he didn't like it. Perhaps this may have had something to do with Shelgrave's previous owner, Quentin Pervert Who preyed on Children Bascombe. "The sex monster of Suburbia," committed to a mental institution in 1963, has since been controversially released. Current whereabouts, unknown .... One story in and already a "Best of Book" contender.
Devils in the Countryside: As Sam commented above, there's a bit more to Berks, Bucks, Herts, Surrey, Kent, Sussex, and all those other posho places than Morris Men, livestock molestation, the Military Wives Choir, doilies, and banging on about how much ones house is worth. Try Witch trials, Sir Francis Dashwood's mischievous Monks of Medmenham, graveyard and church desecration at St. Mary's, Clophill ... I love Paul's non-fiction/ "non-fiction" interludes, and this one is particularly brilliant.
Reggie Oliver – Monkey’s: Summer, 1970. Three Eton pupils take a jolly boating trip to Monk's Eyot, a tiny island on the Thames, where a bellicose fellow named Billy is employed during summer months to manage the clubhouse and serve drinks to thirsty rowers. The trio arrive while Billy is in the process of educating a young Borstal tearaway - and getting demonstrably turned on while doing so. Miss Fletcher's Plum Tree vibes. Don't think I'll be sleeping too good tonight.
The Ostrich Inn: Wilkie Collins "Terribly strange bed" would not seem the least terribly strange to those who fell foul of Jarman the landlord's crude but super-efficient murder contraption.
I tend to get on well with this series, but even so, I'm not sure any of them to date have won me over quite so early in the proceedings.
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Post by humgoo on Oct 25, 2020 8:42:36 GMT
Opening with a Duffy-Oliver one-two punch?! Not to mention the dazzling cover. "Must-have" suddenly sounds like an understatement!
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Post by dem bones on Oct 25, 2020 20:00:11 GMT
Opening with a Duffy-Oliver one-two punch?! Not to mention the dazzling cover. "Must-have" suddenly sounds like an understatement! Make of endorsement what you will, but in the great Dem scheme of things, stories 1-4 are decidedly "must-read." Gail-Nina Anderson – The Old, Cold Clay: Stony Stratford, Milton Keynes (I think!). Chris Robson's return home to the village coincides with the discovery of the corpse of missing schoolboy, Tim ("At least it was simply an accident? ... Well yes - you have to consider that. No adults involved."). Robson is now a reporter on the local TV news, and Miss Val Lowell is grateful for her ex-pupil's quick thinking when Tim's parents throw a fit at the Autumn Fayre. Val really should have given more thought to the way one particular doll's costume ... Even so, she can't help but wonder at Robson's fixation with burial, cremation and death stuff in general. Late that evening, Miss Robson drops by to deliver his purchase at the charity fund-raiser. Much to her surprise, she walks in on a tea party .... The Buckland Shag: Ghosts of Surrey's answer to Romeo and Juliet, the hairy haunter of the brook, and the Bleeding stone of Dorking. Sam Dawson – Between: New money Metro tossers, Nigel and Esme (don't ask what they've named their twins), buy a remote woodland cottage near Hawkesview intent on using it as a weekend centre of operations for his boorish lycra-monster city pals. Unlike predecessors the Smiths, the couple have no regard for local sensibilities - on the contrary, good old Nige makes a virtue of being unpleasant to all comers. Not that the villagers expect them to be around much longer, before they put in an appearance. It seems several generations of foresters were none too particular ... You'll have to read it for yourself! Three More for the Hangman: Witch-swimming and attendant torture in Tring; the Denham tool-case massacre, and Amelia Dyer, the Reading Baby farmer. Book to date also contains more Pop Culture references than even superb Denim on Ice album. Kate Bush/ Never for Ever, Blondie/ Eat To The Beat, Three Men In A Boat, News of the World, Magical Mystery Tour, I Am The Walrus, Lewis Carroll, Spindisc, Midsomer Murders (of course), Stars In Their Eyes, Alice Cooper, Sister Sledge/ Lost in Music, Anita Ward/ Ring My Bell, Country Life, Vogue ...
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Post by ropardoe on Oct 26, 2020 9:30:23 GMT
Opening with a Duffy-Oliver one-two punch?! Not to mention the dazzling cover. "Must-have" suddenly sounds like an understatement! Make of endorsement what you will, but in the great Dem scheme of things, stories 1-4 are decidedly "must-read." Gail-Nina Anderson – The Old, Cold Clay: Stony Stratford, Milton Keynes (I think!). Chris Robson's return home to the village coincides with the discovery of the corpse of missing schoolboy, Tim ("At least it was simply an accident? ... Well yes - you have to consider that. No adults involved."). Robson is now a reporter on the local TV news, and Miss Val Lowell is grateful for her ex-pupil's quick thinking when Tim's parents throw a fit at the Autumn Fayre. Val really should have given more thought to the way one particular doll's costume ... Even so, she can't help but wonder at Robson's fixation with burial, cremation and death stuff in general. Late that evening, Miss Robson drops by to deliver his purchase at the charity fund-raiser. Much to her surprise, she walks in on a tea party .... The Buckland Shag: Ghosts of Surrey's answer to Romeo and Juliet, the hairy haunter of the brook, and the Bleeding stone of Dorking. Sam Dawson – Between: New money Metro tossers, Nigel and Esme (don't ask what they've named their twins), buy a remote woodland cottage near Hawkesview intent on using it as a weekend centre of operations for his boorish lycra-monster city pals. Unlike predecessors the Smiths, the couple have no regard for local sensibilities - on the contrary, good old Nige makes a virtue of being unpleasant to all comers. Not that the villagers expect them to be around much longer, before they put in an appearance. It seems several generations of foresters were none too particular ... You'll have to read it for yourself! Three More for the Hangman: Witch-swimming and attendant torture in Tring; the Denham tool-case massacre, and Amelia Dyer, the Reading Baby farmer. Book to date also contains more Pop Culture references than even superb Denim on Ice album. Kate Bush/ Never for Ever, Blondie/ Eat To The Beat, Three Men In A Boat, News of the World, Magical Mystery Tour, I Am The Walrus, Lewis Carroll, Spindisc, Midsomer Murders (of course), Stars In Their Eyes, Alice Cooper, Sister Sledge/ Lost in Music, Anita Ward/ Ring My Bell, Country Life, Vogue ... The stand-out story for me is Tom Johnstone’s “The Topsy-Turvy Ones” which will definitely stay with me. I may be biased as it revolves around the (17th century) Diggers, and Gerard Winstanley is my great hero. Also one of my favourite books is Christopher Hill’s The World Turned Upside Down, which features in the story (and, like Tom, I too am intrigued by Everard the Magician). Runners-up are the stories by Steve Duffy and Helen Grant.
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Post by fritzmaitland on Oct 26, 2020 20:42:46 GMT
High hopes for TTOTHC turning up as I hoped to put that eagerly anticipated JLP story in my October reviews. Bingo! October 26th - Summer Holiday - John Llewelyn Probert. BHF3's loss is Terror Tales Of The Home Counties gain. JLP does what he does best. Surgical horror. Precision snark. British Horror Film references a-plenty as Lord P drags The Old Dark House into the new millenium with a disgruntled family member setting up executions of tawdry relations all over the place in the propitious setting of Oakley Court as our killer attempts to claim the entire inheritance instead of just a proportion. Unfortunately short but deliriously brilliant, and with an extra charge as it's revealed just who the psychopath is. Fantastique!
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Post by dem bones on Oct 27, 2020 8:39:55 GMT
Andrew Hook – My Somnambulant Heart: Box Hill, Surrey. It wasn't that Ian Baxter bullied John Harris at school, more that he did nothing to prevent the mob-persecution of the "cripple." When Baxter sets up home in the stockbroker belt, their paths cross again. Harris has achieved local celebrity status as a babe-magnet radio DJ, but then he never was quite as helpless as it suited him to make out. Being a magnanimous chap, he hands Ian a token to mark the very brief renewal of their "friendship" ... The Horned Huntsman: Adventures of the enigmatic, possibly even entirely fictitious Herne, the antler-headed horseman of Windsor Great Park. Round-up includes reference to his 1962 run in with rowdy youths as celebrated in Peter Haining's The Screaming Skull & Other True Mysteries. Steven J Dines – The Gravedigger of Witchfield: Holy Trinity Church, Bucks. Frustrated at getting nowhere in conversation with his wandering, grave-digging father, Ben, sixteen, defies the old man to explore the private mansion next door. The Burnwood Estate is home to DJ Kool Ade, a fabulously wealthy "has been pop star" of dubious repute. Ben fatally intrudes on a masked #fuckcorona Satanic orgy. Story very much of the now and aggressively pessimistic re our prospects. The Naphill Death Omen: A shape-shifting portent patrols Grimm's Ditch, enticing passers-by to self-destruction! Tina Rath – Where are they Now?: Unaccountable disappearance of veteran actress, Chloe (the go-to woman for "Alzheimer's victim"), while exploring a mysterious Gothic mansion in the woods near Mortlake. Details provided by a male colleague much given to wittering on and on and on and on and on and ... The gist is, he believes Chloe to have been abducted by what men have, at various times, known as Angels, Fairies, or Extraterrestrials. Black Sorcerers at play; an Ed Gein Supper circle tribute act; bestial foresters and the hideous spawn of their lust; Little folk up to no good. No shortage of contenders for the various Vault DIY imaginary anthologies. Above remarks from Ro and Fritz suggest TToHC has plenty more in the tank.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 28, 2020 19:57:00 GMT
Land of Dark Arts: "Hertfordshire is probably one of Britain's most inoffensive counties," assures the editor. At least, it would be - were Tring station not such a hot-bed of alchemy! Entry wisely stops for a pint in the breathtakingly beautiful village of Aldbury, setting for ace The Avengers episode, Murdersville, and where bride of dem once befriended a Devil Dog in the woods. Paul Finch - The Doom: (Charles Black, [ed.], The Sixth Black Book of Horror, 2010). A stroke of luck for Lewis Bilks, new Vicar of St. Bronwyn's, Chiddingworth, when restoration work uncovers a revolting medieval religious mural depicting the tortures of Hell in obscene detail. Bilks and wife, Pamela, are less fortunate in the calibre of pilgrim the painting attracts. The sole reprint in the collection and fully deserving of revival. Lord Stanhope’s Homonculi: Eyethorpe, Bucks. A haven of mere ugly, "squashed vegetable"-faced goblins? Or could it be that there are yet more sinister creatures abroad; creatures who stare at sheep.? John Llewellyn Probert - Summer Holiday: What a carve up! Difficult to go into detail without revealing identity of the special guest star. Suffice to say, the jovial protagonist gets to whoop it up at Oakley Court, Windsor, bumping of his pesky relatives in a manner befitting a popular 'sixties and 'seventies horror movie location.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 30, 2020 17:28:52 GMT
The Coldest Christmas of All: The splendidly named Cold Christmas Lane, Thundridge, Herts., is supposedly haunted by the ghosts of children who perished during a particularly severe winter in the Middle Ages. Nerve-shredding situation aggravated by hooligan antics of Satanic Hippies and lager lout wannabe ghost-busters who insist on invading the village each December. The stand-out story for me is Tom Johnstone’s “The Topsy-Turvy Ones” which will definitely stay with me. I may be biased as it revolves around the (17th century) Diggers, and Gerard Winstanley is my great hero. Also one of my favourite books is Christopher Hill’s The World Turned Upside Down, which features in the story (and, like Tom, I too am intrigued by Everard the Magician). Runners-up are the stories by Steve Duffy and Helen Grant. Helen Grant - Cheshunt: Narrator returns to late parents' home to salvage any keepsakes before the house clearance. Painful memories, and a vague sense about of unease about a demented old woman with a pram, the air raid shelter, the local "haunted" house, and all the children who vanished over the years. Frustrating that I couldn't make sense of the ending, especially so as it feels like I should. The Raven: On Fridays, it flies around the church being mysterious. And today is Friday.
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Post by dem bones on Oct 31, 2020 20:21:49 GMT
No Sex Please - We're ...
Mick Sims - Love Leaves Last: Another personal favourite. Almost the Monster of Glamis legend (with a neat new slant) relocated to Hertfordshire. Rob Williams is invited to spend a weekend at Coirit Manor to conclude a business deal. Rob was at school with the owner, Ian Churchill, aka Lord Hertmore, and is looking forward to renewing their friendship. Rob brings along wife Casey, their son Scott, and future daughter-in-law, Selina. But Ianis not the cheerful bloke of old, and insists guests must obey the one house rule; that each keep to their own separate rooms at night, no matter their marital status. There can be no sex within the Manor House. They don't like it.
The Thing by the Roadside: Three things to be precise, a trio of black-robed jaywalkers spread out along the Wilden - Ravenden road. From the back they have the appearance of straggly haired old women in tattered gowns. In 1872, Mrs. Goodhall and daughter made the mistake of slowing down before one of the ladies to get a look at her face ....
Tom Johnstone – The Topsy Turvy Ones: Ivor Heath, 1649. Sir Francis Hearn's epically disproportionate punishment of a sassy female preacher for refusing his advances sparks a haunting as horrifying as it is bizarre. Three hundred and fifty years later, Richard, an aspiring film-maker, is location scouting in Hertfordshire with girlfriend Marisa. His wild mood swings have become a problem between them, and this excursion tests the relationship to the limit. Past and present merge in arguably the outstanding story in a tremendous collection. Tories, torture, Levellers, witch-persecution, a Chilean war criminal in exile and a special guest appearance from the cover star.
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Post by Swampirella on Oct 31, 2020 21:22:34 GMT
Pre-ordered my digital copy yesterday; Dem's mouth-watering precis' made it even more enticing that it already was. Hope to dig in on Monday after I finish my current reading....
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Post by dem bones on Nov 2, 2020 19:58:48 GMT
Perhaps it's just me, but Home Counties seems to have detoured into Kitchen Sink Gothic strangelands with these concluding weird fantasies. Knocking Knoll: A ghost in full armour, possibly a medieval chieftain, jealously guards his treasure. Possibly. Nobody seems to know much about it. Allen Ashley – Taking Tusk Mountain: Brandon's latest foolproof get-rich-quick scheme involves a raid on a hut in Whipsnade Zoo used to store elephant tusk-trimmings. Jase, desperate for cash, overcomes his misgivings to assist in/ hinder the theft. Set against a depressingly recognisable pre-Covid backdrop of bitter family rifts over Br*X*t, crippling austerity for some, zero hours contracts, Cash Converters, a loud far right element among certain football club fanbases, an escalating homeless crisis ... Despite this, and its location - story ends on a cheery note. The Drowned: Shere Pool, Guildford, Surrey. Medieval misdeeds. Prince John's pursuit of a woodcutter's comely daughter ends in triple tragedy - and a haunting that persists to this day! David J Howe – Moses: Tolworth, Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey. Toby and Simon, fearless cub scouts, sneak out to spend the night at their secret hideout - a tunnel beneath the Hogsmill River. The boys soon wish they hadn't. Simon soon legs it home Toby is stalked through the dark by a monstrous, hissing arachnid elemental. Only the intervention of Moses, a popular local vagrant with a fondness for bizarre fancy dress, saves the boy from an agonising death. Toby reflects that every town and city has its own protector, Tolworth's just happens to spend much of his time on public benches. Eerie in Oil: In Tadworth Hall hangs a haunted portrait of deliciously macabre provenance. Jason Gould – The Old Man in Apartment Ninety: A six year old is warned by his mother never to stare at the glow emanating from beneath the door of said sad pensioner's room or, worse, take a look inside. It's not unlikely I've written this about most of the series, but this particular volume may be my pick of the Terror Tales.
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Post by Paul Finch on Nov 2, 2020 22:52:14 GMT
Glad you enjoyed, DB.
I always consider the job a good one if it gets the vote of confidence on here.
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Post by fritzmaitland on Nov 4, 2020 9:34:20 GMT
Helen Grant - Cheshunt: Narrator returns to late parents' home to salvage any keepsakes before the house clearance. Painful memories, and a vague sense about of unease about a demented old woman with a pram, the air raid shelter, the local "haunted" house, and all the children who vanished over the years. Frustrating that I couldn't make sense of the ending, especially so as it feels like I should. With you on the ending Dem. I'm hoping Swampi will read the stories soon and provide a bit of perspective on this one. I have a theory....kudos to Ms Grant for stressing that the mad old girl's perambulator was a Silver Cross one - a sign of quality according to my better half.
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Post by Swampirella on Nov 4, 2020 11:46:44 GMT
Helen Grant - Cheshunt: Narrator returns to late parents' home to salvage any keepsakes before the house clearance. Painful memories, and a vague sense about of unease about a demented old woman with a pram, the air raid shelter, the local "haunted" house, and all the children who vanished over the years. Frustrating that I couldn't make sense of the ending, especially so as it feels like I should. With you on the ending Dem. I'm hoping Swampi will read the stories soon and provide a bit of perspective on this one. I have a theory....kudos to Ms Grant for stressing that the mad old girl's perambulator was a Silver Cross one - a sign of quality according to my better half. Thanks for the mention, Mr. M! I'm flattered you're interested in my opinion. I finished the book yesterday & have to admit, several stories left me baffled and/or wanting, such as the ending of "Cheshunt". My top favorites were "The Old, Cold Clay", "Between" "Where Are They Now" "Summer Holiday" and "The Topsy-Turvy Ones".
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