David Stuart Davis - Children of the Night

[dem bones]

David Stuart Davis (ed.) - Children of the Night: Classic Vampire Stories (Wordsworth Editions, 2007)

Blurb:

Vampires, those dark children of the night, who rise from their coffins to suck the blood of the living, continue to hold a strange fascination and dread. In this unique collection of vampire stories you will find some of the earliest depictions of these fearful creatures as in John Polidori’s The Vampyre and James Malcolm Rymer’s Varney the Vampyre, a tale which held readers in thrall when it was first published in the mid-nineteenth century. As well as these rare stories and those featuring the more well known bloodsuckers such as Le Fanu’s Carmilla and Stoker’s Dracula, there is a clutch of lesser known but equally frightening tales written by expert practitioners in the art of raising goose pimples. Children of the Night is a volume filled with the rich blood of chilling vampire fiction.

That surely can't be Varney The Vampyre in it's entirety, and I take it the Stoker contribution is Dracula's Guest? If anyone can give me a full list of contents I'd be obscenely grateful .....

[jkdunham]

Jun 17, 2008 21:04:59 GMT dem bones said:

That surely can't be Varney The Vampyre in it's entirety, and I take it the Stoker contribution is Dracula's Guest? If anyone can give me a full list of contents I'd be obscenely grateful .....

As in "Thanks a f**k**g bunch!"?

Haven't got it but contents are as follows;

Introduction
The Vampire of Croglin Hall
The Vampyre; a Tale
Varney the Vampyre
The Curse of the Vourdalak
Carmilla
Dracula and the Three Bears Brides
For the Blood is the Life
Good Lady Ducayne
An Episode of Cathedral History
The Horla
Bewitched
The Welcome Visitor

From Augustus Hare's account of the Croglin Grange Vampire, through extracts from Varney and Stoker (about 15 pages of Varney), and stories by Aleksey Tolstoy, F. Marion Crawford, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, M. R. James, de Maupassant, Edith Wharton... this looks like a fairly solid collection. All good stuff but few surprises. Well, it is subtitled; "Classic Vampire Stories".

[dem bones]

Another credit for the mysterious 'S' on the Vault site!

What do you mean: "Is that all ?"

Thanks a f**k**g bunch!

Have you an author attribution for The Welcome Visitor?

I recently had an excuse to visit Charing Cross Road and chanced upon some 'Bargain Books'-type emporium in the vicinity of Leicester Square tube station/ Old Compton Street, and they stock the Wordsworth 'Mystery & Imagination' series in great quantities at £2.50 - £3.00 a time. Perhaps some of the Murder One tribe can supply the exact name and address as, being stupid, I didn't make a note of it. I'm pretty sure somebody will recognise it if I mention there's a seedy looking section outback that would appear to cater for *adult* tastes. Also, the guy on the till was pissed out of his head if that's any help? It's a great place!

[Johnlprobert]

Is that the one where you have to go downstairs to get to the adult section?

They do indeed have a most extensive selection of Wordsworths - I've been in there myself

[dem bones]

Amazing! I only had to wait, like, 7 seconds to flush out one of Vault's dirty raincoat brigade (crushed velvet chapter). Yeah, that sounds like the Johnny, Johnny! I wasn't sure if you had to go upstairs or down 'cause, obviously, I've never ventured beyond the respectable area ....

[killercrab]

Definitely downstairs ...

KC

[dem bones]

Ah, I thought I heard that tell-tale click, click, clickety click trailing off into the basement .....

[wordswortheditions]

Jun 18, 2008 20:21:03 GMT dem bones said:

Have you an author attribution for The Welcome Visitor?

The Welcome Visitor was written by David Stuart Davies, who has written and edited other titles for us in the Mystery & Supernatural series.

In response to an earlier question, the Bram Stoker title in the collection is Dracula, although we publish Dracula's Guest in a separate collection.

Also, yes it is just an extract of Varney the Vampyre. We were interested in publishing it, but its such a huge book that we'd have to publish it in two parts!