The Ghost Slayers: Thrilling Tales of Occult Detection

[Michael Connolly]

Mike Ashley, The Ghost Slayers: Thrilling Tales of Occult Detection (British Library Tales of the Weird, 2022).



www.amazon.co.uk/Ghost-Slayers-Thrilling-Detection-British/dp/0712354166

From Amazon: Occult or psychic detective tales have been chilling readers for almost as long as there have been ghost stories. This beguiling subgenre follows specialists in occult lore – often with years of arcane training – investigating strange supernatural occurrences and pitting their wits against the bizarre and inexplicable.

With tales featuring the most prominent psychic detectives such as William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost Finder and Algernon Blackwood’s Dr. Silence, this new collection also includes rare and never-before-reprinted cases investigated by the likes of Flaxman Low, Cosmo Thor, Aylmer Vance and Mesmer Milann.

Who in hell is Cosmo Thor?  Find out here: thepassingtramp.blogspot.com/2019/11/wicked-belgraveians-belgrave-manor.html

Who in hell is Mesmer Milann? You tell me.

[Dr Strange]

Oct 29, 2021 12:07:10 GMT Michael Connolly said:

Who in hell is Mesmer Milann? You tell me.

From "The Encyclopedia of Pulp Heroes: The Online Edition" by Jess Nevins - jessnevins.com/pulp/introduction.html

Mesmer Milann was created by Bertram Atkey (Smiler Bunn, Dragour, Easy Street Experts, Prosper Fair, Hobart Honey, George H. Jay, Winnie O'Wynn) and appeared in five stories in The Grand Magazine in 1914 and 1915, beginning with “The Valley of the Veils of Death” (The Grand Magazine, Nov. 1914).

Mesmer Milann is a consulting Occult Detective, and certainly looks the part, with a “well-fitting frock-coat,” “square, powerful, hard-chiseled face,” “intensely” dark eyes, a bald head, and a “singular quality of immobility.” He has been the “recipient of the more weighty secrets of thousands of the class of people likely to possess secrets.” And he is the master of a wide range of strange and arcane lore. All of which makes him ideal in his role as a “mediator…between human, living people and those that were neither human nor living….”

[helrunar]

Dearest Dr Strange, I thank you heartily for today's guffaw. "A singular quality of immobility" is such an apt descriptive phrase for any number of senior administrators at the august institution at which I toil. Pity I can't make use of it in any work emails (though I'm known around the office for my acid comments on the latest "buzzwords"--I mean, honestly "strategic throughput"--who the hell comes up with this shite? Answer: folks who make more money over a weekend than I'm likely to see in a year).

cheers, Hel

[Middoth]

Where is Lance Cranford, who is "the greatest ghost-hunter of the century"? These charlatans John Silence and Karnaki took over all his deserts.

[andydecker]

This is of course 100% subjective, but which ghost hunters are more entertaining? The old or the new?

I have to confess that the last ghost hunters which were at least marginally interesting for me were the Winchester brothers. Which shouldn't even count as they were created for the screen.

But if I can choose I would rather read even the insufferable Carnacki than something past 2000. We all know that Jules de Grandin was the last great shining example of his trade  , but are there any contemporary worthwhile boys or girls hunting things that go bump into the night?

[Middoth]

in my opinion the type of such a ghost hunter belongs to a long time past.

I want to read about the exploits of Miles Pennoyer

www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?25427

from what was written recently:

www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?28286

www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?35290

www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?28880

[Dr Strange]

Oct 29, 2021 17:24:29 GMT andydecker said:

This is of course 100% subjective, but which ghost hunters are more entertaining? The old or the new?

I have to confess that the last ghost hunters which were at least marginally interesting for me were the Winchester brothers. Which shouldn't even count as they were created for the screen.

But if I can choose I would rather read even the insufferable Carnacki than something past 2000. We all know that Jules de Grandin was the last great shining example of his trade  , but are there any contemporary worthwhile boys or girls hunting things that go bump into the night?

It depends on how you want to define "occult detective" but, for me, John Connolly's Charlie Parker puts most others, old or new, to shame - and there is no arguing that he isn't a detective fighting against the occult. He would also kick the Winchester brothers' asses (actually, he would probably just shoot them).

[Michael Connolly]

I seem to have scratched an itch with this thread. Carnacki remains the most memorable of his ilk.

[Dr Strange]

Oct 29, 2021 18:36:45 GMT Michael Connolly said:

Carnacki remains the most memorable of his ilk.

I do like Carnacki, though he is an annoying character and all that "electric pentacle" guff gets a bit repetitive. When I first read the stories (40-something years ago now) I liked that some of his cases turned out to not actually involve the supernatural at all.

[helrunar]

A friend gave me a copy of Number 7 Queer Street for Xmas a few years ago and I did read most of it, but bogged down in the Leannan Sidhe tale (which ironically my friend thought would have the most appeal). The stories, from what I recall, are in some cases novella-length, and the pace is leisurely. The occultism from what I am able to remember is similar to that found in things such as Blackwood's John Silence stories--heavily influenced by British Theosophy and related teachings.

I keep thinking I'll go back someday and finish reading it. There was at least one Miles Pennoyer story that wasn't included in the edition my friend sent me. And the Pennoyer character did not leave much of an impression.

Off topic, but the past couple of evenings I've been watching old episodes of the 1974 US television series Kolchak: The Night Stalker. The biggest mystery is why nobody, a cop particularly, doesn't just shoot the title character dead somewhere along the line. Annoying doesn't even begin to describe his needling behavior. But I find myself watching somewhat compulsively.

H.

[Middoth]

Oct 29, 2021 19:16:41 GMT helrunar said:

The biggest mystery is why nobody, a cop particularly, doesn't just shoot the title character dead somewhere along the line. Annoying doesn't even begin to describe his needling behavior. But I find myself watching somewhat compulsively.

H.

He just acts like a 70s TV detective.

his name sounds embarrassingly familiar to my ear

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Kolchak

I must admit that I am not too enthusiastic about Kolchak, although I love 70s cinema

[Swampirella]

I've always liked Kolchak. But I can see how his editor might have shot him out of exasperation. 

[Middoth]

So there is something in him, since he was able to impress you)

[cauldronbrewer]

Oct 29, 2021 12:07:10 GMT Michael Connolly said:

Mike Ashley, The Ghost Slayers: Thrilling Tales of Occult Detection (British Library Tales of the Weird, 2022).

This sounds--and looks--great. I enjoyed Ashley's recent anthology on the same theme, Fighters of Fear: Occult Detective Stories (Talos Press, 2020).

[andydecker]

Oct 29, 2021 17:52:49 GMT Dr Strange said:

John Connolly's Charlie Parker puts most others, old or new, to shame - and there is no arguing that he isn't a detective fighting against the occult. He would also kick the Winchester brothers' asses (actually, he would probably just shoot them).

No, Louis would shoot them first Someday I have to read up on this series. I stopped buying them years ago, now there are 19 novels in the series and a couple of thousand pages.

Oct 29, 2021 19:29:49 GMT Swampirella said:

I've always liked Kolchak. But I can see how his editor might have shot him out of exasperation. 

Its been years I watched an episode, but I used to like it. But I always thought Kolchak to be a sad, lonely character. And nowadays he has become an even more anachronistic character than the Duke de Richleau.